Jim's Sermon for September 14th 2008

Matthew 18:21-35
21 Then Peter came up and said to him, “Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?” 22 Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you seven times, but seventy times seven. 23 “Therefore the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his servants. 24 When he began to settle, one was brought to him who owed him ten thousand talents. 25 And since he could not pay, his master ordered him to be sold, with his wife and children and all that he had, and payment to be made. 26 So the servant fell on his knees, imploring him, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you everything.’ 27 And out of pity for him, the master of that servant released him and forgave him the debt. 28 But when that same servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii, and seizing him, he began to choke him, saying, ‘Pay what you owe.’ 29 So his fellow servant fell down and pleaded with him, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you.’ 30 He refused and went and put him in prison until he should pay the debt. 31 When his fellow servants saw what had taken place, they were greatly distressed, and they went and reported to their master all that had taken place. 32 Then his master summoned him and said to him, ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. 33 And should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you?’ 34 And in anger his master delivered him to the jailers, until he should pay all his debt. 35 So also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother from your heart.”

Sermon
“How Many Times?”

Did you hear about the little boy who was saying his prayers. As he went down the list of his family, asking God to bless them, he omitted his brother’s name. His mother said to him, “Why didn’t you pray for Cliff?” He said, “I’m not going to ask God to bless Cliff because he hit me.” And his mother said, “Don’t you remember Jesus said to forgive your enemies?” But the little boy said, “That’s just the trouble. He’s not my enemy; he’s my brother!”

Perhaps many of us have the same difficulty, as did the Apostle Peter. He was faced with the problem of forgiving his brother. Peter and Andrew were brothers and had grown up together. I tend to feel that he actually has in view some offense of Andrew here. Perhaps Andrew habitually left the cap off the toothpaste tube; or he was always borrowing some favorite jacket of Peter’s, and wearing it without permission; or perhaps he refused to clean up his side of the room, or some other manifestation of brotherly evil.

The rabbis taught that you only needed to forgive someone three times at the most. The fourth time you could do whatever you liked. They even taught that God did this, based upon a text in the prophet Amos, in which Amos repeatedly uses the formula, “for three sins, yea, and for four” {cf, Amos 1:3, et al} God brings judgment upon such-and-such a city. So they taught that God himself never forgave more than three times. You can see from this that Peter feels he has gone to the limit when he doubled that, and added one for good measure.

There is humor in our Lord’s reply. There are many passages which we often misunderstand and take seriously, though Jesus is speaking humorously. I am sure there is a note of laughter in his reply to Peter here. If we would put it in modern parlance, what he says is, “Peter, would you believe four hundred and ninety times?” Jesus is saying, it is not a question of how often, or how many times should I forgive my brother. That is not really the question. The real question is, “Why should I forgive at all? When you see that you should forgive, then you will see, Peter, that there is no limit at all, that forgiveness is the kind of thing that ought to go on without limit.” He has only chosen this figure of 490 times as a play upon what Peter has said to him, but it really suggests an unlimited forgiveness. So, to answer that deeper question, “Why should I forgive my brother,” he tells the parable of the unforgiving steward.

The value of this parable lies in seeing that it is a picture of us. Jesus is holding up a mirror so that we can see ourselves. We are the servant who has been forgiven a vast and staggering amount of money, and God is the great king that has forgiven us. Ten thousand talents is an incredible amount. A talent was worth about a thousand dollars. Ten thousand talents is ten million dollars which, in those days, would be a king’s ransom. The entirely yearly income of a kingdom would hardly be that much.

When the settling of accounts came, this man was confronted with this vast debt and he could not pay it. The king ordered that justice be carried out and that the man, his wife and children, and all that he had be sold, as was possible in those days. Even then it would be far, far short of the amount of this debt. In desperation the man makes an impossible promise. He falls on his knees and says to the king, “Have patience, sir, and I will pay you everything.” Now he could never do that. If he worked all his lifetime, and his family also, he would never be able to pay ten million dollars. But in desperation he cries out, and the king’s heart is moved by the man’s impossible situation, and, out of pity toward him, he forgives him, at staggering cost to himself. It means, of course, that this king assumed the debt himself, allowing it to go unpaid and thus impoverishing his treasury. This is no trifling matter.

You see, the sum of our offenses against God through the years constitutes this kind of a debt, an absolutely impossible amount. Our rebellions, our selfish acts and thoughts, our willful choices, our lack of love toward one another, and the hurt we have caused others, our pride, our anger, our lusts, our bitterness, our hates, and our lies; all these add up through the years to a staggering debt we owe God and which we cannot pay. But then there comes the good news, the wonderful good news of the gospel. Our debt was wiped away. In one moment it was gone.

Jesus places, in direct contrast to this, another account which he says occurred immediately, as this man went out from his experience of being so unbelievably forgiven. “As he went out,” he met a man who owed him twenty dollars—that is the amount of a hundred denarii—and seizing him by the throat he said, “Pay me what you owe.” But when the second man says exactly the same words the first had said just a few moments before, “Have patience with me and I’ll pay you everything,” instead of forgiving him this paltry amount, he throws him into prison till he shall pay the full amount.

That, says Jesus, is what we do when we refuse to forgive each other even the most insulting and injurious offenses. No matter how bad it may appear to us, no matter how hurt we are by what someone has done to us, in comparison to what God has forgiven us, it is like comparing twenty dollars to ten million dollars of debt. And these two events are occurring simultaneously in our lives, in immediate context, just as Jesus said.

There is not one of us here who doesn’t sin. As Christians we are forgiven but we are not perfect. Not a day goes by but that we do not stand in desperate need of the forgiveness of God. Again and again God forgives us. And yet, when someone offends us, how quickly we revert to the basis of justice and start demanding, “Pay me what you owe.” “I demand an apology.” “Let me have what’s coming to me.” “Treat me like I deserve.” How many times have we uttered such words?

In the rest of the story our Lord reveals why Christians must practice forgiveness. We have to forgive people because anything less is hypocritical. We cannot demand justice from others because when we don’t stand on that ground ourselves. As the king said, “You wicked servant! Should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you?” This is what Jesus is saying to us. We must forgive one another because we have already been forgiven.

Jesus says that, when we refuse to do this, when we hold a grudge, or are difficult or bitter and refuse to settle an issue, then we are doing exactly what this unrighteous steward does here. In the very moment of our own forgiveness we are demanding justice, when we ourselves cannot and do not stand on that level.

What Jesus is saying is that forgiveness is possible because we have been forgiven. Because this vast and staggering debt against us has been wiped out by the grace of God, we have the capability to forgive. Our inner attitude is changed, and there is an acceptance of the person, and an understanding and sympathy extended that permits an honest look at the problem, and opens the door for help.

This parable expands what Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount. He says there, “If you forgive not others their trespasses neither will my Father forgive yours,” {cf, Matt 6:15 RSV}. The Sermon on the Mount is addressed to those who have already been forgiven by God. It is addressed to those in whom the Spirit of God lives and therefore God knows they have the ability and capacity to forgive. But if they will not exercise it, if they insist upon going back to the ground of justice with others, well, then, that is the way God will handle them. If we insist on justice, we will be given justice ourselves.

When we read this story, our first reaction is probably to ask, how could someone who has been forgiven so much be unwilling to forgive someone who owes him so little? The sad truth is that it happens all the time. When we consider our own unworthiness in the sight of God and the forgiveness we have received, how is it that we still sometimes manage to be unforgiving to other people? There are certainly affronts that are difficult to forgive, but too often we get hung up on petty grievances. "Lucy spread a nasty rumor about me!" "Sam sucked up to the boss and stole my promotion!" "That stranger cut me off in traffic!" The key to forgiving others is an increasing appreciation of God's forgiveness of our own sins. Can’t we forgive twenty dollars’ worth of injury, when we have been forgiven ten million? That’s always our situation. We can change by coming to a fuller awareness of the holiness of God, perhaps through contemplation or meditation. 1 John 3:1 expresses well the sentiment that I'm talking about: "See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God!" As the wonder of our adoption into God's family grows, our ability to forgive others will increase accordingly.