St Matthew 18:21-36/Micah 6:6-8/Philippians 1:3-11
In the Name + of Jesus. Amen.
It is the way of the Law to measure. Those given to law thinking want limits and boundaries so they can know when they’ve done enough; so they can keep score, mark the tally. So Peter in today’s Gospel. He wants a limit. He’s been in our Lord’s company long enough to realize that Jesus is all about forgiveness. It is His life-blood. Peter and the others are willing to ponder forgiveness, but surely there needs to be some limit, some safe guard.
Peter proposes seven. A good, biblical number. Lord, how often will by brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times? Yeah, seven is good. Most rabbis said three. With seven Peter was being charitable without getting fanatical.
But Jesus blows the numbering right out of the water. I do not say to you seven times, but seventy times seven! That is to say, limitless. Get rid of the scorecard, tear it up, throw it away! Don’t measure the forgiveness you give your brother. Let it be boundless.
As our Lord looks into the perplexed faces of His disciples, He tries to help them see it the right way around. It comes to this: you are taught to pray, Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. Do you really want your heavenly Father to set a limit on the number of times He forgives you when you sin against Him? Then why do it to your brother? He gets to it by way of a parable.
Therefore the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a King who wished to settle accounts. That’s judgment. And a person can be heedlessly in debt to the king and joking about it, never thinking it a matter of serious consequence. But when he is hauled off to give an account for the missing sum, the joke it over. And make no mistake: you WILL be hauled off to answer for the debt. You are the debtor in this tale.
Ten thousand talents doesn’t sound like much, especially during these weeks of Presidential debate, and billions and trillions being tossed around. Consider this: a talent of silver weighed 75 pounds, 12 troy ounces per pound, silver closed at $33 a troy ounce on Friday, that yields a debt of $297 million! How could one person amass such a debt? This staggering sum already hints at the extravagant mercy of the King.
When it is clear that payment could not be made, the Master ordered him sold, along with his family and all he had. Even that would be a pittance against the debt. Realizing his sorry plight now, and that his cavalier attitude was the cause of his own ruin and the ruin of those he loved, the man falls to his knees and pleads, Have patience with me, and I will repay you everything.
An impossible lie. So people foolishly begin attempting to bargain with the King when called into judgment. Is he this delusional? He had no way to pay back everything. It wasn’t even possible! But when people’s consciences are stricken by the Law, and they suddenly realize how much they owe, they grasp at straws; they make all sorts of promises they can’t keep.
But here is the miracle. The King, the Master of that servant, has pity. Literally, splancnisthes, that is, mercy; deep, guttural, visceral mercy. And He does more than the man asked. He gets more than patience, much more than a second chance. The King unexpectedly looks on him in love and tears up the debt! He takes the loss himself, eats the cost, and lets the man go free. All is forgiven! That is the radical nature of the Gospel! Dirty, rotten, scoundrels who have taken advantage of the King’s charity are forgiven and freed.
How hard, Dr Luther said, it is to believe this! Yea, impossible! How hard to believe that our debt has been completely wiped out and gone! And how it was wiped out St Paul writes to the Colossians, And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This He set aside, nailing it to the Cross (2:12-14).
Make no mistake, dear Christian, the forgiveness of your debt, your trespasses and sins, is free to you, but costly to Him. The prophet asks, With what shall I come before the Lord and bow myself before God on high? It is the not the blood of goats and bulls and rams that delivers from sin and death. Not even your first-born can make atonement. But the outrageous cost of the Only-Begotten Son of the Father, the blood of God is the cost of your redemption, the cost of your debt.
But as the nails were pounded into place His cry was not for vengeance, but for pardon: Father, forgive them. His blood still cries for your forgiveness and is the sure and certain proof of it. All your trespasses are gone. Dr Luther said, “Forgiveness gobbles up sin.” Indeed it does. Swallows it down whole. And we walk away free men.
What will you do with that freedom? Well, you know the rest of the parable. The man whose debt had been cancelled meets a fellow debtor who owes him. It’s not on the same scale, but it’s not small fee either. A hundred denarii isn’t 100 bucks. A denarii is a day’s wage. So it’s roughly one third a year’s salary. Could you forgive a debt one third your annual salary? What if you had just been freed of a $300 million debt, your life spared, the lives of your wife and children?
What does he do? Smiling, pat the guy on the back and laugh and say, “Rejoice, my friend! Today your debt is wiped out too! You are free!” No. His face darkens and all he can think about is what he is owed. Forgotten is the mercy he received and he slips back into the measuring way of the Law. After all it is the default position of the flesh.
Pay what you owe, he says as he chokes the man. And when the man pleads for patience and promises to pay – the same plea he just made, only this one more plausible – he has none of it. “Off to jail with you, you wretch.”
His fellow servants are grieved by this spectacle. Christians rightly are at the sight of injustice. They returned to the King with the sad news. And the King does a terrifying thing. He revokes the gift. It wasn’t as if His mercy was contingent. Rather he behaved as if his debt had not been forgiven, as if mercy had not been shown. He rejected the King’s charity and gift. You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. And should you not have had mercy on your fellow servant as I had mercy on you? And this time it’s off to the jailers, the tortures, for good. This isn’t purgatory – that heretical fantasy of the Pope. This is hell. No escape, no possibility of paying off the debt. He’s going to die there. Eternal suffering. And then Jesus adds something that cuts us to our core: So also My heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother from your heart.
And He means it. Unequivocally He means it. What does the Lord require of you, but to do justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God? We are taught to pray, “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” Strong stuff. We have to ponder how it is possible to be so hard-hearted toward one another that we withhold forgiveness for the hurts we bear, when God has in His Son entirely wiped out our debt to Him. And the debt of sin that we think is against us – it’s not! – it’s against Him. Still we withhold forgiveness!
How can the unforgiving servant be so callous? So vindictive? How can we? The only answer is that he forgot the enormity of what had been forgiven him. He didn’t believe it. He let it slip from his mind and heart. And that’s when forgiveness to his neighbor became impossible.
It is impossible. Thus St Paul’s prayer, I thank my God in all my remembrance of you. And it is my prayer that your love may abound more and more, with knowledge and all discernment, so that you may approve what is excellent, and so be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God.
And because your Lord knows how impossible it is, how easily His Word of forgiveness can slip from your mind and heart, He has set His Supper before you. Here you receive the price of your redemption. Here, as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you never forget how much it cost for Him to absorb your debt.
But more! Here, in the Eucharist, His love and mercy flow from His pierced side to you, for you, that you might grow in Him, being turned into a forgiver of those who have sinned against you. His salutary gift forgives your sins and strengthens you in love toward your neighbor that you may forgive hers. I am sure of this, that He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.
His Body broken and His Blood outpoured testify to you that your sin is gone, your debt paid, wiped out, cancelled at the Cross. Do you find it hard to forgive? Then taste the forgiveness that is yours – full and free – and you shall be strengthened to go forth and share it with others. Tear up the scorecards, don’t keep count. For you have received much more than seventy times seven and thus you are strengthened to give.
In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
In the Name + of Jesus. Amen.
It is the way of the Law to measure. Those given to law thinking want limits and boundaries so they can know when they’ve done enough; so they can keep score, mark the tally. So Peter in today’s Gospel. He wants a limit. He’s been in our Lord’s company long enough to realize that Jesus is all about forgiveness. It is His life-blood. Peter and the others are willing to ponder forgiveness, but surely there needs to be some limit, some safe guard.
Peter proposes seven. A good, biblical number. Lord, how often will by brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times? Yeah, seven is good. Most rabbis said three. With seven Peter was being charitable without getting fanatical.
But Jesus blows the numbering right out of the water. I do not say to you seven times, but seventy times seven! That is to say, limitless. Get rid of the scorecard, tear it up, throw it away! Don’t measure the forgiveness you give your brother. Let it be boundless.
As our Lord looks into the perplexed faces of His disciples, He tries to help them see it the right way around. It comes to this: you are taught to pray, Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. Do you really want your heavenly Father to set a limit on the number of times He forgives you when you sin against Him? Then why do it to your brother? He gets to it by way of a parable.
Therefore the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a King who wished to settle accounts. That’s judgment. And a person can be heedlessly in debt to the king and joking about it, never thinking it a matter of serious consequence. But when he is hauled off to give an account for the missing sum, the joke it over. And make no mistake: you WILL be hauled off to answer for the debt. You are the debtor in this tale.
Ten thousand talents doesn’t sound like much, especially during these weeks of Presidential debate, and billions and trillions being tossed around. Consider this: a talent of silver weighed 75 pounds, 12 troy ounces per pound, silver closed at $33 a troy ounce on Friday, that yields a debt of $297 million! How could one person amass such a debt? This staggering sum already hints at the extravagant mercy of the King.
When it is clear that payment could not be made, the Master ordered him sold, along with his family and all he had. Even that would be a pittance against the debt. Realizing his sorry plight now, and that his cavalier attitude was the cause of his own ruin and the ruin of those he loved, the man falls to his knees and pleads, Have patience with me, and I will repay you everything.
An impossible lie. So people foolishly begin attempting to bargain with the King when called into judgment. Is he this delusional? He had no way to pay back everything. It wasn’t even possible! But when people’s consciences are stricken by the Law, and they suddenly realize how much they owe, they grasp at straws; they make all sorts of promises they can’t keep.
But here is the miracle. The King, the Master of that servant, has pity. Literally, splancnisthes, that is, mercy; deep, guttural, visceral mercy. And He does more than the man asked. He gets more than patience, much more than a second chance. The King unexpectedly looks on him in love and tears up the debt! He takes the loss himself, eats the cost, and lets the man go free. All is forgiven! That is the radical nature of the Gospel! Dirty, rotten, scoundrels who have taken advantage of the King’s charity are forgiven and freed.
How hard, Dr Luther said, it is to believe this! Yea, impossible! How hard to believe that our debt has been completely wiped out and gone! And how it was wiped out St Paul writes to the Colossians, And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This He set aside, nailing it to the Cross (2:12-14).
Make no mistake, dear Christian, the forgiveness of your debt, your trespasses and sins, is free to you, but costly to Him. The prophet asks, With what shall I come before the Lord and bow myself before God on high? It is the not the blood of goats and bulls and rams that delivers from sin and death. Not even your first-born can make atonement. But the outrageous cost of the Only-Begotten Son of the Father, the blood of God is the cost of your redemption, the cost of your debt.
But as the nails were pounded into place His cry was not for vengeance, but for pardon: Father, forgive them. His blood still cries for your forgiveness and is the sure and certain proof of it. All your trespasses are gone. Dr Luther said, “Forgiveness gobbles up sin.” Indeed it does. Swallows it down whole. And we walk away free men.
What will you do with that freedom? Well, you know the rest of the parable. The man whose debt had been cancelled meets a fellow debtor who owes him. It’s not on the same scale, but it’s not small fee either. A hundred denarii isn’t 100 bucks. A denarii is a day’s wage. So it’s roughly one third a year’s salary. Could you forgive a debt one third your annual salary? What if you had just been freed of a $300 million debt, your life spared, the lives of your wife and children?
What does he do? Smiling, pat the guy on the back and laugh and say, “Rejoice, my friend! Today your debt is wiped out too! You are free!” No. His face darkens and all he can think about is what he is owed. Forgotten is the mercy he received and he slips back into the measuring way of the Law. After all it is the default position of the flesh.
Pay what you owe, he says as he chokes the man. And when the man pleads for patience and promises to pay – the same plea he just made, only this one more plausible – he has none of it. “Off to jail with you, you wretch.”
His fellow servants are grieved by this spectacle. Christians rightly are at the sight of injustice. They returned to the King with the sad news. And the King does a terrifying thing. He revokes the gift. It wasn’t as if His mercy was contingent. Rather he behaved as if his debt had not been forgiven, as if mercy had not been shown. He rejected the King’s charity and gift. You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. And should you not have had mercy on your fellow servant as I had mercy on you? And this time it’s off to the jailers, the tortures, for good. This isn’t purgatory – that heretical fantasy of the Pope. This is hell. No escape, no possibility of paying off the debt. He’s going to die there. Eternal suffering. And then Jesus adds something that cuts us to our core: So also My heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother from your heart.
And He means it. Unequivocally He means it. What does the Lord require of you, but to do justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God? We are taught to pray, “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” Strong stuff. We have to ponder how it is possible to be so hard-hearted toward one another that we withhold forgiveness for the hurts we bear, when God has in His Son entirely wiped out our debt to Him. And the debt of sin that we think is against us – it’s not! – it’s against Him. Still we withhold forgiveness!
How can the unforgiving servant be so callous? So vindictive? How can we? The only answer is that he forgot the enormity of what had been forgiven him. He didn’t believe it. He let it slip from his mind and heart. And that’s when forgiveness to his neighbor became impossible.
It is impossible. Thus St Paul’s prayer, I thank my God in all my remembrance of you. And it is my prayer that your love may abound more and more, with knowledge and all discernment, so that you may approve what is excellent, and so be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God.
And because your Lord knows how impossible it is, how easily His Word of forgiveness can slip from your mind and heart, He has set His Supper before you. Here you receive the price of your redemption. Here, as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you never forget how much it cost for Him to absorb your debt.
But more! Here, in the Eucharist, His love and mercy flow from His pierced side to you, for you, that you might grow in Him, being turned into a forgiver of those who have sinned against you. His salutary gift forgives your sins and strengthens you in love toward your neighbor that you may forgive hers. I am sure of this, that He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.
His Body broken and His Blood outpoured testify to you that your sin is gone, your debt paid, wiped out, cancelled at the Cross. Do you find it hard to forgive? Then taste the forgiveness that is yours – full and free – and you shall be strengthened to go forth and share it with others. Tear up the scorecards, don’t keep count. For you have received much more than seventy times seven and thus you are strengthened to give.
In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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