Listen to the audio of today’s Reflection:
Matthew 18:21-35
https://soundcloud.com/hapearce/reflection-for-november-28-2023
The Parable of the Unmerciful Servant
21Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me? Up to seven times?”
22Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.
23“Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. 24As he began the settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand bags of gold was brought to him. 25Since he was not able to pay, the master ordered that he and his wife and his children and all that he had be sold to repay the debt.
26“At this the servant fell on his knees before him. ‘Be patient with me,’ he begged, ‘and I will pay back everything.’ 27The servant’s master took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go.
28“But when that servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred silver coins. He grabbed him and began to choke him. ‘Pay back what you owe me!’ he demanded.
29“His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged him, ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay it back.’
30“But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt. 31When the other servants saw what had happened, they were outraged and went and told their master everything that had happened.
32“Then the master called the servant in. ‘You wicked servant,’ he said, ‘I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. 33Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?’ 34In anger his master handed him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back all he owed.
35“This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart.”
For a long time, I avoided writing Reflections on this passage. And preaching sermons on it. The main reason is that at the end of the parable, Jesus seems to say that God will not forgive us any more than we forgive others. That makes me uneasy, for the same reason that the familiar form of the Lord’s Prayer seems to say we can expect only the amount of forgiveness we demonstrate.
I suppose lots of people would think it’s perfectly reasonable. They might say, “You can’t expect God to forgive you any more than you’re willing to forgive others.”
But stop and think about it for a minute. If that’s really the case, then we have to earn God’s forgiveness by forgiving others. And since we have to be forgiven to be saved, that would mean that we earn our own salvation by forgiving other people. And one of the cornerstones of our theology is that we’re saved by God’s grace – by God’s un-earned favor – not by anything we do. In fact, we believe it’s impossible for us to do enough to earn our own salvation.
That’s why I’m more comfortable with the way it’s expressed in the alternative version of the Lord’s Prayer we use on Friday – the one that’s based on scholarship into the Aramaic language Jesus spoke. That version says, “Forgive us our sins, as we forgive those we love.” And we extend a lot more grace to those we love than to anybody else.
But lately, when this parable comes up in the lectionary, I gulp and take another look at what’s going on here – what Jesus really wants to say to us.
It’s important to know that this parable comes right after a passage in which Jesus was giving instructions on how his followers should deal with cases where members of the church sin against each other. The goal is always supposed to be forgiveness and reconciliation when conflicts occur, but Jesus also gives the leadership the authority to put people out of the church if they sin in scandalous or divisive ways.
So the fact that this parable follows that earlier teaching on discipline in the church needs to be kept in mind, because it seems to connect the two passages. Jesus seems to be telling the church that it has the power – even the responsibility – to maintain discipline over church members. But that discipline should always be exercised with the recognition that everyone in the church is a forgiven sinner – and that includes the leaders who are responsible for disciplinary matters.
It’s easy for church members to delude themselves into thinking that harsh discipline toward those who sin is “God’s will.” But like everything else in the life of faith, church discipline is to be colored with the realization that all of us are forgiven sinners who are dependent on the grace of God.
And for the rest of us – those who don’t have the responsibility of maintaining discipline in the church – it seems to me that the bottom line of the passage isn’t that we have to earn forgiveness by forgiving others. Instead, it’s that if we claim to be following Jesus but refuse to forgive others their offenses against us (which are usually pretty trivial) we’ve failed to grasp the real nature of our relationship with God in Jesus. Because anybody who honestly holds up their life to the example of Jesus quickly sees how far they fall short of that example. That means we’re totally dependent on God’s grace for our new life in Jesus. And nobody who really comes to grip with dependence on God’s grace would fail to extend grace – and forgiveness – to others.
Let’s pray. Lord, since we acknowledge that the forgiveness of our sins and our new life in Jesus really are gifts out of your gracious love, move us to be more willing to forgive others as a way of expressing our thanks, and of passing along that gracious love to them. And let our love and forgiveness help others come to know you better and love you more deeply. Amen.
Grace and Peace,
Henry
(The listed readings for today are Psalms 97 and 98; Nahum 1:1-13; I Peter 1:13-25; and Matthew 19:13-22. Our readings come from the NIV Bible, as posted on Biblica.com, the website of the International Bible Society.)
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