Matthew 18:21-35
Last week I used an illustration from a novel by Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities. This novel begins with the famous line, “It was the best of times; it was the worst of times.” It is a novel that takes place in the two cities of London and Paris during the time of the French Revolution when the aristocracy of France was being beheaded by the guillotine.
In this novel, there is a central figure, Madame DuFarge. Madame DuFarge is one of those who are overthrowing the French aristocracy. She sits outside her husband’s wine shop, day by day, knitting. People pass by on their business, walking and in carriages. All they can see is a woman knitting. But as Madame DuFarge knits day by day, she knits into her weave the names of people who will or should be guillotined.
That is a great picture of broken relationships and unforgiveness. It is a picture of a person who sits day by day nurturing feelings of bitterness and anger. It is a picture of a person who sacrifices the joy of life and relationships for vengeance. It is a picture of one who has chosen the way of death.
Contrast this with a scene from a novel by a Frenchman, Victor Hugo. Les Miserables takes place in post-Napoleonic France. It is the story of Jean Valjean, a criminal who has spent nineteen years in prison for stealing a loaf of bread. He comes out of prison and is rejected everywhere he goes because his identity card reveals him to be an ex-convict.
The turning point in his life comes at the beginning of the novel when he is welcomed into the house of a Catholic bishop. He enjoys the hospitality of the bishop, is given a room where he can sleep, but that night, gets up in the middle of the night and steals the household silver.
The next day, the gendarmes bring Jean Valjean to the bishop because Jean Valjean told the gendarmes the bishop had given him the silver and they don’t believe his story. The bishop approaches the gendarmes as they enter his garden and says,
“Ah, there you are!” said he, looking towards Jean Valjean, “I am glad to see you. But! I gave you the candlesticks also, which are silver like the rest, and would bring two hundred francs. Why did you not take them along with your plates?”
The gendarmes release Jean Valjean, who is stunned. The bishop gives him the candlesticks and then speaks to him.
“Forget not, never forget that you have promised me to use this silver to become an honest man.”
Jean Valjean, who had no recollection of this promise, stood confounded. The bishop had laid much stress upon these words as he uttered them. He continued solemnly:
“Jean Valjean, my brother: you belong no longer to evil, but to good. It is your soul that I am buying for you. I withdraw it from dark thoughts and from the spirit of perdition, and I give it to God!”
Jean Valjean becomes a changed man and the rest of the novel reveals the effects of the powerful change that took place in Jean Valjean’s life and how he became a force for good in the lives of those around him.
Two scenes: Madame DuFarge who sits day by day, nurturing the injustices done to her, knitting into her weave the names of those who should die to satisfy her thirst for vengeance; and Monseigneur Bienvenu, the bishop, who chooses to forgive and build a new life for God.
Two scenes: Madam DuFarge and the way of death; and Monseigneur Bienvenu and the way of life.
As you sit here this morning, which scene best illustrates your life? Has anyone ever hurt you in such a way that you have not been able to forgive them for what they did? Have you knit into the weave of your life the names of those who deserve punishment for how they have hurt you?
In the Gospel lesson today, Peter comes up to Jesus to ask a question. It is obvious that the disciples have been talking about this among themselves. Being Jews, they were used to the Rabbinic method of study in which the fine points of Deuteronomic law were discussed. Rabbis and students would discuss this question, “How many times must you forgive someone?” The answer in these Rabbinic discussions generally regarded it sufficient to forgive your brother a maximum of four times.
The disciples have, most likely, been discussing this issue of forgiveness and Peter, as their spokesman, comes to Jesus with the question. He knows Jesus is more than just a Rabbi, so he asks,
“Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?”
Peter takes the four of the Rabbis and almost doubles it to seven.
Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.
Why does Jesus respond to Peter’s question with the number seventy-seven? When Peter asks Jesus this question and uses the number seven, scholars speculate that Jesus remembered an event in Genesis.
When Cain, the son of Adam, killed his brother Abel, he feared for his life, that vengeance would be sought against him. And God told him that if anyone killed him, that person would suffer vengeance seven times over.
Five generations later, Lamech killed a man for wounding him and he said, “If Cain is avenged seven times, then Lamech seventy-seven times.” (Genesis 4:24)
Cain and Lamech are consumed with the question of vengeance, the way of Madame DuFarge. Jesus turns this formula, from seven to seventy-seven, on its heels and says not that vengeance goes from seven times to seventy-seven times, but that a person should forgive not just seven times but seventy-seven times. From vengeance to forgiveness. From death to life. Jesus rejects the world of Madame DuFarge and sets the path for Monseigneur Bienvenu and Jean Valjean.
And then Jesus continues with this parable, to further illustrate his point.
A king wants to settle accounts with his servants.
The king Jesus has in mind here is an oriental king, one who had power of life and death over his servants. In this system, the king had servants who, themselves, had quite a bit of power. The king delegated responsibility to them and they had property and servants themselves to help with their responsibilities.
A servant who owed him ten thousand talents was brought to him. What did the listeners of this parable hear when Jesus said the servant owed ten thousand talents? This was a phenomenal amount. King Herod collected in taxes only 900 talents a year. Ten thousand talents is an impossibly large amount.
Since the man 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. The servant , his wife and children and their possessions would not bring a sum equal to ten thousand talents, but at least some of the debt would be repaid and a message would be sent to others, not to mismanage the king’s money.
In the parables of Jesus, there is always a twist, something that came as a shock to the listeners. It might be a Samaritan, despised by Orthodox Jews as being unworthy of God, who ends up a hero in a story that includes Jewish priests and Levites. It might be people throwing a party for one stupid lamb that got lost from the herd.
In this parable, this is the first twist. This impossibly large debt that was owed, was forgiven. The servant fell on his knees and pleaded with the king. He promises to repay the debt, something beyond his ability to do. The servant and the king both know that debt cannot be repaid. It is an unpayable debt. But the king took pity on him and canceled the debt. Instead of being sold along with his family and all his possessions, he walked away from his appearance before the king with no debt whatsoever. He walked in with a staggering debt. He walked out, as free and as light as a bird.
Now we move to Act II in this parable. The servant who has just had this impossibly large debt forgiven, walks away from the king and meets a fellow servant who owes him 100 denarii. A denarii was a day’s wage for a laborer. It is a reasonably large amount, 100 days of pay. But it pales in comparison with the debt that has just been forgiven. It would have taken 15 years of wages to pay back just one talent. At the rate of one denarii a day, it would take 150,000 years of wages to pay back the debt that has just been forgiven.
This is the second twist in this parable. The servant would have been expected to cancel this debt since he was so relieved to have his huge debt forgiven. But instead, he grabs him and begins choking him. His fellow servant falls to his knees and pleads for mercy and promises to pay back the debt, just as the servant had done with the king. But the servant refuses and has him thrown into prison where his assets would be sold with the proceeds going to repay the debt.
Now, in Act III, the other servants are disturbed by this and tell the king and we come to the main point of the parable. The king calls in the servant and asks him, “Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?”
“Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?”
In anger, the king turns the servant over to the jailers to be tortured until he payed back all that he owed.
And then Jesus ends his parable, and addresses his listeners, “This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother from your heart.”
Last week I talked about the suffering of Christ who died our death so we might have life. We were on death row, awaiting our execution and Jesus volunteered to step in and take our place. Jesus died in our place.
This is the dept that Jesus paid for us. Now, what has anyone ever done to you that can compare with this gift?
Is there anyone who has come to your mind who has hurt you and who you are having a difficult time forgiving? Perhaps they insulted you? Perhaps they slighted you? Perhaps they betrayed your confidence? Perhaps they broke a promise? Perhaps they caused you to suffer physical harm or emotionally abused you?
We are to forgive because God forgave us. This is not a cold, hard transaction. Jesus says we are to forgive from our heart. When the servant walked away from the king’s palace after having had his impossibly large debt forgiven, he should have been celebrating. When the fellow servant came to him, he should have said, “Come with me, let’s feast! Your debt is forgiven because my debt has been forgiven!”
We forgive from the heart because we are so grateful to have been forgiven our debt of sin.
But as is true with all of God’s commands and teachings, when we obey him, we benefit. It is not just our responsibility to forgive, forgiving those who have hurt us has a beneficial impact for us.
When I was a youth pastor in a Methodist Church in West Virginia in the United States, there was conflict between the pastor and myself. He was a very insecure person and the youth group was thriving under my leadership. He accused me of trying to divide the church and start my own church, taking members of the church with me. From a rational perspective, this was absurd, but he was caught up in his emotions and made very cruel and insulting accusations about me and my character.
This was a painful experience but I prayed and was able to forgive him. Did this mean I sought out his company and became his best friend? Without mutual forgiveness, this is difficult. But I released the animus, the feelings of anger I had toward him. In forgiving him, I chose to no longer hold on to my feelings of anger toward him for what he said to me. I chose the way of life.
Before I came to the point of forgiving him, my feelings of anger surged within me. Carrying those feelings creates a hardness of heart. We think by being angry we are punishing that person, but we punish only ourselves. When we forgive, we are freed from that burden of anger and bitterness we carry. Forgiving is a healthy act for us.
My mother is an angry and bitter woman. She carries grudges for extended periods of time. There are people who have hurt her, betrayed her and she has never forgiven them. For forty years she has carried this anger with her. And she has suffered because of this anger.
My mother has chose the path of Madam DuFarge, knitting into the weave of her life the names of those who have hurt her. She has chosen the way of death.
What do you do if the wrong that was done to you seems too much to forgive?
Corrie ten Boom was a Dutch Christian who helped Jews during the Nazi occupation of Holland in WWII. She was taken by the Nazis and sent to a concentration camp along with her sister and father. Both her father and sister died in the camps, but Corrie was miraculously released. After the war, she felt called by God to have a ministry of reconciliation and began speaking throughout Europe.
At one meeting in Germany, after she spoke, she saw a man coming up the aisle toward her and she recognized him as a guard who had beaten her sister. He came to her and spoke. “Fraulein, you don’t know me, but I’ve done some terrible things and I need you to forgive me.”
How do you respond to someone who has hurt you very deeply?
You can choose the path of Madame DuFarge and nurture anger and desires for vengeance, the way of death. Or you can choose the path of Monseigneur Bienvenu and forgive and restore broken relationships, the way of life.
You say, “I can’t do it. It hurts too much.”
When the former prison guard asked Corrie to forgive him, she found herself unable to do so. Then she prayed, stuck out her arm and she says she felt God’s power move through her arm and was able to say, “I forgive you.”
When you find yourself unable to forgive, surrender your feelings of hurt to God and he can give you the power to forgive.
We forgive because God has forgiven us. We forgive because it is healthy for us. And we forgive because we block God’s blessing in our lives when we do not forgive.
Do you remember this from the Lord’s Prayer?
12 Forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
13 And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from the evil one.’
And then Jesus continues,
14 For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. 15 But if you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.
How about this from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount:
37 “Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven. 38 Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.” (Luke 6)
When you hold on to unforgiveness, you block God’s work in your life.
This morning you can choose the path of Madam DuFarge or the path of Monseigneur Bienvenu? You can chose the way of death or the way of life. Will you continue to harbor feelings of anger and bitterness? Death. Or will you forgive as you have been forgiven and restore relationships and create new hope? Life.
This morning, you have the opportunity to let go of the feelings of hurt and anger. This morning, you have the opportunity to forgive anyone who has hurt you.
You suffer when you do not forgive, but the church community suffers as well. When you hold on to anger and bitterness and refuse to reconcile broken relationships, the body of Christ suffers.
So this morning, for your health and for the health of the church, I want to offer you the opportunity to come forward to let go of the feelings of anger and bitterness you carry. If God has brought someone to your mind who you need to forgive, I want you to come forward.
The person who has hurt you may or may not be here, but that doesn’t matter. This is between you and God.
Choose this morning the path of Jesus who said, “Forgive them Father, they know not what they do.” Choose the path of Monseigneur Bienvenu. Choose the way of life. You do not need to tell us details, you do not need to speak to the congregation at all. When you come up, I will pray with those who have come forward.
I could ask you to do this in your seats, in the privacy of your heart. But I want to make this a dramatic moment in your life. Some hurts are very difficult to let go. Coming forward will help you make this a moment when you start with a cleansed and renewed heart.
I want to allow you to declare that you are done carrying this burden. Come forward and let me pray for you. Chose the way of life.
