Forgive 77 Times: The Cost and Power of Mercy

The holy Gospel according to Saint Matthew, the 18th chapter.

Glory to you, O Lord. Peter came and said to

Jesus, Lord, if my brother or sister sins

against me, how often should I forgive?

As many as 7 times? Jesus said to him,

not 7 times, but,

I tell you, 77 times.

For this reason the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a

king who wished to settle accounts with his slaves.

When he began the reckoning, the one who owed him 10,000

talents was brought to him, and as

he could not pay, the lord ordered him to be sold together with his wife

and children and all his possessions, and payment

to be made. So the slave fell on his knees before

him, saying, have patience with me, and I will pay you everything.

And out of pity for him, the lord of that slave

released him and forgave him the debt.

But that same slave, as he went out, came upon one of his fellow slaves

who owed him 100 denarii, and seizing him by the throat,

he said, Pay what you owe.

Then his fellow slave fell down and pleaded with him, Have patience with me,

and I will pay you. But he refused.

Then he went and threw him into prison until he would pay

the debt. When his fellow slaves saw what

had happened, they were greatly distressed, and they went and reported to their

lord all that had taken place. Then his lord summoned

him and said to him, you wicked slave! I forgave

you all that debt because you pleaded

with me. Should you not have had mercy on your fellow slave

as I had mercy on you? And in

anger, his lord handed him over to be tortured until he would

pay his entire debt. So my

heavenly Father will also do to every one of you if

you do not forgive your brother or your sister from your

heart. The Gospel of the Lord. Praise to

you, Christ. You may be seated.

Let us pray.

God, grant us the grace and the strength to

forgive, even as we rest in

your forgiveness for us. Let the words of my mouth and

meditations of all of our hearts be acceptable to you, O God,

our Rock, and our Redeemer. Amen.

Amen. A riddle for you to

start this sermon. I'm going to say it twice.

Here it goes. I cost nothing to

give, but holding on to

me does cost. I cost

you nothing to give, but holding on to me costs.

What am I?

Forgiveness, duh, right, we just read that passage, yeah, okay,

good for you for following along. The answer is forgiveness.

We live in a culture, in a world that

is, I think, antithetical,

opposed to forgiveness.

I think that is because our human nature, sinful and broken as

it is, is opposed to forgiveness. And we live in a time

where it is easier than ever for both— for us both to have

an audience and to have

also so little consequence for what

we say and what we do.

Forgiveness, while it's always difficult, is Likely much

more challenging than it has ever been because we have so much exposure and

so little consequence. Why would I need to forgive you when

I can just block you and

avoid you, when I can just walk away?

A proof for you: look no further than

the beloved phenomenon of cancel

culture. In the last 10 to 15 years,

and aligning closely with the rise of social media and online

advertising, we again both increasingly have a

platform and an audience, and thus feel a need to

express our opinion and be on the right side of the opinion.

But if you have a divergent opinion,

Watch out, you might be canceled.

Again, something in our culture, and not just our culture, but something in

our nature makes it difficult for

us to forgive those who wrong us or disagree with us or

think differently than us, and the ground

is more fertile for retribution, the opposite

forgiveness than maybe ever before.

It's just so easy to throw a response around

online because, well, there's no real consequence for

it. And that has creeped into how we

treat one another in our face-to-face interactions.

And so, I need to admit to you this morning that this Gospel text before

us is gives me a really funny feeling.

It gives me a funny feeling because the shifts in our culture, at least

to me, seem to be pulling us more and more away

from the spiritual ideal and the Christian virtue

of forgiveness. These shifts in our

culture seem to be promoting division and vengeance and retribution and

tribalism. Above all else. If you

are not with me, then you are against me.

That sort of thinking.

And this sort of thinking, well, it does make sense if

you're just trying to survive, right? From the beginning,

humans have formed tribes and teams to defend ourselves,

to ensure our safety and security to safeguard

against scarcity. And yet,

the kind of security and safety we think that we need is really

only needed at all because of the presence of sin

at work in our hearts and in our world. It's only ever

needed because we ourselves are curved inward, because we

choose as we have since that very first sin,

to cast ourselves as God and to make

our own values and expectations and

opinions into idols.

And so, we kill so that we may live, we destroy

so that we may protect, we use our logic and our

reason to justify our sin.

I have a funny feeling that to our culture the king

in our parable might seem like a

fool, and that the forgiven

servant, or I should say the unforgiving servant,

the one who exacts his debt and throws his debtor into prison,

that one might seem like a shrewd and

cunning businessman.

And so, I pose to you a question this morning.

Which do you think costs more,

forgiveness or retribution?

Which do you think costs more? I have a funny feeling that though

we might say forgiveness, is our Christian ideal,

we may not want to have our answer to that question revealed.

Our text today begins with Peter coming to Jesus in

response to Jesus' description, which we had last week, of how

to handle sin in Christian community. What are we to do if a

brother or sister sins against us? Jesus lays out this really

wonderful process. First, go to the person individually.

Then if they don't listen, go with a partner. Then if they still don't listen,

go in front of the entire church to handle the sin and

the conflict. And then, then if necessary, that person needs

to be removed from the community.

A patient, a gracious process, but still a hard conclusion

if need be. And so, it's this backdrop that

draws Peter's question. All right, Jesus, So,

if a brother or sister does sin against me, how often

should I really forgive them?

Jesus' response and the parable that He uses to expand

it, I think, are some of the most comforting and challenging of

Jesus' teachings.

Comforting because the forgiveness is essentially

unlimited. 7 is the number of completion in the Hebrew

world, and so 7 times 70 or 77 times would have

been like an infinite concept to them, right?

Unlimited, infinite forgiveness.

Comforting, right? Because we all need not

just a little but a lot of forgiveness and

Jesus has it for us, thanks be

to God. But this teaching is

also quite challenging isn't it?

It's challenging because this is the model and

the pattern and essentially the command that Jesus

gives to us. Forgive as

I have forgiven you.

It's one thing to be forgiven, and I'm

not entirely convinced that it is an easy thing in every circumstance

to even receive forgiveness. It's a different sermon.

But it's an entirely different challenge to forgive

someone else, isn't it?

To lay down our claims, our anger, our drive

for retribution.

Which costs more?

The cost of forgiveness is high, make no mistake about it.

And the good news of the gospel that we share is that Jesus on that

cross paid it for us.

That's the comforting part.

But the challenge of discipleship is that we

are called likewise to continue that

work, to pay it forward in

our words, in our actions, because forgiveness

embodied in our world looks mercy.

To follow Jesus Christ is to be a person striving

after forgiveness and mercy, as comforting and

as challenging as that may be.

And yet, as costly as forgiveness may be to us,

economically in this text, emotionally in our

lives, There is an even higher cost

that the Lord wants us to wrestle with in this parable.

The cost of retribution.

The seeking out of one's own form of vengeance above all

else. Even after being forgiven this astronomical

amount, the unforgiving servant throws his own debtor

into prison. And in so doing,

as our text ominously hints, is left to an even greater

form of torture. It seems

that the refusal to forgive, that the holding on of a

wrongdoing, that the seeking after vengeance and retribution, that in

and of itself is a form of

torture. And retribution

can take many different forms, right? The obvious ones: vengeance,

wrath, anger. We can identify those.

But what about the bitterness that

we let take hold in our hearts? What about the spite?

What about avoidance or closing

our hearts to those who have hurt us, failing to give them that second

chance that Jesus has always for us?

What about when we let our anger fuel us?

When we let it burn up our lives and let it burn down

our world? What about when we

let it hold us back from giving the kind of love

that has been freely given to us?

Make no mistake,

Forgiveness is, well, it's complex.

And it is complicated, and it is costly. It takes its

own time. It cannot and should not be rushed.

And forgiveness isn't always the same as reconciliation.

There are times when forgiveness, for safety's sake,

right, must be granted from a distance.

But if we withhold it,

the cost is high for

our own hearts and our spirits that will continue to be controlled by

that drive for retribution,

and the cost will be high for our world because

forgiveness is can change

everything. Because forgiveness is what makes

community possible. Because forgiveness allows

us to pay that love that we have received forward,

irregardless of whether it's deserved or not.

Because forgiveness sets us free. Because forgiveness

fuels us to serve, to use our hands,

carry on God's work.

Because forgiveness, as the king in our parable reminds us,

looks like mercy, and our world is in desperate

need of mercy. Because forgiveness is

the greatest gift of all, the gift that Jesus

came to give to each and every one of us and

to our world.

Forgiveness may be costly.

I think that's true in each and every case when we have to give

it. But failing to give it may

cost us. It may cost

us individually. It may cost us all together

as the human community.

Everything. Blessed, Jesus says, are the merciful.

Happy are the merciful, but woe to those

who withhold forgiveness.

And we pray as Jesus teaches us each and every Sunday,

Lord, forgive us our sins, our debts, our trespasses,

as we forgive those who sin against us, who trespass

against us, who hold our debts.

Lord, give us the strength to forgive.