| Twenty-second Sunday after Trinity , 2001
Matthew 18:21-35 The Unpayable Debt
For centuries Tutsis and Hutus had lived together in relative peace. The Hutus tilled the soil of Rwanda and the Tutsis herded the cattle. Both people were black, spoke the same language, and lived in the same regions. Yet for some mysterious reason they remained different from one another in cultural ways.
On November 1, 1959 a Hutu politician named Mbonyumutwa was beaten up by a group of Tutsi attackers. Within twenty-four hours of the beating, roving bands of Hutus were attacking Tutsis. In less than a week, the violence spread through most of the country. Hutus torched Tutsi homes. Tutsis struck back. The uprising was quelled, but resentment and blood-revenge simmered just below the surface.
In 1972 Tutsis came to power and killed 100,000 Hutus; another 200,000 fled as refugees. In 1990 a Hutu leader named Hassan Ngeze published "The Hutu Ten Commandments." The Eighth Commandment of his Decalogue said: "Hutus must stop having mercy on the Tutsis." Then in 1994 the big massacre hit. The Rwandan government implemented a policy that called on everyone in the Hutu majority to murder everyone in the Tutsi minority. Using machetes the genocide was carried out at dazzling speed. 800,000 people were killed in a hundred days.
What is shocking is the degree to which the Church was involved in this. Hutu Christians killed Tutsi Christians with hardly a twinge of compunction. In the midst of the bloodbath, several Tutsi pastors sent a letter to their denominational president who was a Hutu. One line of the letter said: "We wish to inform you that tomorrow we will be killed with our families." It happened. And the Hutu president did nothing to stop it. Rwanda turned into a hell on earth. That is what occurs when a society turns its back on forgiveness and surrenders itself to vengeance.
We live in a wicked world, and it is futile to think we can escape bad treatment. When people get together for any length of time there will be conflicts. Due to sin, the interaction of human beings produces pain and injury, suffering and trouble. More than any other person, it is Jesus Christ, the Son of God who promoted forgiveness. He required that we shun revenge. That is what our Gospel passage is about today.
[The following works were consulted: Books on the Parables of Jesus by James Boice, Simon Kistemaker, William Barclay, and Marcus Dods; Commentaries by J.C. Ryle; Books on forgiveness by David Augsburger, John Patton, Henry Barclay Swete. Stories from Rwanda by Philip Gourevitch. WORLD magazine the Sept 29, and Oct. 27, issues.]
Peter asks Jesus, "Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? Up to seven times?" Jesus said to him, "I do not say to you, up to seven times but up to seventy times seven (Matthew 18:21-22).
Peter was aware of the Jewish rule that said: "Forgive a first offense, forgive a second, a third forgive, but punish the fourth." Being familiar with this Rabbinic saying, he may have asked the question with a hint of self-righteousness. After all, to forgive a man seven times was almost twice more than the accepted norm. He could have been thinking, "What a good man I am."
But Jesus bursts his bubble: "Don't stop forgiving at seven. Pardon your brother up to seventy-seven times." In other words, forgive to the uttermost. There is no limit.
Before going on, let us consider the qualifications to forgiveness. The Lord's teaching does not mean that we ignore crime. The police must enforce the laws, the judges must put the guilty behind bars, and our military must defend us against aggression. Since St. Augustine's time, the Church has held that the state may use lethal force to protect innocent life, and to ensure that people can live decently, and in freedom. Tomorrow is Veterans Day and it is proper that we commemorate it. So Christian forgiveness does not let children become spoiled, or criminals to be coddled; nor should criminal nations be allowed to terrorize with impunity. Moreover, it is also the job of the Church to discipline members who refuse to repent of grievous sin, and depose evil ministers (Article XXVI of the 39 Articles). Scripture also tells us that it is not wise to be merciful to the cruel and unrepentant. Proverbs declares: "He who justifies the wicked, and he who condemns the just, Both of them alike are an abomination to the Lord." If we're merciful to the cruel, we'll more than likely be cruel to the merciful (Isaiah 5:20; Proverbs 17:15). True mercy is balanced by justice.
These are some obvious exceptions to forgiveness. However, that being said, we can't avoid the words of Jesus Christ. He commands us to forgive our neighbor seventy-seven, or even four hundred and ninety times. So what does it mean? Let's examine it a little more.
Forgiving a brother seventy-seven times tilts all our dealings with people in the direction of kindness and compassion. Jesus is telling us that we are to strive for a spirit of mercy towards family and fellow believers. We are to endure a lot of bother, and put up with a lot of friction, rather than quarrel. We are to overlook much, and give in, rather than provoke strife. Above all, we should reject malice, revenge and retaliation. Such reactions are the practice of the heathen.
The Rwandan genocide stemmed from their centuries old clan feuds. Early missionaries reported that the tribes were constantly at war in order to avenge some wrong done in the distant past. Christ tells us that retaliation should have no part with the child of God. The parable sets out these parameters. Let us review it beginning at Matthew 18:23-27. [Read them.]
One of the servants owed a lot of money to the king. Ten thousand talents was mucho dinero. How much money? The Jewish historian Josephus tells us that Herod the Great's annual revenue from his entire kingdom was about nine hundred talents. Clearly, the servant owed his master a tremendous sum; enough that his whole family was on the verge of being sold into slavery. In the ancient world it was customary that financial debt drive a man and his family into slavery. Faced with such a prospect, what did the servant do? He fell on his face before the king and begged for mercy. It worked. In response, the king had compassion on him, "released him, and forgave him the debt." Incredible! What joy! What kindness!
That is the first part of the parable. The second part we read in Matthew 18:28-30. [Read them.]
As the joyful servant was leaving the gates of the king's palace he encountered a fellow servant. This one owed him one hundred denarii. At most, a hundred denarii is a couple days work. The indebted servant fell on his face and begged for time to repay it. But the other refused. He threw the man in prison, expecting someone to bail him out and pay the debt.
The word soon got around. Let us read the conclusion to the parable. Reading Matthew 18:31-35.
How did the king react when he heard? He was livid. He summoned the man before him and gave him a rebuke: "You wicked servant, I canceled all the debt of yours because you begged me to. Shouldn't you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?" With that he turned him over to the jailers to have him tortured until all his debts were paid. Torture was regularly employed in those days for big debtors. The goal was to extract the amount from friends or relatives of the tortured.
What is Jesus trying to teach Peter and the rest of us? First of all, we all need forgiveness from God. Each and every day, we sin and accumulate mounting debts to God. The confession in the Prayer Book for Morning Prayer correctly says: "we have left undone those things that we ought to have done; And we have done those things which we ought not to have done; And there is no health in us." Spiritually, our sins put us billions of dollars farther in debt every week. Anger, lying, egoism, ingratitude, laziness, impatience, pride, materialism -- these things put us in the red to the point of becoming an unpayable debt. And if we do not realize that we need God's mercy and pardon every day of our lives, then we are not very sensitive to sin. What we owe God is huge, and yet He has forgiven us everything through the gracious blood of His Son shed on Calvary.
This means that the offensive words and deeds our neighbor commits against us are truly insignificant compared to how we offend the Lord. Hence, God's loving character needs to saturate our character. In Christ, He has cancelled every last penny.
We said previously that one of the exceptions to forgiveness is criminal behavior. The judge should enforce the law and not coddle the criminal. Yet, the compassion of God shines forth even in the punishment of thieves. God's law has a robber pay back what he has stolen plus restitution, and ask forgiveness. If he does all that, he is given a second chance in the Christian scheme of things. Under Islamic law the right hand of the burglar is cut off at the wrist. The thief is marred for life. The true God is truly compassionate, and makes Christian culture more forgiving.
That being the case, how can we be snappy, sour, or argumentative when God has been so patient and merciful to us? How can we harbor thoughts of revenge against others, while our transgressions against God and His law are so numerous and grievous? That is why Jesus calls us to be merciful, to respond to the slights of others with forgiving hearts. The grace of God should quiet our peppery tempers, His mercy should dull our sarcasm, and soften our harshness. The Gospel parable emphasizes the truth that forgiveness can be attained only by those who can themselves forgive. If we have experienced God's redeeming mercy and grace then the result will be a truly forgiving heart.
Along these lines, one of the Rabbis came up with the notion that there are four different types of character. It is a concept worth pondering. What are the four kinds of people? "First -- he who is easily provoked and easily pacified; his loss is cancelled by his gain. Second -- he who is hard to provoke and hard to pacify; his gain is cancelled by his loss. Third -- he who is hard to provoke and easily pacified; he is a good man. Fourth -- he who is easily provoked and hard to pacify -- he is a wicked man." It is worthwhile to ruminate on that. The one who walks around constantly angry about the bad treatment he or she is receiving from others has a problem. This person ought to look in the mirror. The problem most likely is his. Maybe he is the one who is too easily provoked and too hard to pacify.
What are some other ways to apply Christ's parable? Consider the injuries you find it almost impossible to forgive. People close to you do not meet your expectations. Does that ever happen? They don't perfectly accomplish what you want, and so you decide to get even. Or someone has the audacity to disagree with you on some matter of politics, theology, or art. How dare they differ! So you start searching for a way to get back. Or people underestimate you, and make you feel second-rate; or they make some comment that is less than positive, or tell a story that is a bit damaging. They win a prize you were hoping to get, or receive a piece of property you coveted. Jesus tells you to cope. Deal with it in a gentle way.
Christ's parable challenges us on big matters as well. There are people whose entire lives have been embittered by the injustice, neglect or selfishness of someone else. Every time they are reminded of the person, their heart boils with hatred and emotion. Forgiving people four hundred and ninety times means overlooking even terrible offenses. Think of the injury that is most difficult for you to forgive. Maybe it goes back ten or twenty years. Now measure it against what God has forgiven you. How does it compare? You had an unpayable debt and God sent His Son to die and cancel the whole amount. Does the injury committed against you really justify an implacable hostility and a resolution for revenge?
The Lord lays down the law of forgiveness for His kingdom. The Christian society that He came to form cannot be held together without observing this law. Forgiveness is one of the essential principles of the Church, and it is a prime ingredient for every family. We cannot expect the police to compel men and women to work smoothly together, nor ask the lawyers to settle every little grievance. Rather, Christ's kingdom is held together by mercy, by the willingness of each member to forgive, and practice kindness to the other members.
"How often shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him?" May the doctrine of Christ guide our daily behavior with those around us. May we forgive them 490 times. As the Lord forgives us our trespasses, may He also grant His grace to forgive those who trespass against us.
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