PENTECOST 15

Sermon
9-13-2020
 Rev. Steven S. Billings
Pentecost 15
Sermon
9-13-2020

Matthew 18:21-35
21
Then Peter came up and said to him, “Lord, how often will my
brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven
times?” 22 Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you seven times, but
seventy-seven times.
23
“Therefore the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a
king who wished to settle accounts with his servants. 24 When he
began to settle, one was brought to him who owed him ten
thousand talents. 25 And since he could not pay, his master ordered
him to be sold, with his wife and children and all that he had, and
payment to be made. 26 So the servant fell on his knees, imploring
him, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you everything.’ 27 And
out of pity for him, the master of that servant released him and
forgave him the debt. 28 But when that same servant went out, he
found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii,
and seizing him, he began to choke him, saying, ‘Pay what you
owe.’ 29 So his fellow servant fell down and pleaded with him, ‘Have
patience with me, and I will pay you.’ 30 He refused and went and
put him in prison until he should pay the debt. 31 When his fellow
servants saw what had taken place, they were greatly distressed,
and they went and reported to their master all that had taken place.
32
Then his master summoned him and said to him, ‘You wicked
servant! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me.
33
And should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I
had mercy on you?’ 34 And in anger his master delivered him to the
jailers, until he should pay all his debt. 35 So also my heavenly

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Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother
from your heart.”

“So also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you

do not forgive your brother from your heart.” Beloved, forgiveness
is not optional. Nor is it limited.
I don’t know what Peter was thinking when he approached
Jesus with the question in our text: “Lord, how often will my brother
sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?” His
conscience may have been pricked by Jesus’ teaching about
forgiveness in the previous verses, and, realizing the hard work
that true forgiveness requires, he may have been looking for a way
out – a loop hole.
It’s certainly understandable, isn’t it? You have the same
argument with someone over and over again. How many times do
you have to go through that? Or someone commits the same
offense against you time after time after time. How long do you
have to put up with that? There’s a limit to our patience. Shouldn’t
there be a limit to the times we have to forgive someone? Not
according to Jesus.
And if you think that Jesus is merely raising the limit by saying
“77 times” instead of “7 times,” please understand that this was a
linguistic device, an idiomatic way of indicating a number
approaching infinity. If you were of that time and place you would
have understood Jesus to say that you never reach the limit; you
never stop forgiving someone. As long as they desire forgiveness,
you are to give it. We see the basis for this in the parable that
follows.

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 Jesus says, “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a
king who wished to settle accounts with his servants. When he
began to settle, one was brought to him who owed him ten
thousand talents. And since he could not pay, his master ordered
him to be sold, with his wife and children and all that he had, and
payment to be made.” Now, you might be wondering how much
money that would be in today’s terms. How much was a talent?
In today’s money, a talent would be worth about $450,000. This
man owed the king 10,000 talents! Can you do the math? I had
to get out my calculator. 10,000 talents in today’s money would be
the equivalent of four and a half BILLION dollars!!
So, this man owes the king a boatload of money. There’s no
way he’s going to pay that off. So the king orders him to be sold
together with his wife and kids and all he has. He and his whole
family are going to be someone else’s property for the rest of their
lives.
Well, this is more than the poor man can endure. He falls on
his knees and begs the king, “Have patience with me, and I will pay
you everything.” But the king knows he can’t do that. Even if the
man sold everything he owned, he’d never have the money to
erase his debt. So, what does the king do? He has compassion
on the man. Out of pity, he forgives the debt. Wipes it out.
Whew! What a relief! He must have felt like he’d been paroled.
You know, debt can be its own kind of prison. A lot of people these
days walking around with the chains of debt binding them hand
and foot. What a joy it is finally to get out from under that burden!
You’d think that maybe this servant would have wanted to share
his new found wealth – the riches of freedom.

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 But no. Instead, he went out and “found one of his fellow
servants who owed him a hundred denarii, and seizing him, he
began to choke him, saying, ‘Pay what you owe.’” Now, a denarius
in today’s money is worth about $3.60, making the total owed
about $360.00. That’s .00000008 percent of what he had owed the
king! But, you know how it is; if you don’t have two nickels to rub
together, $360.00 may as well be $4.5 billion. If you can’t pay it,
you can’t pay it.
So, what does the fellow servant do? The same thing the first
one did. He “pleaded with him, ‘Have patience with me, and I will
pay you.’” And does the man have mercy on him? Does he have
compassion? No. “He refused and went and put him in prison until
he should pay the debt.”
As you might guess, that didn’t sit well with the other fellow
servants, so they went to their master, the king, and “reported . . .
all that had taken place.”
The king was furious and summoned [the man] and said to him,
“‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you
pleaded with me. Should you not have had mercy on your fellow
servant, as I had on you?’ And [he] delivered him to the jailers,
until he should pay all his debt.”
“So also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you,” Jesus
says, “if you do not forgive your brother from your heart.”
There’s a biblical principle at play in this parable. Jesus once
said, “To whom much is given, much is required” (Luke 12:48b).
He says elsewhere, “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive
mercy” (Mat. 5:7). Those who have received great blessings are
expected to share those blessings with others. In this case, those
who have received great forgiveness are expected to exercise the
same toward their neighbor.

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 Now . . . In case you missed it, this parable is talking about you.
You are the servant of the King. Jesus, the King, is your master.
You owed Him a debt you could never repay. The sinful nature in
which you were conceived and born has produced a bountiful crop
– a harvest of sin insurmountable. Jesus used the ridiculous
amount of money in His parable to demonstrate the absolute
impossibility of repayment. You may as well owe Him $4.5 billion
dollars, and yet you’d sooner pay that off than make up for your
debt of sin. You know it’s true. And so do I.
But the blessed Gospel declares that your sin has been
forgiven, the debt wiped away; your slate is perfectly clean – not
because you’ve atoned for your sins, but because Christ has
atoned for them for you. When He cried from the cross, “It is
finished!” that’s what He was referring to – not just the completion
of your salvation, but the payment of your debt. ÔgôÝëgóôáé– the
transaction has been completed – signed, sealed, and delivered.
Your sins are paid for, your debt erased.
This should be a joyous thing. It should inspire you to release
others from their debt to you. But often we don’t, do we? We act
as though forgiveness were optional. But does it sound that way
when you hear Jesus in Matthew 6(:15)? “If you do not forgive
others their trespasses [against you], neither will your Father
forgive your trespasses.”
Beloved, Jesus went to great lengths to release you from your
bondage to sin. He forgave your sins freely by His grace. He
asked no payment from you. And that forgiveness is yours now
and forever; nothing will ever take it away. But you can push it
away by despising it. That’s what you’re doing when you refuse to
forgive others – you’re despising the forgiveness you’ve received.
“To whom much is given, much is required.” Forgiveness is not
optional.

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 This is not, however, to say that it is easy. Forgiveness is
sometimes the hardest thing you’ll ever do. But you must do it if
you value the forgiveness you’ve received. You must do it in
obedience to your Savior. You must do it to release one who has
repented of his sin. You must do it for yourself, to lay your chains
of unforgiveness aside and stop bearing that awful weight – a
weight Jesus died and rose again to release you from.
Then you may begin to sense the joy of forgiveness. I mean,
if you can’t let go of other people’s sins, how can you ever
conceive of God letting go of yours? Living in forgiveness toward
others makes your own forgiveness more real, more tangible. Not
only that: it models God’s forgiveness to others and makes His
forgiveness more real to them.
So, lay down your chains, beloved. Let go of whatever it is
you’ve been holding on to. Forgive as you’ve been forgiven. In the
name of the Father and of the T Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen