So let's pray. Let's ask God for help as we dig
into His Word now. Heavenly Father, we thank
you that you speak to us. We thank you that you
love us. We thank you that you forgive us. Please
help us, Father, to know the magnitude of your
forgiveness, to rejoice in it, to celebrate it,
to marvel at it. And please, as we do, Father,
would you make us forgiving people. who forgive
those who sin against us. And we ask this in
Jesus' name. Amen. Well, before coming to Northern
Hope, I worked at five other churches. And two
out of the five churches I worked in, I actually
ended up working for narcissistic, spiritually
abusive pastors. Two out of five. I think that's
a pretty good track record, isn't it? Certainly
can pick them. You know, for a while there, I
had to work through a bunch of things. I had
to work through a fear of cafes because I constantly
got brought into cafes by these pastors and just
told the most horrific, horrible things. I had
to get over a whole bunch of gaslighting. I had
to get over misreadings of scripture that they
had taught me and use scripture in a wrong way.
There was a whole bunch of things that it left
me hurting. It left me confused. It was horrible.
And I know it wasn't just me. I know there are
other people who'd been hurt by these two separate
men. And sadly, I know some in this room have
been hurt by people like that. It's a horrible,
horrible thing. But such stories as these raise
an important question. And it may not be the
question you think. Here's the question. When
someone sins against someone else, who's in spiritual
danger? When someone sins against someone else,
who's in spiritual danger? Especially, you know,
when it's serious sin, you know, if you, you
know, put sugar in someone's coffee rather than,
salt rather than sugar, you know, you can get
over that one. But when you've been really hurt
by someone, who's in spiritual danger? And I'd
want to say it's actually the abuser and the
victim. Both are in spiritual danger. See, the
abuser can have a conscience that becomes rock
hard. Their heart's far from God. This is how
the conscience works. No, it's not there. Okay.
Don't worry. Oh, there it is. Cool. Here's how
the conscience works. No, it's back to that one.
All right. We're a well -oiled machine. This
is how your conscience works. Your conscience
is like a circle with a triangle in it. And every
time you sin, you go, ow! Like, can you see how
that triangle would be pointy and jarring? And
if it moves, every time you sin, it moves and
you go, oh, that hurts. But what happens when
you sin again and again and again and again and
you never repent and you never... It smooths
out and you don't feel it anymore. That's what
happens. when you consistently sin again and
again and again. It means your heart ends up
far from God, your conscience becomes calloused
and rock hard. We don't feel our guilt anymore.
There's a huge spiritual danger when we keep
sinning and abusing people. But there's a huge
danger when you're the victim. Because what happens
when you're the victim? Especially if you've
been hurt by other Christians, It's easy to give
up on God. It's easy to give up on Christianity.
It's easy to become bitter and unforgiving, isn't
it? See, that's the power of sin. It can make
your conscience calloused. It can make you feel
guilty. As the writer Plutarch says, guilt is
an ulcer in the flesh, a remorse that never ceases
to wound. I mean, that's a horrible thing to
go through as well. but also it can leave you
to an unforgiving heart, a bitter spiritual decay
within. See, whether you've got a callous conscience,
whether you struggle with guilt for the things
you've done, whether you're unforgiving, these
are all different traps, they're all different
types of spiritual danger. And they can make
our lives miserable, but if unchecked, they can
actually erode our faith in a horrible and serious
way. So how do we escape these traps? Well, that's
what I hope to show you as we look at this parable
and at forgive us our debts as we forgive those
who indebted to us. And the big thing we're going
to see today is this. Pray for God's pardon so
that sin won't ensnare your heart. It's one thing
you take away from today. Pray for God's pardon.
so that sin won't ensnare your heart. Whether
it's through hard -heartedness, whether it's
through guilt, whether it's through bitterness,
we don't want our hearts to be ensnared. And
as we look at this parable, we're going to see
three things which help us, guard us against
the traps of sin. Three things. We have a massive
debt, God cancelled our debt, and we must forgive
debts. We have a massive debt. God cancelled
our debt. We must forgive debts. So let's have
a look at the first one. We have a massive debt.
Now, often this is hard for us to see. And the
Lord's Prayer helps open our eyes to it. It assumes
that we have a debt. And Matthew 18, 21 to 25
makes it explicit. We've got this guy, he's got...
Well, let me just read it. Matthew 18, 21 to
25. Then 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?
Jesus answered, I tell you not seven times, but
77 times. This is a callback to Genesis 4 and
Lamech there, because he wants to seek vengeance
77 times. And then he says, therefore the king
of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle
accounts with his servants. As he began the settlement,
a man who owed him 10 ,000 bags of gold was brought
to him. And since 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.
I mean, what this guy owes is phenomenal. If
you were to do rough calculations, it would be
$10 billion in our money today. This is a massive
debt, a debt he could never pay back. And in
the world of the parable, this is borrowed money.
He's borrowed it, he's invested it poorly. He
now has this debt that he can't get out of. He's
dug himself into a massive hole. And we know
in the context here that this debt is a metaphor
for sin. We've taken from God and we can't pay
him back. My grandad used to be the state accountant
at Coles back in New South Wales and he told
me once about a guy who crashed his car into
one of the Coles stores. And he crashed the car
and it hit some pillars and it actually made
like a big chunk of the store collapse and all
the stock, the store was hugely damaged. And
this guy had no insurance. He had a debt so massive
that he could never repay it. He had his wages
garnished just a little bit each week to try
and pay this debt that he was never going to
pay off. It was crippling for his life. Now,
it's more serious for us, isn't it? If we don't
pay God our debt back, well, we're facing his
judgment forever. This is a debt we need to clear.
But you might be thinking, oh yeah, but we can
do that, can't we? Well, if you think that, just
go through this exercise. I want you to calculate
all the wrongs that you did last year. It might
take a while. Just think, all the sins, all the
wrongs you did, the lies, the lusts, the selfishness,
all the things. If doing good deeds could make
up for it, and I'm not saying that they can,
But if they could, how long would you need to
cover just last year? Pretty long time, wouldn't
you? And here's the problem. Every time we're
trying to pay that debt off, if that's even possible,
we're actually adding to the debt, aren't we?
I mean, just the last year, I think, yeah, I
probably sinned more than I did good things.
Like, I'm actually, my debt's growing, not shrinking.
The longer I live, I'm just making it worse.
Can you see how serious things are? You and I
have sinned so much, it's an unimaginable debt
that we have before God. A debt that is literally
gonna ruin us. It's dire and there is nothing
we can do. We're just making it worse. And if
you're a Christian, it's important to stop and
regularly feel the weight of that debt. When
does grace stop becoming so amazing? It's when
we lose sight of how great our debt is. So it's
good to search your heart. When you sin, to not
just avoid it or ignore it or to numb your conscience
over it, but to feel the weight of it, that is
a good thing to do. But if you're here and your
sin feels small and insignificant, that is danger
science. Perhaps your conscience is actually
getting calloused. Maybe it needs recalibration.
I mean... We're in serious spiritual danger if
we're so used to sinning that it doesn't bother
us anymore. See, our conscience is meant to be
like a fire alarm. It warns of danger. It's bad
if it's not working. It's bad if it does it all
the time, and we need to recalibrate it then
too, but it's bad if it's not working at all.
So pray for God to open your eyes if you've got
a conscience that's not working. Because it's
there warning you. It's giving you a little bit
of pain to warn you about the future pain that
you'll face if you are cut off from God for eternity.
So that's what our consciences do. We have a
massive debt. But what do we do about it? If
we're just adding to it, what are we meant to
do with this? Well, thankfully there is an escape.
God is willing to forgive our sin debt. Here's
the next thing we see. God cancelled our debt.
Look with me at verses 26 to 27. At this, the
servant fell on his knees before him. Oh, be
patient with me, he begged, and I'll pay back
everything. Yeah, right. $10 billion worth? Keep
dreaming. The servant's master, took pity on
him, cancelled the debt and let him go. What
an amazing thing to do. He just forgives it.
He cancels that enormous debt. Think back to
that guy my grandpa told me about. Imagine the
CEO of Coles ringing up that guy and saying,
hey mate, I know you've got this huge debt, you
know, it's... I think it was over half a million
dollars. I just wanted to say we've decided to
write it off. It's all forgiven. Don't you reckon
that fella would have a spring in his step? He'd
probably use the money to go buy some insurance.
I don't know. But he'd be stoked, wouldn't he?
That's what God does for me. That's what God
does for you if you trust the Lord Jesus All
your sin has been completely eradicated and cleared
Now in the parable, it's pretty easy the King
just says yeah, no worries mate It's cancelled.
He just speaks. I mean, yeah, he's got to wear
the debt, but he just speaks and it's done But
for God In our world, it's different, isn't it?
He's just and good. He can't just sweep the debt
under the rug, can he? When it's a sin debt,
it's different. It must be paid. And if not by
us, then it will be paid by him. That's how he
cancels it. He has to wear the cost of that debt.
How is our debt paid for by God? It's cancelled
by the cross. That's what we see at the cross.
The full judgment of God rains down on Jesus.
And he experiences the loss, the pain of our
debt so that we don't have to. Reminds me of
a story about Nicholas II. He was the last Tsar,
the last King of Russia. in the early 1900s.
And Nicholas used to do the whole undercover
boss thing. He'd wander into the military barracks
dressed as an officer but not dressed as the
King of Russia. And one night he saw the light
on in the paymaster's tent. And he found the
paymaster fast asleep. And he came over to wake
him and there he saw a revolver a small pile
of money and some papers. And he looked closely
at the papers and he saw a list of gambling debts
and a suicide note. The debt was massive, totalling
thousands of ruples. The paymaster had racked
up a huge gambling debt and then used the army
funds to pay the debt. And he spent the night
trying to find a way to pay the army back. But
it was nowhere near enough, and on one of the
papers he'd written, who can pay so great a debt?
And do you know what Nicholas did? He did something
remarkable. Under the question, who can pay so
great a debt? He signed his name. Nicholas, Tsar
of Russia. The paymaster woke up, saw the signature,
compared it with other ones he had and went,
oh, it actually really is his. And he could rest
easy because the King of Russia had paid his
debt for him. And it wasn't just some prank,
it actually came through the next day. That's
like what Jesus did for us. He bore our debt.
He paid it himself. That's the objective truth
of every Christian. And subjectively, it is such
a comfort, especially if you're haunted by a
guilty conscience. The trick is to feel what's
real, to apply the truths of the cross to our
heart. How do you do that, Brendan? It's learning
to say, I'll take God at His word. You know,
there are times where we go, oh, I mean, I've
sinned so badly and I said I wouldn't anymore
and I've done it again and I've done it worse
this time. And if, oh, there's no way God's gonna
forgive me. I mean, like, do you know how bad
I am? And in those moments, we need to remind
ourselves. I need to take God at his word. He
says, my debt is forgiven. It's forgiven. My
debt is paid in full. My guilt is gone. Every
time guilt rears its ugly head, we need to reapply
the balm of the gospel to our hearts. And if
you do that, not only will the guilt go away,
But it's so liberating and freeing, you end up
filled with joy. You're conscious of how forgiven
and loved and cleansed you are. It makes all
your other problems feel smaller and changes
your perspective, because hey, eternal ruin has
been taken out of my life. I think I'll be okay
with all the other stuff. You go from feeling
eaten alive inside to walking on cloud nine.
It changes everything when you feel forgiven
like that So if you're a Christian keep reapplying
the balm of the gospel every day to your heart
That's what we do when we pray when we confess
our sins to God We're confessing the things we've
done wrong. We're feeling the weight of our massive
debt But we're reminding ourselves that God has
cancelled it completely through the cross. And
if you're not a Christian, can I encourage you,
ask Jesus for forgiveness? Why wouldn't you want
what I've just talked about in your life? Nothing
else frees people from guilt. Why would Jesus
die if there were some other way? No, this is
the only way. Come to him, ask for forgiveness.
But God's forgiveness doesn't just deal with
our sin debt and our guilt and make us more joyful.
It actually moves us to be more forgiving as
well. Here's the third thing we see. We must
forgive debts. We must forgive debts. Forgiven
people become forgiving people. Look at verses
28 to 35. 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.
His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged
him. Be patient with me and I'll pay it back."
But he refused. Instead, he went off and had
the man thrown into prison and tell he could
pay the debt. When the other servants saw that
what had happened, they were outraged and went
and told their master everything that had happened.
Then the master called the servant in. You wicked
servant, he said. I cancelled all that debt of
yours because you begged me to. Shouldn't you
have had mercy on your fellow servant just as
I had on you? In anger his master handed him
over to the jailers to be tortured until he should
pay back all he owed. And this is how my heavenly
father will treat each of you unless you forgive
your brother or sister from your heart. Now we've
got to remember here that this 100 denarii is
not nothing. The other guy owed 10 billion but
this is not nothing. This is three months wages.
This is $20 ,000 in our terms. But compared with
the massive debt, it's nothing, isn't it? Receiving
such compassion from the King should have made
this guy compassionate. If you're a Les Miserables
fan, it's pronounced Les Miserables, but if you're
a Les Miserables fan, you know what I'm talking
about, Jean Valjean, the guy who, he stole a
loaf of bread, he was put in prison, he had a
horrible life for years and years and years,
and then he finally gets out, he goes, no one
will give him work, he goes to a bishop's house
and he steals the candlestick holders, the silver
candlestick holders of the bishop. He's caught
up with by the police. And do you know what the
police, they grab him, they bring him back to
the bishop and say, He's stolen from you. And
actually the bishop says, no, these were a gift.
Actually, I think he stole something else and
then the bishop said, you know, the candlestick
holders, these are a gift as well. Anyway, the
bishop was a really good guy and he was so compassionate
to Jean Valjean. And when that happened, it changed
Jean Valjean's life. He became a compassionate
person. That's what compassion does when we receive
it properly. See, what's so wicked here is that
this guy wouldn't show mercy after being given
such immense mercy. It's not that the king is
unforgiving. The king withdraws his forgiveness
because he's going, this guy hasn't understood
my forgiveness. It hasn't gripped his heart.
It hasn't changed him. This is not a tit for
tat quid pro quo kind of thing. And it's not
like that with us. God, you know, God only forgives
us if we forgive others. As if somehow we're
earning our forgiveness by forgiving others.
No. This is saying that God's forgiveness takes
root in someone's heart, in their life, when
they become more forgiving of others. If you
believe and receive God's forgiveness, it will
produce fruit in your life. Actually, you can
do the most amazing things when you experience
God's forgiveness. Corrie Tanboon, her family
hid from the Nazis. She was Jewish and her family
was Jewish. They hid from the Nazis during World
War II. Sadly, her family got ratted out and
the ones who survived were put in concentration
camps. They were tortured and abused there. Eventually,
Corey's sister died. But Corey survived. She
went around Europe after World War II preaching
about God's forgiveness and her experience. Until
one meeting she spoke at, she was approached
by a man. He was one of the guards at the concentration
camp where she was imprisoned. He didn't remember
her, but she remembered him. And he came up to
her and said, I've become a Christian. I know
that God has forgiven me for the cruel things
I did there in that concentration camp. But I'd
like to hear it from your lips as well. Will
you forgive me? Here's what Corey Tamboon says.
I stood there, I whose sins had again and again
been forgiven, and I could not forgive. Betsy,
that's her sister, had died in that place. Could
he erase her slow, terrible death simply for
the asking? And still I stood there with the
coldness clutching my heart. But forgiveness
is not an emotion. I knew that too. Forgiveness
is an act of the will. And the will can function
regardless of the temperature of the heart. Help!
I prayed silently. And then this healing warmth
seemed to flood my whole being, bringing tears
to my eyes. I forgive you brother, I cried, with
all my heart. Had she not known God's forgiveness,
she never would have done that. Now going from
bitterness to forgiveness, like any form of sanctification
of holiness, it's a process. We're not going
to be perfect at it straight away. But we keep
working at it. We keep growing it. Especially
if the wounds of hurt are deep. And if we have
received God's forgiveness, we will grow at it.
We'll get better at extending forgiveness to
others, and it will be clear that we're radically
different in that. But if we don't, it's a warning.
Maybe God's forgiveness hasn't taken root in
your heart. I'm not trying to victim shame. Let
me be clear. Bitterness is a real spiritual danger.
When someone hurts you badly, here's what happens.
The massive debt you owe before God looks smaller
and smaller. and the wrongs that that other person
has done to you look bigger and bigger. And the
only antidote is to look to the cross so that
we flip it back the right way up, so that we
see again how massive our debt was, so that we
see again how wonderful God's grace is. Even
as we look at the cross, we see Jesus' immense
forgiveness as He's being crucified. Forgive
them, Father, for they don't know what they're
doing. The cross is so powerful at warming a
cold and bitter heart. All right, well, let's
draw some threads together. We started by talking
about the dangers of sin, that sin... can trap
us, it can give us a callous conscience, it can
leave us just feeling miserable with a guilty
conscience, and it can leave us with a bitter
heart when people sin against us. But God's forgiveness
at the cross destroys sin's power. See we have
a massive debt, but at the cross it shows that
we do have a debt, that it needs to be paid.
God cancelled our debt and at the cross it says
we see that the debt has been paid and we must
forgive debts. At the cross we see the example
that Jesus shows us of what a forgiving heart
looks like. But what's this got to do with the
Lord's Prayer? Well that line of the Lord's Prayer
brings these truths to bear in our lives. These
aren't just truths to be understood cognitively,
these are Truths that we need to feel, these
are truths that we need to pray again and again
and again. And that's why our big idea is this,
pray for God's pardon so that sin won't ensnare
your heart. Or as the Lord's Prayer shows us,
there's two aspects to it. Ask for God to forgive
you and ask for God's help to forgive. That's
what we need to do. Now, if you're a Christian,
Here's what it means for us. There's always a
possibility that we might become hard -hearted
or hurtful or abusive, that we just keep sinning
and we don't recognise it. What helps you guard
against that? Because it's a real danger. Self
-reflection and confessing your sins. Spending
time And that's what you have to do when you
confess your sins. You don't just generically
do it. Lord, forgive us our sins. Amen. No, you
want to think, OK, what did I do yesterday? What
did I do today? Yeah, oh, gee, that was horrible.
I really shouldn't have done that. And spending
that time, doing that hard work, prevents our
hearts from becoming calloused. Do it in the
morning. Do it at night. How do I sin today?
I'm looking back on the day I had. Father, I'm
sorry for, you know, I did this and I did that,
and thank you for your mercy. Thank you for Jesus'
death on the cross. Thank you that it cleans
all my sins away. Thank you. Doing that will
keep your heart soft. And if you're a Christian
who's wracked with guilt, you can lie awake at
night, thinking, God can't love me. If that's
you, bring your shame and your guilt to God.
It's the same thing, confession. Confessing your
sins to God reminds you that you can't out -sin
the Saviour. It helps you feel it. You pray something
like this, Father, I did it again, I'm sorry.
You know it was worse this time, whether it was
porn, whether it was lying, whether it was being
judgmental, whatever it was. But you say, help
me to see the wonderful forgiveness in Jesus.
I love that verse that was on the front of our
bulletin. It's to see that the blood of the lamb,
the blood of Jesus is like spiritual bleach.
It washes us completely clean in God's eyes.
Help me to see that, Lord. And if you're a Christian
and you've been hurt by others, it's easy to
throw in the towel and give up on Jesus. I mean,
there's been times where that's been tempting
for me, I'll admit. How do you guard your heart
in those times? Well, it's praying those things
that we just said it's you got to have an understanding
of how big your Debt is and how much God's done
for you, but it's also praying something like
this Help me forgive them Genuinely from the
heart Lord Give me a forgiving heart protect
me from bitterness Please Lord, you know the
wrongs they did help them repent because I want
to see them saved too. If you're a Christian
and you make it a habit to pray like that, it
will help your heart be in a spiritually good
and safe place. Now, don't get me wrong. This
doesn't mean we tolerate more abuse. You know,
oh, I'm just going to let them keep hurting me
and... No, put up boundaries. Reconciliation,
it doesn't happen unless there's repentance and
forgiveness. We need to have both or otherwise
the relationship will remain broken. But even
if they won't repent, we need to be ready and
willing and extending forgiveness. Let me ask,
who is it you need to forgive? I wonder here,
are there folk at the Good Shepherd Church, perhaps,
that maybe some of us need to forgive? Maybe
if you've been hurt by another church, maybe
it's people there. Maybe it's an ex, maybe it's
an employer, maybe it's your spouse. I don't
know. Don't hold onto bitterness, though. Don't
get bogged down in resentment. Don't put yourself
in spiritual danger. See the size of your debt.
See the wonder of God's grace and ask him to
help you forgive. And if you're here today and
you're not yet a Christian, I've got something
for you too. I hope you've seen that you too
need God's forgiveness. Jesus is offering it
to you free today as well. What else can make
you face your failures with honesty and recalibrate
your conscience? What else can make you free
from guilt and fill you with hope and joy? What
else can transform you into someone who's radically
compassionate like Jesus? Nothing else can. If
you want to experience that forgiveness, it starts
with a prayer. Here's the prayer. Dear God, my
sin debt is massive. I can't pay it off. Please
forgive my debt. Thank you that Jesus paid my
debt in full by his death. Please let your forgiveness
change me and my heart. Now if you want to become
a Christian, I mean these aren't magic words,
these are just the ideas that you need to be
praying about if you want to become a Christian.
And if you already are a Christian, this is the
same sort of stuff we pray about too, isn't it?
So everyone today, if you're a Christian, I encourage
you to pray that with me now, just silently in
your own heart. But if you want to become a Christian,
pray that too, just quietly in your own heart.
I'll pray it, and I'll give you some time to
pray it after me quietly in your own heart, and
then we'll close. Let's pray. Dear God, my sin
debt is massive. I can't pay it off. Please forgive
my debt. Thank you that Jesus paid my debt in
full by his death. Please let your forgiveness
change me and my heart. Amen. Now if you've prayed
that for the first time, God is at work in you.
You have been forgiven. Please come and have
a chat with me. We'd love to help you on the
way as you now follow him.