Son of the Holy Spirit, glory to Jesus Christ.
I'm not going to recount the parable for you.
Through my way of thinking, the way of the church,
you heard Jesus Christ himself tell you this
parable. He told it to you. That's the way the
scriptures work when we read it in church, when
we chant it. It's his voice. He's speaking to
each one of us personally. He's speaking to us,
in this case, as a community. That's why we say,
wisdom, stand aright, because it's Christ himself
speaking to us. And in this case, if he's speaking
to us in a community, it's important to remember
some key phrases from this gospel. Fellow servants,
forgive your brother. Fellow servants of the
king. Chapter 18 of the Gospel of St. Matthew,
from where we just read, is about life in the
church. Jesus is teaching his disciples how to
behave as fellow worshipers, as fellow disciples.
So we have a parable. Jesus is speaking, and
Peter comes up with a question, thinking he's
magnanimous and generous. Lord, the rabbis say
it four times. I can forgive, then just forget
about that guy. What about seven? That sounds
generous. And Jesus is like, that's seven, not
seven. Seventy times seven. Now that's not, you
know, my wife gave me 220 times, so I've got
another 200 plus left before she tells me it's
all over. The seven is the holy number, right?
The seven days in which God, six days created
and seventh he rested. The seventh number is
the perfection number. It tells us, do this to
be perfect. It's important also to remember that
Jesus is not talking about those situations.
He's not talking about how will the Ukrainians
and the Russians ever reconcile after the war.
How will a Jewish person in the camps forgive
his Nazi captors and tormentors? It's not like
that. This is your brother, your sister, your
fellow servant of the master. That's the context
of this parable. Peter's asking about this fellow
that irritates him continually. You can't tell
me there's no one in your life like that. In
the parable, the value, the incredible sum the
man owed was 10 ,000 talents. Enormous. enormous,
because the talent is like 30 pounds of silver
at the time. This is something bigger than any
lottery winning. It's a sum he could never hope
to pay back. It's on paper. He can't pay it back.
This is like your student loan if you have them.
It's just not possible with the interest that's
building up. Why did he owe so much? We might
ask that question, but I think that's the wrong
question. Did he owe so much because he had some
horrendously dark, evil, wicked sin before his
master so that he built up this amount that could
never be repaid? No. Let's not think of it in
that way. Let's think of it another way. The
incredible sum. It's infinite to this man. It's
what? You are worth to God. It's what you're
worth to God. It's how precious you are to God.
Even when we are completely broken by sin. Even
when we seem to fall so far away. It's what we
owe unto thee, O Lord, is to all worship, honor,
and glory. We say this continually in the liturgy.
We say, come let us worship and fall down before
Christ. Our worship of God is as we say, unto
thee are due all glory. And we should add, unto
thee is due love, fidelity, trust, faithfulness.
This is our God. You are each worth more than.
any sum. That's why the sum in this parable is
beyond calculation. That's why, well, we'll get
to that in a moment. You remember the story of
the lost sheep? It just preceded this parable
in the gospel. And Luke speaks about the lost
coin, the pearl of great price. That's us, which
Christ has come to take. Did Jesus Christ come
to condemn us? Think of the gospel. What did
he say? I came not to condemn the world, but
to save it. Did he come for his father to send
us to hell? Is that why he came? Did he need
to come for that? Jesus didn't have to become
incarnate for that. He didn't have to suffer
for that. He didn't have to die. He didn't have
to do that for God to judge the world. For if
Jesus Christ, our Savior, is the exact image,
the reflection, the perfect expression of his
Father, then the whole purpose, the whole purpose
of him becoming man, the whole purpose of his
suffering and dying and rising again, was for
us to escape. Eternal death. Eternal death. To
escape ignorance of God and who we are. To escape
the poison of sin. It was to experience salvation.
For us to be healed. For us to be restored. For
us to be made holy. For us to be reconciled to
God. the Father, through the Son, in the Holy
Spirit, to live the life of God. Forgiveness
is that reconciliation. This is why we go to
confession so frequently. If you haven't a memory
of the last time you confessed, it's been too
long. And you need to come before the Lord and
say, Lord, thank you for this life. Thank you
for the peace of heart. Thank you for giving
me this community in which forgiveness is paramount.
This is the life we have. In the world, you're
going to experience harshness. There's no such
thing as forgiveness. Yes, nowadays you can choose.
Your own family, so to say. Your own tribe. You
can join that if you have some kind of thing
that you're into. But you're not going to be
united to God by that. We want others to know
the gracious Lord. We want others to know that
if they come to this place, if they come to your
house, if they meet you, that you are a person
that understands this parable. that can say,
goodness, what God has done for me, what he has
forgiven me for, is beyond calculation. He has
given me life. He has given me salvation. He
has given me this congregation and fellowship.
He has given me the knowledge. He has given me
the scriptures. He has given me his body and
blood. He has already given me the kingdom of
God. I don't have to wait. to die to experience
God's glory. I can do what he says and be like
he wants me to be. What does forgiveness of a
huge debt, continual debt, someone, a fellow
servant, feel like? Is it to ignore the sin?
No. But yes, if you can. Is it to forget the
sin? Not always possible. Is it to feel okay
about it and resolved in your mind? Not at all.
When the Lord Jesus Christ was on the cross and
said, Father, forgive them for they know not
what they do, that forgiveness, did it come out
of everything's okay, it's all fine? No, it came
out of... It came out of pain, suffering, sorrow,
and abandonment. Abandonment and ignorance and
insults. That could be forgiveness for us too.
It costs us something. Let each of us remember
what God has given us. Life, existence. I've
encountered so many people outside the church
who feel... that they, well, they feel that God
is maybe out there somewhere and that God has
cheated them. They've been dealt a bad set of
cards for their life, and maybe that's so, but
God has done them wrong. But here, here, we don't
live the life of Cain and Abel, that brokenness,
or Lamech, who says, I'm going to avenge 70 times.
Or what happened during the times of Noah when
evil abounded on the earth? Here, we're going
to say, Lord, what debt I have before thee, forgive
me. In the parable also, the fellow servants
of this unmerciful debtor, they hear about what
happened to this other fellow. Who owes this
guy maybe a hundred bucks? And he could have
paid it off. The unmerciful debtor thinks, oh,
Lord, have mercy on me, and I will pay thee all,
which is just clueless and impossible. But the
fellow debtors here, are they tattletailing?
Lord, you know what this guy did to this other
servant? No, they're not tattletailing. In the
parable, they're interceding. They're praying
to the Lord. They're asking for mercy for this
other man who doesn't get it. Let each of us
count up today and every day. The blessings that
we have, yes, the cards that we've been dealt
that we have to live with because the Lord knows
our sanctification is on that pathway. Let's
give thanks to God for the things of which we
know and the things we know not. For all the
benefits bestowed upon us, whether manifest or
unseen. And then we thank him. and treat our
fellow servants with love and forgiveness. To
our Lord be glory, now and ever, and to ages
of ages. Amen.