In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and
of the Holy Spirit. Today, our Lord and Savior
speaks to us through a parable. The story that
he tells us serves as the answer in the form
of a parable to the question of Apostle Peter,
not included in the reading today. If my brother
sins against me, asks the apostle, how often
should I forgive? Seven times. The Lord responds,
not seven, but seventy times seven, meaning not
exactly that number, but meaning an incalculable
number. The parable that the Lord tells after
this conversation is rather, on the one hand,
is rather uncomplicated. It seems to be, an expression
of the ancient saying, of the ancient golden
rule of the moral law, do unto others what is
done unto you, what you wish to be done unto
you. A king wanted his servant to repay his humongous
debt, but in response to his begging for mercy,
forgave him his debt. A man who was forgiven
then pursued his fellow servant and required
his much lesser debt from that last person. He
was found out and punished for the lack of mercy.
In the parable, the Lord seeks to relate to us
the meaning of the kingdom. That's how the parable
begins. The kingdom of heaven is like this king.
Thus, the meaning of salvation, and he speaks
about debt and forgiveness. The reality of debt,
of being in debt, is, of course, very much familiar
to us in our daily struggles. In our daily lives,
we often live in debt. We owe money to institutions
for anything, for our school or for other things.
And for us, being an independent person is to
be debt -free, not owing anyone anything, something
that we accomplish through our own efforts. We
have reached that goal. We have achieved it.
We are proud of it, that we don't owe anyone
anything. But if we look deeper into reality
of our life, we see that it's not quite true.
We owe a debt of gratitude. in thanksgiving to
so many people among many people our parents
our teachers our colleagues our friends without
whom we wouldn't be who we are we would not have
come into existence as human beings or as the
persons we are many of us have come into orthodoxy
through through discovering this great truth
about the meaning of concerning God, concerning
ourselves. And we stand here in gratitude and
thanksgiving for being Orthodox, that we are
now in the Orthodox Church. But we owe a debt
of gratitude to those of our ancestors who were
not Orthodox, thanks to whom we have reached
this point, we have come to this place. In a
more profound sense, we are the creatures of
God, all of us whom God called from non -existence
into being. And it is to God, the author of life,
the maker of heaven and earth, that we owe our
existence, the debt that we can never repay.
We read in the Psalms, the heavens are thine,
the earth also is thine. All that exists, visible
and invisible, is already in the dominion of
God. All that is already belongs to God in our
very life. And thus in the divine liturgy, when
the deacon elevates the gifts above the holy
table, the priest prays on behalf of us all that
thy known of thy known we offer unto God. That
is, we offer God what he already has in his possession,
created gifts out of his own creation. But why
then we offer it if he already has it? God speaks
in the Psalms to the prophet, offer to God a
sacrifice of thanksgiving and pay your vows to
the Most High. We cannot repay God for everything
that he has done for us. We humble creatures
cannot repay God, our Creator, with an appropriate
sacrifice, for we owe Him everything. What He
requires of us is our heart, our spirit, our
broken spirit, the sacrifice of thanksgiving,
praise, glorification, and repentance. God speaks
through Isaiah, Wash yourselves, make yourselves
clean, remove the evil of your doings from before
mine eyes. For there is another debt that we
owe, the weight that lies heavily on us as human
race, our debts, our transgressions and sins
that we commit before God and before one another,
the corruption of the human nature by death and
sin that alienates us from God, that enslaved
our existence to the vicious cycle of seeking
futile pleasures. living the life alien to God
and to each other, ending in death. Throughout
its history, human beings were extremely inventive
in manifold ways to oppress one another, to enslave
one another, to hate one another, and to turn
the reason given to us by our Creator into the
instrument of hatred. countries and nations went
to war against each other and still do and pass
on to the alienation and prejudice to the subsequent
generations. And it is only the mercy of God
that human race has not obliterated itself from
the face of the earth. In our own individual
lives, we hold grudges, we remember offenses,
and it is so hard for us to let go of the memory
of someone slighting us, hurting us. In our own
weakness and sinfulness, we perpetuate in our
souls the fruit of another person's offense.
It is easy to say that we have to forgive, but
it is sometimes so hard to forgive. of the lord
is clear in the prayer that he gives his disciples
so to us too in the lord's prayer we say the
petition every day forgive us our debts as we
forgive our debtors we are called to forgive
for how can we ask forgiveness of god if we do
not try to forgive how can we say lord have mercy
if our hearts are not merciful In the parable
that we read today, we see our Lord further expanding
to us his commandment. We are called to forgive
one another, for we were forgiven first. That's
how the parable is structured. King forgives
an enormous debt to this person. He forgives
that debt. And then the person who leaves the
presence of the king does not forgive his much
lesser debt. And so this, of course, shows that
we are called to forgive, for God forgave us
first. The debt of sin and transgression, the
slavery to the devil and corruption, was lifted
and repaid, and we were set free. For Christ,
the Word, the Light, the Power of God, the Immortal
Son of God, came to dwell among us as the one
mediator between God and mankind and gave himself
as a ransom for all people. Through our Lord
Jesus and in him, God reconciled to himself all
things, making peace through the blood of his
cross, where Christ has offered himself as the
perfect sacrifice for our salvation. Of this
sacrifice, the fruit of thanksgiving and praise,
of this sacrifice we partake when we gather as
a church for the Eucharist, the thanksgiving,
and the liturgy that we offer to him who has
already all things and who gave us everything
needed for our salvation. He showed his love
for us by dying for us sinners to grant us reconciliation,
freedom, salvation, and forgiveness. If we are
truly the disciples of Christ, we are called
to forgive one another, for we were forgiven
once and for all. If it is hard for us to forgive,
we call upon God through his power, for his mercy,
for his grace, to give us an ability to forgive,
to enable us to forgive. For we cannot do this
with our own strength. But we are called to forgive,
not once, not seven times. but to live our life
in repentance and forgiveness and humility, remembering
the great debt that our race has owed to our
Creator and the immeasurable mercy and forgiveness
that flowed from the tomb of Christ who rose
from the dead. It may be beyond our capacity
to stop all hatred and violence in the world.
It is likely that it will never stop until the
world will end. But we begin with ourselves.
As Saint Seraphim of Sarov has famously said,
acquire the spirit of peace and thousands around
you will be saved. Let us take care of our own
spiritual house, our hearts, our souls. Let us
forgive one another, pray for one another, offer
our praise and thanks unto God, for we were the
lost sheep. And Christ, our shepherd, came, forgave
us, and opened to us his kingdom. Amen.