We have been spending some of our evening lessons looking at how Jesus teaches and transforms Peter through the various discussions they have with each other. Jesus approached a man named Simon, called him to be an apostle, and changed his name to “rock” (Peter). Matthew 18 is another time when Jesus teaches Peter. The teaching moment is going to come from a question about forgiveness that Peter asks Jesus. It is tempting to go straight to the question Peter has. But the question about forgiveness is in the middle of a context of Jesus teaching about how we look at other people. So it is important to read what Jesus was teaching his disciples so that we can appreciate the reason for Peter’s question and better understand the answer Jesus gives. Open your copies of God’s word to Matthew 18 and we are going to consider the whole chapter as we learn how to forge forgiveness.
The Teaching (Matthew 18:1-20)
Matthew 18 begins with the disciples asking who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Jesus answers their question by teaching them about humility (Matthew 18:2-4). No one will enter the kingdom of heaven without humility. Greatness in the kingdom is not about thinking about yourself or elevating yourself but by humbling yourself. But I want us to notice an important first conclusion Jesus draws in this paragraph. Look at verse 6. If you cause someone who believes in Jesus to sin, it is better to have a great millstone fastened around your neck and be drowned in the depth of the sea. Please think about the seriousness of Jesus’ statement. If you cause someone who is following Jesus to stop following Jesus, then you have committed a grave offense before the Lord. You see Jesus say this in verse 7. There are all kinds of temptations to sin in the world. But woe to the person who is the cause of the temptation! Do not cause other people to sin. Do not cause people to stop following the Lord. It is better to cut off hands and feet than be the cause for sin (Matthew 18:8-9).
Jesus further underscores the importance of every sheep by illustrating the need to go after one sheep that leaves the flock (Matthew 18:10-14). The Father does not want any of his sheep to perish. So do not be the cause of a sheep to leave and go after the sheep that goes astray. Notice this is the context of Matthew 18:15-20 in which we are trying to restore a lost sheep. If one of the sheep of the flock sins against you, we do not want that person to be eternally lost in sin. You are given the responsibility to go to the sheep that has sinned against you, tell him your fault, just between the two of you. Is the purpose of this interaction to try to win an argument or elevate yourself? No, the context of our teaching is humility and the importance of gaining your brother or sister in Christ who has strayed (Matthew 18:15). But if the sheep does not listen, then take one or two others with you so that there are witnesses to the change and the discussion of trying to win this sheep back. If that fails, then tell it to the church so that the whole church can try to win back this sheep. It is only after all of these efforts toward a lost sheep have failed that the church must treat the sheep as out of fellowship with God. Again, the point is to communicate to the sheep that they are lost and need to return to their heavenly Father.
Peter’s Question (Matthew 18:21)
This context is important to the question that Peter now asks. In Matthew 18:15 Jesus said that if your brother in Christ sins against you, you are to go to that person alone and try to gain your brother back. So now Peter asks in Matthew 18:21 how many times will my brother sin against me and I forgive him. How many times do we need to do this? How many times can a sheep sin against me and I forgive him? How many times do we go through this process? At what point can we throw our hands up and say that this time is too many times? It appears that the rabbis taught that there was a limit to forgiveness.
“If a man commits a transgression, the first, second and third time he is forgiven, the fourth time he is not.” (b. Yoma 86b, 87a)
Peter is going well past the rabbinical discussion that forgiveness needs to only happen three times and no more than that. Peter seems to be learning that the way of Jesus goes far beyond the teachings of the day. But even still, Jesus is going to say something that perhaps would have been surprising to his disciples. Seven times is not the limit to forgiveness. Rather, seventy times seven. Some translations read “seventy-seven times.” The Greek can be translated either as 77 times or 70 times 7. It is clear that Jesus is taking Peter’s number, seven, and going exponential with the number. The rabbis said three times. Peter thinks maybe seven times. But Jesus shoots way past either of those numbers. It appears to be an impossible command. Please think about it in real terms. It is easy to read that we are to forgive seventy times seven. But please imagine a brother or sister in Christ who sins against you again and again and again. It just keeps happening. How long are you going to put up with it? How long are you going to try to bring about a resolution, going to that person alone? How long will you see the lost sheep and want to bring that sheep back to the fold?
The Problems With Forgiveness
I think it is important for us to consider why we find forgiveness so hard to give. What makes forgiveness difficult? I think there are a number of factors that prevent us from offering forgiveness. First, we may refuse to forgive because we do not think the person deserves it. We may consider the person and just think they are not spiritual enough. Maybe we think that they do not seem sorry enough. Maybe we have a certain expectation and that person just is not meeting our expectation. For whatever the filter is that we place on a person, we deem that person unworthy of our forgiveness. Second, we may refuse to forgive because we perceive the offense is too great. The person inflicted too much harm. The hurt is too deep. What they said was too evil. Their actions were too vile. We simply think that we could never forgive what this person has done to us. Third, we may refuse to forgive because we think there needs to be immediate justice. What the other person did was wrong and there needs to be a reckoning. It seems wrong for us to forgive because what they did was so wrong. So we look at the situation and believe that there cannot be forgiveness because there needs to be justice. I am sure that there are other reasons that we have in our minds and hearts when we consider that forgiveness is simply impossible. Jesus knew that what he was teaching was extremely difficult. This seems to be the reason why Jesus wants to tell a parable to help us over the obstacles that keep us from forging forgiveness with our brethren.
The Parable (Matthew 18:23-34)
Notice in Matthew 18:23 that Jesus says that the kingdom can be compared to the parable that he is going to tell. The nature of God’s kingdom rule is going to be explored through this parable. The parable then goes on to describe a king who is ready to settle accounts with his servants. One of the king’s servants owes him 10,000 talents. This is an insane amount of money. One talent was equivalent to about 20 years of wages. So 10,000 talents would be about 200,000 years of wages. Obviously this is a debt that could never be repaid. This servant is forever in debt to the king, spending the rest of his life trying to pay off what little he can pay of this enormous debt. In verse 25 we see that the king orders that all this servant has to be sold so that some sort of payment could be made.
Now listen to the next two verses because they are critical to the parable. Look at verse 26. The servant is on his knees, begging for the king to show him patience, and he will pay back everything. Could the servant repay this debt? No, he could not. The debt is far too big. But the servant indicates his desire to try. He begs for patience and time to repay this debt. Look at verse 27. The master of the servant released him and forgave the debt. This is shocking. The master forgave the whole debt and let the servant go. Why? Why did the master do this? Verse 27 tells us because the master had compassion on the servant. The master was deeply moved by the servant. The servant asked for patience and the master showed compassion. The servant asked for time to repay and the master forgave the debt. It is not hard to see that this is us. This is our situation before our Father. Sin is the debt that cannot be repaid. Romans 6:23 tells us that the wages of sin is death. The problem is sin is that there is no solution that we can offer to God. There is no way for us to pay off the debt we have incurred by our sins. All that we can do is go to the Father and ask for patience. Our Father has shown us extraordinary compassion. Our Father has forgiven our debt through Christ. The parable shows us the heart of God toward our debt of sin.
But Jesus is not done with the parable. In verse 28 Jesus continues to explain what he wants us to do so that we can forge forgiveness. The same servant went to one of his fellow servants who had a debt against him. The debt incurred was 100 denarii. A denarius was a day’s wage. So the debt that he owes is about 3 months of wages. It is a significant sum but it is nothing in comparison to 200,000 years of wages. Notice that the forgiven servant is violent toward the other servant, choking him and demanding him to pay what he woes. The servant then says the same words that the forgiven servant had said earlier to his master. He asks for patience and time to repay the debt. But the forgiven servant refused, putting him in prison and demanding the debt be repaid.
The master hears what this forgiven servant did and calls him in. Look at verse 32. The master says that he forgave all that debt because you pleaded with me. Shouldn’t you also have had mercy on your fellow servant as I had mercy on you. Notice the motive of forgiveness. When you pleaded for patience and mercy, your master showed it to you. You should have the same mercy toward those who have incurred debts with you. Therefore, the forgiven servant is no longer forgiven the debt. He is delivered to the prison until the debt is repaid. Do not forget that this was a debt that could not be repaid.
The Instruction (Matthew 18:35)
This leads to Jesus’ very important instruction in verse 35. Jesus says that his heavenly Father will do to each of us if we do not forgive our brothers and sisters from our hearts. Please think about how Jesus’ parable nullifies all of our excuses. We refuse to forgive because the other person does not deserve it. Did this servant deserve to be forgiven by the master? No, he did not deserve it. We refuse to forgive because the offense is too great against us. Was this servant’s debt to great to be forgiven by the master? No, even though it was an extraordinary debt, the master did not look at the offense and say that it was too great to be forgiven. The master forgave the debt. We refuse to forgive because we want justice. Did the master demand justice because of the debt this servant incurred? No, the master showed compassion rather than demanding justice out of his servant. The parable nullifies every excuse we use as to why we think we cannot forgive what someone has done against us.
The way to forge forgiveness is to never forget that God forgave the debt we could never repay. We see Jesus tell us this when he teaches his disciples to pray. Listen to what Jesus said:
And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. (Matthew 6:12 ESV)
Jesus knew that we would forget our part of this forgiveness equation. We are very happy to receive God’s forgiveness but we are ready to never forgive our brother or sister who sins against us. Jesus tells us that it does not work like this. The nature of the kingdom of heaven is that we have a heart that wants to forgive and restore relationships. We are expected to reflect God’s forgiveness because we have experienced God’s forgiveness. The imagery of forgiveness that Jesus uses in this parable is that there is no more debt. There is nothing to call into account. There is nothing to hang over another person’s head. The forgiven forgive.
Not only do the forgiven forgive, but look again at Matthew 18:35. Jesus says that the forgiveness we give to each other is from our hearts. This means that the forgiveness is genuine. The forgiveness we give is wholehearted and not grudgingly. The forgiveness we show is from our compassion for each other because God has been so compassionate toward us. We do not say that we forgive but hold on to the debt. We do not pretend to forgive while holding on to the grudge. We do not act like we forgave but still want to choke out the other servant. We must forgive from our hearts. Please hear Jesus’ words from this parable. Our Father in heaven is going to act toward us how we act toward each other when it comes to forgiveness. We must forgive each other or God has said he will not forgive us. We must show mercy to each other or God will not show mercy to us. The whole message of Matthew 18 is that we need to humble ourselves and have a heart for God’s sheep. Forgiveness is not about me. Forgiveness is about reflecting to you what God has done for me. We will never forgive each other if we fail to humble ourselves. We will never forgive each other if we fail to care for the souls of other sheep in God’s flock. “Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you?” (Matthew 18:33)