Forgive Until It Doesn't Hurt?!
Matthew 18:21-35
by Jim Westmoreland
Two decades ago (1981) there was an attempt on the life of Pope John Paul.
Fortunately, the Pope lived. After he recovered, he shocked the world when he made a visit
to Rome's Rabbibia Prison to see the man who had attempted to assassinate him on Christmas
day. Millions watched on television as the Pope visited with Mehmet Ali Agca, who only two
years before had tried to assassinate him. The white-robed Pope and jean-clad terrorist
huddled in the dark prison cell for 20 minutes, talking in low voices that could not be
heard. When he emerged John Paul explained, "I spoke to a brother whom I have
pardoned."
The following week Time Magazine ran the headline, "Why forgive?" Time
tries to represent mainstream American culture. I don't think it figured out the answer to
its question, "Why forgive?" I don't think the average person, whether a church
member or not, knows the answer either. "Why forgive" is a good question, one
that has been asked for centuries. It was asked by Peter in verse 21 of the passage that
was read this morning. If you have not asked yourself the question "yesterday,"
wait, you will "tomorrow!"
As with so many of the stories of Jesus, the parable of the debtors arose out of a
question that was posed to Jesus. Simon Peter said to him: "Master, if my brother
sins against me, how many times should I forgive him? Seven times? Have you ever seen
children who will sometimes confess something they do wrong expecting to get praise from a
teacher or a parent because they were so honest.
In the same sense, Simon Peter by asking this question is not expecting rebuke but praise.
He is expecting Jesus to say: "Great answer, Peter. You go to the head of the class.
You get A+." According to Jewish law, Peter had the right to think that he had done
something good. Scribal law clearly read: "If a man transgresses one time, forgive
him. If a man transgresses two times, forgive him. If a man transgresses three times,
forgive him. If a man transgresses four times, do not forgive him." It was a system
or law of limited forgiveness. What Peter has done is to take this idea of limited
forgiveness that was based on scribal law, multiply it by two and add one, and
then sit back with a smile on his face and say: Am I good, or what? And he surely must
have been taken aback when Jesus said you must forgive seventy times seven.
Life is full of hurts and misunderstandings and many blessings. We need to be careful what
we are counting. Remember the old chorus, "Count your blessings?" It goes,
"Count your blessings name them one by one. Count your blessings see what God hath
done. Count your blessings name them one by one. Count your many blessings see what God
hath done."
When we get focused on counting whatever hurts come our way, our hearts will get heavy,
and before, you know it, we will forget to count the many blessings that God has given us.
Peter was focused on counting. He thought he was exceeding the law. They thought
"One, two, three, forgiveness is not easy! Now you've committed number four, you're
past my limit, and I'll forgive you no more!"
Peter must have thought "if three's the limit of the law, I'll double that and go you
one more." But Peter's answer to forgive seven times fell a little short, if your
trying to keep count. And, Jesus' answer would make it really hard to keep count!
Then Jesus proceeded to tell a story. There was a certain king who had a day of reckoning
for his servants. He found one who owed him 10,000 talents and, because he could not pay,
he was about to have him thrown into jail and his wife and children sold into slavery. In
response to the man's pathetic pleas for mercy, however, he forgave him the entire debt.
This same servant, who had been forgiven of a great debt, went to a fellow servant who
owed him 100 denarii, which was a very small sum of money, and demanded payment. He begged
for extra time, but the man would not hear of it, and he had him thrown into jail. The
king heard about how the servant he had forgiven had treated the one who owed him, and the
king became very angry. He had the forgiven servant brought before him. The king told him
that, because of his unforgiving conduct, he was now to be thrown into jail. His original
debt was reinstated.
Now the question is, what was Jesus attempting to say to Simon Peter?
1. First, forgiveness carries a heavy price. In the worship bulletin a couple of weeks ago
I included a quotation from Dietrich Bonhoeffer about "costly grace." For God,
"costly grace" meant the death of his Son. For us "costly grace" may
mean letting go of the attitudes that justify our holding on and refusing to forgive
another person.
There's a scene from a movie a few years ago called "Nobody's Fool." There's a
working man named Donald Sullivan. Everybody calls him Sully. He's about sixty years old,
and spent his whole life in the same town. When his parents died, he inherited their
house. He never moved in. Instead he left it alone. It was the house where his father beat
him as a child. So he has left it alone, and every day he drives by to watch it slowly
fall apart.One day he takes one of his friends, a builder, through that broken-down house.
The builder says, "Sully, you could have saved this place. You could have fixed it up
a little bit, rented it out. You could have sold it and put the money in your own pocket.
Instead you stick it to your old man. What's it been - - thirty, thirty-five years? You
still keeping score? Well, here's the good news: you won."
Meanwhile the house is falling down . . . --The Arithmetic of Forgiveness by
William G. Carter
Now, I also want to say a few things about what forgiveness is not. Forgiveness is not . .
.
Forgetting: deep hurts can rarely be wiped out of one's awareness.
Reconciliation: reconciliation takes two people, but an injured party can forgive an
offender without reconciliation.
Condoning: forgiveness does not necessarily excuse bad or hurtful behavior.
Dismissing: forgiveness involves taking the offense seriously, not passing it off as
inconsequential or insignificant.
Pardoning: a pardon is a legal transaction that releases an offender from the
consequences of an action, such as a penalty.
Forgiveness is a personal transaction that releases the one offended from the
offense. --Adapted from Robert D. Enright, in Niki Denison, "To Live
& Forget," On Wisconsin (November-December 1992).
This last one helps us to see what the sermon title, "Forgive until it doesn't
hurt," is getting at. Often, when we describe something that we do intently, we say
"do it until it hurts!" But to do forgiveness right, we have to release the
power of the hurt over us. We, the offended party, have to be released from the hurt of
the offense so that we are not depressed, mad, poutie and controlled by what was done.
Forgiveness is good for us! Therefore, are called, not to hold onto the hurt, but to
"forgive until it doesn't hurt!
2. The second thing Jesus was saying is that a forgiven person should be a forgiving
person. What is it that the Lord's prayer teaches us to pray? "Forgive us our
trespasses as we forgive those who have trespassed against us." We
cannot come to God to ask for forgiveness while we refuse to forgive others. When we come
to the Lord's Table, we are to make things right with one another before we come to the
Table. That means apologizing for offenses, for remarks and things done in anger, or
insensitivity. It means caring that relationships are being strained and moving towards
alienation. It means taking the first step to doing the right thing. And we can't make the
first step unless we have a forgiving heart that won't let the hurt feelings control us.
An unforgiving heart makes us stubborn and unwilling to work things out.
Every person in the church is valuable and worthy. Every person in the church is someone
for whom Christ died. Every one of us has made some mistakes and has offended someone if
we live and breathe long enough. In that sense, we are like the unforgiving servant if we
do not forgive our brothers and sisters. Forgiveness makes the difference in the life and
character of a church. When we stand for and demonstrate forgiveness toward one another
and to others in the community, we stand with Christ. To God forgiveness is worth it. What
is forgiveness worth to us?
John D. Rockefeller built the great Standard Oil empire. Not surprisingly, Rockefeller was
a man who demanded high performance from his executives. One day, one of those executives
made a two million dollar mistake. Word of the man's enormous error quickly spread
throughout the executive offices, and the other men began to make themselves scarce, not
wanting to cross his path.
One man didn't have any choice, however, since he had an appointment with the boss. So he
straightened his shoulders and walked into Rockefeller' s office. As he approached
Rockefeller's desk, he looked up from the piece of paper on which he was writing. "I
guess you've heard about the two million dollar mistake our friend made," he said
abruptly. "Yes," the executive said, expecting Rockefeller to explode.
"Well, I've been sitting here listing all of our friend's good qualities, and I've
discovered that in the past he has made us many more times the amount he lost for us today
by his one mistake. His good points far outweigh this one human error. So I think we ought
to forgive him, don't you?"--Dale Galloway, You Can Win with Love, in The
Tale of the Tardy Oxcart, Charles Swindoll, Word Pub., 1998, p. 215.
Forgiveness moves past the hurts and sees what God sees in us. As long as we are still
pouting over and tending our hurts, nothing good happens. That's why we are called to
"Forgive until it doesn't hurt!" Forgiveness heals, restores, makes new things
possible. How make times are we to forgive? Until we quit thinking about our hurt. Then,
we have really forgiven..