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Grace, mercy, and peace be unto you, from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen. What a great and glorious God have we. Unbelievable that He would choose to put on flesh and blood in order to bring us release and freedom from the bondage of our own guilt and of the debt that we owe Him. Amen. So loving and miraculous is God, who did this in His flesh and blood, that He wishes then to bring forgiveness to one another through your and my flesh and blood as well. Very incarnational.
Our entire divine service is centered around that. Think about it. That a sinful man would come forth and proclaim to you and to me, who are repentant sinners, who have confessed our own guilt and shame, and only we know the deep, dark secrets of our heart, we would hear from the lips of flesh and blood forgiveness, as if from God himself. And in no wise doubt should we believe those same words apply to you and to me. And then we’re turning to one another and sharing the peace of that forgiveness that was given to us. It’s not howdy, how you doing time. It’s sharing that piece of forgiveness that we’ve just received. It is giving flesh and blood to God’s forgiveness that we first received. And then in just a little bit, we’re going to gather up here at the rail, and we will kneel together and eat that flesh and blood that brought us redemption and release and freedom of bondage.
And we will not do it alone in our own little private world, but we’re going to do it with one another here, signifying that we are united in our forgiveness of one another as we are united first and foremost with the forgiveness that God has showered upon us. Peter was asking that question. How many times, Lord, there has to be a logical amount of time; there has to be a logical line in the sand that when someone crosses, we can cut them off from our forgiveness. You must have to cut us off for forgiveness too, Lord. There’s got to be a line in the sand for us too that you say no more. You are damned. You don’t deserve my forgiveness. There’s got to be. That’s why Peter asked that question. That’s why we ask that question too, don’t we? Especially for those who we deem undeserving of our forgiveness.
But notice for a second, rather than your point of view or my point of view, notice how our actions with God’s forgiveness affect other people. See, we think that our relationship with God is just between me and God, and our relationship with God isn’t between other people, and it doesn’t affect other people. So if I’m struggling with forgiving this person, it doesn’t affect anybody else in my life. That’s a lie. In this morning’s parable, it is the other servants that are upset. The other servants are offended. The other weak brothers, as Paul mentioned in the epistle reading, are struggling with what was given to this servant and he not giving it to others.
You see, that first servant came before that master fully, fully owing that master far more than imaginably could be paid back. In other words, even if this servant worked every day of every year, it would take him forever. Thousands of years to pay that debt back, which basically says it was impossible. He pleads for mercy and says, I’ll pay you back. I’ll make it right. I’ll do better. Maybe we’ve heard someone say that to us. And do you know what that master did? He’s insane. He is a complete and utter fool. He gives the servant forgiveness. He breaks him of his bond and says, okay, you don’t owe me. You’re free. That’s foolishness and insanity. But he does it.
And all the other servants know that this guy was given that forgiveness. Because such a huge debt to be forgiven was going to be talked about by the other servants. So when they watch him come from the master’s presence and grab one of his fellow servants by the scruff of the neck, choking him, and says, pay what you owe, they have to be scratching their heads and saying, did he not just get this debt forgiven? Amen? Did he not just be told by the Master that he owes nothing? This isn’t right. And they are right. It isn’t right.
Jesus said it in another way. He said, if you forgive only those who forgive you, how is that different from the rest of the world? That’s how the rest of the world operates, isn’t it? You forgive me, I owe you now, so I forgive you. Jesus goes on and says, you’re different from the rest of the world. That’s not how you are. Because you’re like that servant. You’ve been proclaimed to you. You’ve had it fed to you. You’re different than the rest of the world. The rest of the world deals on a total law basis. A tit for a tat. Very legalistic. And God deals like the master with you and me. Completely insane. Because he forgives where people don’t deserve it.
And not only does he do that, he takes the initiative for you and to me. Before we ever could believe in such forgiveness, did he seek us out in our lostness? Did he find us in our deadness and resurrect us with forgiveness and then gives it to us? And he doesn’t just choose to give it to us once, twice, but daily he gives it to us. Weekly he gathers us together with other broken people whose broken lives we can fix up all we want on the outside, but the heart still is broken, isn’t it? And you know and I know those dark places that are broken.
And the crazy thing is, the most insane part of this all is that this insane and completely foolish God who forgives people who don’t deserve it, He entrusts his forgiveness to you to give to everyone else, especially those who don’t deserve it. He is foolish indeed, according to the world standard, but not to God’s wisdom. Remember the order of events. Very important. The master forgave the servant far more than he deserved, far more than he asked. Then the servant, having been given that, had something to give to someone else. You and I come here with empty sacks that have to be filled up with His forgiveness.
We have to first and foremost be forgiven or we’re going to struggle forgiving someone else because we’ve got nothing to give. And it’s not a one-time event. It’s daily and weekly. That’s why the Master said, as I showed mercy to you, it was necessary for you to show mercy to him, wasn’t it? And the answer is, yes, it was necessary. The prayer that our Lord taught us to pray, the Lord’s Prayer, the Our Father, the fifth petition of that prayer says, forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. Forgiveness is not an option. It’s who God is. It’s who His children are.
So firmly did Jesus want to indelibly mark this upon the hearts and minds of His children. After the Lord’s prayer had been taught to His disciples, He added these two more phrases or sentences about forgiveness. Our Lord said, if you forgive men their trespasses, your Heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men, neither will your Heavenly Father forgive your transgressions. How is it possible? What about my feelings? What about what was done to me? What about the injustice that I have experienced?
Remember the order of events. Locate first and foremost from where your forgiveness comes. It comes first and foremost from the riven side of your Lord and His pierced hands and feet, the sacrifice that was made for you. Locate where that forgiveness is given to you, here in this place, by the lips of that pastor, by the flesh and blood with the bread and wine that we’re going to eat in unity as fellow servants, fellow wicked servants of the same Master who forgives us and gives us that forgiveness to give to one another, especially to the ones who don’t deserve it.
A very important aspect of this forgiveness is that we must keep the distinction between the commitment to forgive and any feelings we have along the way. They are at disparity with one another. Forgiveness is not a feeling. It is a commitment. Keep that distinction clear in your heart and mind for Satan wants you to blend those and completely obliterate that distinction. The commitment to forgive and the feelings, whether they come or whether they go, are not to be seen as synonymous. You and I will chase our tail like a dog if we think that they are. Forgiveness is about releasing things.
Being released first and foremost, being let go of the debt that we are first and foremost, then it’s the release of other people. And those ones who don’t deserve it, they may never receive it from you. The lick’s on them. God has said we must forgive because he’s forgiven us and has filled our sack full to share it with other people. We sometimes have in our mind that through our emotions, we’re going to rekindle this relationship. It’s going to be different than it was. It’s going to be like what we dreamed it could be. Don’t go down that path, because that’s Satan’s path again.
It may be as good as it gets. It is the forgiveness in our heart toward them, the commitment to forgive. Keep that separate from the attendant feelings that come and go. And just like with little children, since we are little children, we have to be told it many times. Mommy, Daddy, do you forgive me? Do you love me? Am I your good girl or good boy? And we sometimes have a nuisance thinking that they have to ask us again. No, that’s exactly what you should be asking your Heavenly Father. And He says to you again with open arms, you are my beloved son. You are my beloved daughter. Feed upon that which is my forgiveness, my flesh and blood.
Be filled. Be filled. That you then can give it to someone else. And though they may refuse your forgiveness, offer it. Remember again, the master gave more than the servant deserved. The master gave more than the servant asked. So your Heavenly Father has given you more than either you and I have deserved and far more than either you and I can ask.
Finally, note this very important phrase in this text. Jesus does not say this. He does not say, if you cannot forgive them, you will not be forgiven. He does not say, if you cannot forgive them, you will not be forgiven. He says, if you will not forgive them, you cannot be forgiven. There’s a difference. The difference is, you and I may go to our graves struggling to forgive. That’s different than obstinately drawing the line and saying, I will not. That’s when bitterness creeps in and faith dies. That’s when faith dies. And our own trust in God’s forgiveness dwindles.
And we begin to justify ourselves and all of our actions. If Jesus has to repeatedly come to you and to me, here in this place, to bring us His forgiveness in flesh and blood, He will use us repeatedly in our husbands’ lives and in our wives’ lives. He will use us in our children’s lives and they in our lives as parents. He will use us as fellow members of the same body of Christ, eating and drinking together, to bolster one another up, to build one another up, repeatedly. Seventy times seven means always, just as he will always receive us back as he did the prodigal son.
His forgiveness and mercy trumps all of our feelings and all of our uncertainties. We’ve got a gracious God. God be praised. Amen.
We rise. Please pray with me. Let holy charity mine outward vesture be, and lowliness become mine inner clothing. True lowliness of heart, which takes the humbler part, and over its great shortcomings weeps with loathing. In the name of the One who did that for you and me, Jesus. Amen.