Beloved, today Jesus teaches us that forgiveness comes easier in the receiving than it does in the giving. But give, dear brothers and sisters, give! With Jesus there is always more!
It is a dangerous thing to ask the Lord a question, isn't it. But that doesn't stop the scribes. It doesn't stop the Pharisees. It doesn't stop us. And it certainly didn't stop Peter. “Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? Up to seven times?”
Peter has heard Jesus talk “forgiveness talk” over and over. He gets it. Sort of. “I'll forgive my brother, sure, I understand. But there's a limit right? How about seven times. That seems reasonable. Who could blame me for not forgiving an eighth time? If they're repentant, they're going to stop. We won't even get to eight!”
But Jesus doesn't care for the question. Counting is law talk. What does theology have to do with mathematics? Well, not much. The sins of all people in all times in all places plus Jesus equals zero. Stop counting, Peter. Seventy times seven. Try that number on for size. I know you're going to stop counting long before you get to four hundred ninety. And that's the point, Peter. Stop counting.
Jesus tells a story, and he knows Peter's listening. Peter might be a disruptive student, but he usually remembers the material. And just what do you think he might get from this story? The kingdom of heaven is like a King who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. The first guy comes. He owes more than he could pay in a thousand lifetimes. Whoops. Glad I'm not him!
The King requires from him all that he has. He's terrified. “Have patience with me! I will pay it all.” Peter chuckles a bit. “Yeah right, Jesus. Tiberius Caesar doesn't have that kind of cash! Even Solomon would have thought twice before writing the check!”
But the King loves his servant, and He cannot help but be who He is. His guts get all tied up inside. A tear moistens his eye. He forgives the debt. Peter makes a mark in the dirt with his sandals. “One.” He's still counting.
The forgiven servant finds one who owes him a small sum. A drop in the ocean compared to what he's been forgiven. Three month's wages. And he grabs the poor servant by the throat. He shakes him, and he throws him into prison. Peter is enraged. How dare one who has received such mercy be such a cheapskate in showing mercy! This is unspeakable evil!
The King seems to agree with Peter. He comes back to the unmerciful servant and hands him over for torture until he has paid every penny, a debt he can never pay. Yeah, Jesus. That's what I'm talking about! That creep's getting just what he's got coming. How dare he treat someone so badly.
And, oh, how we love to see someone get what's coming to them. What goes around comes around and there's a little satanic glee that fills our hearts and eats our souls when we see our brother suffer for his sins.
And that's the problem, isn't it. We like receiving forgiveness. It's the place from which our very life flows. We look to the cross and we say, “Yes! Jesus has died for me! He has shed his blood for me! He has forgiven my sins.” But what's good for the goose isn't good for the gander. What's good for the goose is good for the goose! The gander can save his own neck.
We want to be like Peter. Peter doesn't realize that he's the unmerciful servant he's condemning, the same unmerciful servant who has received his very life from the King. We want to try to hold all that love, all that life, inside of us. But, friends, it just doesn't work that way. If you try to keep Jesus to yourself, He'll burst forth from you, and that's not going to be good. He'll leave you behind, because Jesus is Gift, and He's not going to be satisfied unless He's being given out.
And so we don't get to keep Him to ourselves. We don't get to make a little box, put Jesus inside it, and keep him there in a nice cool dark place where He can never have His way with us. The grave couldn't hold him, and neither can we.
No, that's not the way to keep the Lord. The way to keep the Lord is to give Him away. Give Him away! With Jesus, there's always more!
Peter wants to be the King. He wants to judge whether or not the person is truly repentant. And what is this true repentance? It's letting God kill the old sinful flesh. It's receiving the gifts of forgiveness He has given you by your new life in Holy Baptism, the selfsame life He gives in His own Body and Blood.
When you're alive, you'll do things that living beings do. Life finds a way. Life gives more life. Forgiveness is life! The King didn't throw the man to the torturers because the King was fickle. No, the King threw the unmerciful servant to torment because he was dead. And the dead can only feel pain. Suffering is their only reward.
When Peter keeps a tally of sin and of forgiveness, he's taking the cup of salvation the King has given him, and he's pouring the life out onto the ground. And if you keep rejecting life, then eventually you'll run out of it altogether. You'll starve. You'll die. And accounting is poisonous in the Scriptures.
And that's where the parable seems to leave us, isn't it. The kingdom of heaven is like a King, and we know who the King is: He's the Eternal One, the One who knows our need before we even ask it. And so that leaves us two options. Are we Peter, the unmerciful servant who suffers hellish torment because he wants love to stay tame and gentle? Or are we maybe the
fellow servant, the one who begs for mercy but does not receive it?
The answer, beloved, is that we are both. We are servants who desperately need the mercy of the King and of each other. Too often we go to our neighbor and receive from him everything but what we most need. We go to our brother confessing our sins and wanting Jesus, and we receive just what we so often give. Judgment. Condemnation. Death. With the portion you give, so shall you receive.
And so the answer is simple. You are a subject of the King. Let Him have His way with you. Receive. Receive. See the gifts your King gives and take them into your mouth. Hear them and take them into your ears!
Love runs wild. The Lion of the tribe of Judah is not tame. And where He is, in His Holy Church, there is forgiveness. You come here, to this place, and God comes to you. And He smiles. He has spread his arms wide. He has destroyed your sin on the cross, and He wasn't afraid of nails, of whips, and of the spit of the ones who hated Him.
He let the world have its way with Him, and the world's ways are over. They're done with. No more of that. Now the Lion is coming for you. And he's not cuddly, but He loves you. He'll run into the fray and confront anything that might keep you from him. Sin and death and hell and Satan have been ripped to shreds by the Lion's claws. And He'll keep doing it even if it's your own lack of forgiveness He's tearing apart. He'll rip it out of you, and take it into
Himself. It can't survive in His Body. God destroys every idol. He'll let nothing stand between you and His Love which He has manifested to you on the cross.
He is risen and so are you. Life now! Forgiveness now! Eternal life now! Jesus is yours, and you, dear Christian, are called by His Name.
Give Him away. There's always more! And the more will keep going. It started in your Baptism. It'll keep going for eternity. That's a long time. That's a lot of Jesus. And He loves you.
In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the
Holy Spirit.
Amen.
