by Bob Cornwall

Gospel: Matthew 18:21-35

21 Then Peter came and said to him, "Lord, if another member of the church sins against me, how often should I forgive? As many as seven times?" 22 Jesus said to him, "Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy-seven times.

23 "For this reason the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his slaves. 24 When he began the reckoning, one who owed him ten thousand talents was brought to him; 25 and, as he could not pay, his lord ordered him to be sold, together with his wife and children and all his possessions, and payment to be made. 26 So the slave fell on his knees before him, saying, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you everything.' 27 And out of pity for him, the lord of that slave released him and forgave him the debt. 28 But that same slave, as he went out, came upon one of his fellow slaves who owed him a hundred denarii; and seizing him by the throat, he said, ‘Pay what you owe.' 29 Then his fellow slave fell down and pleaded with him, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you.'30 But he refused; then he went and threw him into prison until he would pay the debt. 31 When his fellow slaves saw what had happened, they were greatly distressed, and they went and reported to their lord all that had taken place. 32 Then his lord summoned him and said to him, ‘You wicked slave! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. 33 Should you not have had mercy on your fellow slave, as I had mercy on you?' 34 And in anger his lord handed him over to be tortured until he would pay his entire debt. 35 So my heavenly Father will also do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother or sister from your heart."
Matthew 18:21-35

What is it that you don't get about being forgiven? If you've been forgiven, then shouldn't you forgive others? Doesn't that make sense? It would seem appropriate that as a recipient of grace, one would recognize the responsibility to show the same grace to others. This is especially true if you have been forgiven much, and the person asking for forgiveness owes little in the way of debt or honor.

It makes sense that one who has experienced forgiveness would want to share the same with others, but forgiveness doesn't come easily. It doesn't matter if the person who offended you said something hurtful or killed a loved one. So, when Peter comes to Jesus and asks him if seven times is sufficient, he was thinking that he was being generous. To be honest, I sort of agree with him.

Now, to understand what Peter was asking when he came to Jesus, we have to back up a few verses to the previous week's reading. Jesus provides the disciples with a means by which a person might be restored to relationship after that relationship had been broken. What's interesting about this process is that the one offended is the one who pursues restoration. We assume, for the most part, that the onus is on the offender to seek reconciliation. Let the offender come to me and seek my forgiveness. But that isn't the way Jesus puts it in his directive (Matthew 18:15-20).

With this as the background, along with the earlier parable about the Lost Sheep, we come to Peter's question for Jesus. Is seven times enough? If I've gone through this process of restoration seven times, am I free to say no more to the one who continues to offend? Jesus tells Peter – no, how about seventy-seven times? The alternative translation is even larger – seventy times seven, which takes us to 4900 offenses. Too many to keep track of, and I'm assuming that's what Jesus had in mind. Just stop counting, and keep on forgiving.

Before moving to the parable that illustrates why we should forgive, it is important to remember the context of the conversation. We tend to read texts like this as referring to individuals, but the process of restoration that precedes this text suggests that Jesus and Peter have something else in mind. Indeed, it is best to read this whole section as referring to the way in which the church lives together. It would be absurd, though many a pastor has done so, to tell a wife who has experienced domestic violence to just forgive her husband and go back to life as usual. The recent stories about NFL star running back Ray Rice and his now wife, whom he brutally slugged in an elevator, is a good reminder of the possibilities of violence in individual relationships. But Peter's question is set in the context of the church and a process of accountability. Of course, as I noted last week, we struggle in the modern church with accountability in the church.

The gospel moves from Peter's question to the Parable of the Unforgiving Servant. This parable is quite hyperbolic. It is intended to shock and awe us into recognizing our own sensibilities when it comes to forgiveness.

Like many parables Jesus begins by referring to the Kingdom of God (heaven in Matthew). "The kingdom of heaven," he says, "may be compared to . . . " When we hear this it's easy to think that the parable has an eschatological focus and not this worldly one. In other words, whatever Jesus says here doesn't apply to the church. That is, for many of our own age, a good thing, since the church seems to have little value. It is merely an outmoded institution. But what if Jesus speaks here not of something forthcoming, but something that exists now – a community of people under the lordship/rule of God through Jesus?

Whether or not the Kingdom of God is larger than the church, whatever applies to the realm of God should apply to the church of Jesus Christ as well, shouldn't it? Therefore, whatever the kingdom is, it involves forgiveness and restoration. In fact, it appears to be a non-negotiable term of participation. It speaks to the way in which we live our lives in community. This is important because, as anyone who has experienced community knows, we have a tendency to step on each other's toes and worse.

Jesus parable is full of hyperbole. The contrast between the slave who is forgiven by the king and the slave who seeks forgiveness from the slave who has been forgiven much is quite wide. The slave who has been called in by the king seemingly owes more than can be repaid in several life times. Perhaps in this day of easy credit, this doesn't sound so outlandish, but in the first century no one could get that far into debt. So the reader understands – Jesus is making a point. This servant cannot repay the debt. It's too large. The king decides to get the most out of this servant as he can, so he orders the man and his wife sold, along with their possessions. At least something can be repaid. With nothing to lose, the slave begs for compassion. He asks for patience, so he can pay back what he owes – as if that is possible. The king is moved to pity, and gives him clemency. The king simply writes off the debt. We call this bankruptcy in our day. He gets start fresh. There are no claims against him. This is the gospel message. It is the message Paul declares in 2 Corinthians 5 – in Christ all things become new. The old is gone. This is message of the kingdom. It is, therefore, also the message of the church. So, you would think that the man who has been forgiven so much, would want to show the same graciousness to his fellow workers.

I can imagine the man skipping down the steps of the courthouse, shouting praises. All is good. That is, until he spots this other slave who owes him but a small amount. It's so small that it can be repaid in time. Perhaps not today, but given a month or two, this slave can scrape together what is needed. So this slave asks for patience. Give me a bit of time, and I will repay you everything. There's a parallel in the conversations. We're expecting the forgiven slave to act in the same way with his fellow slave as he was treated by the king. But such was not to be the case. No, the one just forgiven turns on this other slave and demands immediate payment or imprisonment.

Well, as you might expect, this didn't sit well with the other slaves who had witnessed the forgiveness offered by the king, and so they go to the king and share their concerns. The king, for his part, is rather put off as well. So he hauls in the unforgiving slave and demands to know why he has acted in this way: "Should you not have had mercy on your fellow slave as I had mercy on you?" (vs. 34).

The distressed king, who had chosen to be gracious, finds it impossible to be gracious once more. You would think, given the exchange with Peter that there would be another opportunity for forgiveness. But in this case there isn't. This ending can be distressing, especially if the preacher uses it to induce guilt. But relationships in the church based on guilt or fear don't go far. They often turn inward and create dysfunction. But, could it be that we can be so focused on ourselves that there is no possibility of restoration. Could it be, in the life of the church, despite Jesus' numbers, that there are some people who are so destructive to the community that they must be removed? Perhaps not tortured as in the parable, but still they simply don't get it.

Forgiveness, it seems clear enough, is the life blood of the community. Without it, the community cannot exist. The Niebuhrian in me (and it grows stronger by the year) won't allow me to embrace utopian ideals. There will not be a time, at least in this life, when graciousness and forgiveness are not needed for the church to exist and thrive and minister. Forgiveness is an ongoing proposition – as is confession of sin!

by Edward F. Markquart, Seattle, WA

Gospel: Matthew 18:21-35

They had been married for twenty five years. It was one of those average, not so good marriages. Not so good and not so bad. But over time, the love between the two of them gradually dissolved. He had an affair and that pretty much ended the marriage. They divorced, leaving her with the four children. She ended up much poorer than she thought she was going to be. There just wasn't enough money to pay all the bills, causing her much inner turmoil. He soon remarried, too soon so it felt. But it was the wedding day of their youngest daughter that got to her.....when that woman was escorted down the aisle, now seated right behind her. The inner rage started to burn. And when her husband come down the aisle, smiling ear to ear with their daughter, that was just too much. Her feelings of bitterness flooded into her heart, forming a pocket of poison within. Nobody knew it, of course; she covered it up with an appropriate smile. But that moment in the church on the wedding day was one of the most difficult times of her whole life.

He had been hired by his company right out of college. He had done well for himself, gradually climbing to the top. His company had gone through a couple of buy-outs, but he always landed on his feet, and landed on top. He hadn't seen it coming, but in the latest reorganization, his name wasn't part of the chart. He couldn't believe it. They gave him a good severance package and all, but he was out on the streets without a job. Too young to retire. Too old to get another good job. And the anger was building inside, anger towards the company, in particular anger towards his old boss. And he wasn't sleeping well any more and was taking too much aspirin for tension. Yes, at the bottom of his heart, was forming a pocket of poison.

She left Seattle for Minneapolis with the new baby, to show the baby off to her parents. The infant had all the necessary vaccinations, including the vaccination for polio. It was a real fluky deal, but the polio vaccine seeped through a diaper and into her cut finger, and she, herself, got polio, of all things. And by the time she and her daughter flew back to Seattle, she was in a wheel chair. What a bizarre turn of events! And when she came back home to Seattle, the marriage just couldn't handle it; her handicap, the new baby, a radically changed life. And gradually, at the bottom of her heart, was a pocket of poison, a pool of bitterness, growing ever so slowly.

God has built us human beings in such a way, that when we experience enormous pain in our lives, we respond with internal anger. When we experience enormous pain in our lives or prolonged pain or repeated petty pain in our lives, we human beings develop this pocket of poison in our hearts, a pool of anger and bitterness inside; and if this pocket of poison is not lanced and drained, it can kill us or ruin the rest of our lives.

To illustrate. My wife and I have just returned from our summer vacation where we were hiking up in the Rockies, both the American and Canadian Rockies. The first day out on the trails, we were on the top of Logan Pass at Glacier Park and we went on an eleven mile hike. It was not any easy one. By the end of that first hike on the first day of our vacation, my wife, Jan, had developed an enormous blister on the heel of her left foot. That blister had to be lanced and drained, or ..... we would ruin the rest of our hiking vacation. And so it is with you and me; if we don't lance the pockets of poison in the bottom of our hearts, it can ruin the rest of our lives.

It is with this introduction that we approach the Gospel lesson for today. And as a good rabbi, I would like to walk through the Biblical text with you. Would you please refer to your bulletin where the Gospel is printed? I would like to read the whole story again to you, highlighting certain words and phrases for you.

The word, "Peter." Peter means rock, solid as a rock. Two chapters ago in Matthew, in chapter 16, Jesus asked Peter who he was and Peter responded: "You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God." And Jesus said, "Very good, Simon. From now on I am going to call you Peter, Peter the solid rock, and on your confession of faith, I will build my church. You, Peter, are the solid rock, and I will give you the crucial keys of the kingdom, the keys of forgiveness." And so two chapters ago, Peter was given the keys of the kingdom, the master key to the kingdom, the key of forgiveness, but Peter, the Rock, didn't know how to use the keys of the kingdom. It was now time for him to learn how to use the keys of the kingdom, the keys of forgiveness.

And so Peter, the Rock, asked Jesus, the Son of God, "How many times shall I forgive?" "Forgive." Focus on the word forgive. The word forgive, "apheamee," in the Greek language, means to "let go." Look at my hand, clenched and hard, and then my clenched hand opens to let go. Let go of the rock. Let go of the rage. Let go of the anger. It is letting to of what you are clutching in your hand. The word, forgive, means to let go. ..... In my Adult Inquiry class, I always teach about how to trap monkeys. You drill holes the size of a monkey's hand into a coconut, and put such coconuts under the trees where the monkeys are. The monkey squeezes his right hand into the hole and grabs the coconut meat inside; his right hand is expanded by grabbing the sweet coconut. Then the left hand. Then the right foot. Then the left foot. And now, all four appendages of the monkey are trapped as he clutches the coconut. The only way the monkey can become free is to let go, let go of the coconut. ..... And likewise with you and me, the only way we become free of the pain we have experienced....the deep pain, the prolonged pain, the repeated pain.....the only way we ever become free is to let go of the way we have been hurt by others.

"My brother." My brother is a broad word, including all human beings. My brother, sister, mother, father, son, daughter, friend, co-worker, neighbor, stranger, in laws, ex laws, spouse, ex spouse, even myself, especially myself. Sometimes the person who has hurt you most deeply is yourself. Through poor choices; foolish actions. Sometimes the person most difficult to forgive is one's self. "My brother" includes all human beings who have hurt you deeply or repeatedly.

"Who has sinned." The word sin means "miss the mark, miss the target." Imagine a target there in the front of the church, and your have a bow and arrow and you are about to shoot the arrow at the target, at the bulls eye of target. Your arrow flies and you miss the whole target. You miss the mark. And so it is with our lives; we miss the mark of doing it right; we miss the target of doing things the way God wanted us to, the way we wanted to, coming up short. Missed again. Didn't do it quite right.

"Against me." That personal word, "me." The pain is always the greatest when it affects me and mine. Me, my family, my closest friends. When someone deeply hurts me, my family, my closest friends, my rage against such people burns inside of me.

And then Peter quickly thinks to himself: "Three times? I know in the Old Testament, the prophets tell us to forgive others three times. The Old Testament is clear about that. Like baseball, three strikes and you're out. Like our new laws, three strikes and you're out of society and into prison. Three sins and you're out. But Jesus seems to be a generous hearted fellow, so I will ‘up it' to seven."

"Seven times, Jesus?" And Jesus said, "No, Peter, not seven times but seventy seven times." And Peter's mouth dropped. Flabbergasted. Stunned. He had never heard of such a thing. It was shocking. Jesus spoke the Aramaic language. In Aramaic, they have no words for million, billion, trillion, infinity. They didn't have such big numbers, so when Jesus said, seventy seven seventy seven seventy seven seventy seven seventy seven, it was like saying "infinitely." And Peter's mouth dropped. He was stunned. No one had ever said that in the history of human race. Not in the Old Testament. Not in the ancient philosophers. No one ever. Of course, Peter would not have known that, but we know that. Incredible.

And Jesus said, "let me tell you a story that illustrates this." And Jesus went on to tell the following story.

"There was a servant owed the king 10,000 talents." Ten thousand talents! And his jaw dropped again. That's the equivalent of twenty-five life times of labor. Impossible. Incredible. What servant could ever run up that kind of debt? Taxation for the Roman empire for all of Israel ran 600 talents a year. It was an unimaginable number, the level of debt that was run up by such a peon servant. And it is unimaginable the level of debt that we human beings can run up against God, an accumulation of sin throughout our whole life time.

"Sold the servant, his wife and children and all possessions to pay the debt." Wow. This king is tough, selling not only the servant, but his whole family.

"The servant fell on his knees and pleaded 'be patient with me.'" And that is the way we are with God. When we get up to the pearly gates and face Jesus and Simon Peter, gatekeeper in all the jokes; when we stand before God, at the pearly gates, we will be pleading: "Be patient with me. I tried. I know it wasn't good enough. I really need your patience with me."

"I will pay back everything I owe." What a liar. How could the servant pay back twenty five life times of labor? Impossible. Could any of you pay back a debt of twenty five million dollars? Of twenty five billion dollars? Could I see your hands? No one. And who could ever pay God back for all the sins of our entire lives, beginning with infancy, early childhood, the teen years, all the years? Who could ever pay God back for the accumulation of our sins and missing the mark our entire lives? Could anyone pay back such a debt? No one.

"But the servant's master." And by now, you clearly realize that you are in the middle of Jesus' parable, and the servant's master, the king, is God. Yes, this parable is obviously about God.

"God, the master or king, took pity on him." Pity. Mercy. This is one of the most important words in the Bible to describe God, in both the Old and New Testaments. That God's heart is merciful and kind. The psalmist said it over and over again: Gods' mercy endures forever. God's mercy endures forever. God's mercy lives forever. It is God's kindness of heart that we rely upon and need.

"Canceled his debt." Incredible. God cancels the debt. And immediately, our mind rushes to other Bible verses which tell us that Christ's death on the cross paid for all our sins. Our sins are canceled on the cross; our slate is wiped clean; our sins are erased. The atonement of Christ. The death of Christ. The payment of Christ, canceling all our sins.

"And let him go"...free. This is the heart of the theology of the Apostle Paul. Christ died on the cross to pay the penalty for our sins. Our debt is canceled. He let's go of our sins; he forgives our sins and we are now free.

Jesus could have ended his story right now and he would have summarized the theology of grace, but Jesus has more to say, more twists and turns that need to be revealed.

(Then read the rest of the parable about the harsh, unforgiving servant.)

The key line to the parable: shouldn't you have mercy on your fellow servant...your husband, wife, ex husband, ex wife, children, parents, co-worker, boss, exlaw, inlaws, yourself...as I have had on you? This is the key question to the parable. ... There is a momentary pause, and Christ waits for your answer.

Again, Jesus could have ended the parable here, but adds another twist. In anger, the king turned the first servant over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back." In Matthew's Gospel, you often hear of this threat of hell and damnation, the "grinding and gnashing of teeth," the eternal punishment of God.

The threat of the tortures of hell always gets your attention.

Unless you forgive your brother from the heart. From the heart. Forgiveness from the heart. Not merely from the lips. Not merely from the head. Not merely out of churchly obligation. But that forgiveness would genuinely flow from deep within the human heart.

And when Jesus finished telling this story, I wrote on bottom of the page. Scintillating. Brilliant. Genius. Only a spiritual genius could have created such a story. Or, the very Son of God who knew the heart and mind of God.

So what does this parable mean for our lives? How do we apply this story to the way we live and die?

First, the language of love is always the language of forgiveness. Love is not love unless it is essentially the spirit of forgiveness. Forgives as Jesus forgives is the master key of all human relationships. You cannot live in the house of life with all it varied rooms without a master key, and the master key of the house of life is forgiveness.

Now, why is this so? Why is forgiveness so essential to successful living? Because the only kind of human beings there are on this earth are imperfect ones, who miss the mark, who don't do it right, who come up short; and the only way you can live an abundant life with such imperfect people is with forgiveness....letting to of their sins, of your sins, of their imperfections, of your imperfections; of their mistakes, of your mistakes. Let me be absolutely clear: All people are imperfect. That's the way it will always be with all people here on earth, and the only way your can live with such imperfect people, including yourself, is through forgiveness. Oh, you can be miserable. You can forever punish others and yourself for your flaws and their flaws, but the only way to live happily with imperfect people is to learn the divine art of forgiveness...letting go.

Forgiveness is essential to living. It is simply true: you cannot live without water. You cannot live without food. And you cannot live without forgiveness. That's just the way life is. That is true. Dr. Weatherhead said that forgives is the most powerful therapeutic force in the world, and I agree. Forgiveness of self. Forgiveness of others. It is absolutely essential in order to live.

Forgiveness is the master key to the kingdom of God and the house of life, and we need to learn how to use that master key well..... and often.

Second, in this parable, Jesus is inspiring us to forgive, motivating us, lifting us up, encouraging us to be more forgiving people. And how does Jesus do this? By telling us of the greatness, the vastness, the mind-boggling infinity of God's forgiveness towards us. Millions, billions, trillions of sin that God has forgiveness us. Wiped it away. Canceled. Payment made in Jesus Christ. If God is go generous in forgiving us, certainly we need to be generous in forgiving others, including ourselves.

When we were on our vacation, we happened to be watching TV one morning as we were getting ready for the day, and about the only channel available to us was a religious channel. The host was interviewing a woman whose son had been murdered at school, in a shooting similar to the one that happened at Columbine Highschool. The mother of a boy who had been killed told of how she talked to the mother of the son who had killed her boy; and how she talked to the murderer himself. And as this grieving mother talked, you sensed that God's healing had already been at work, that the pool of poison in the bottom of her heart, was being drained of its poisonous power. The nature of her grief was inspiring, because her grief was deep and enormously difficult, but at the same time, there was an absence of bitterness in her. She was an inspirational person.

The same is true of interviews that I have seen of Nelson Mandella, the President of South Africa who had been in prison for more than thirty years, who had been tortured by his guards. It has always amazed me that Mandella has this peace about him, this inner tranquillity, after losing three decades of life to prison. That pool of poison seems to have been drained completely from Mandella's heart.

And that is the reason that Jesus tells this story about the immensity of God's forgiveness towards us. A million. A billion. A trillion amount of forgiveness for your sins and mine. And the purpose of this is to inspire us, motivate us, lift us up, enable us to be forgiving people. When the story if finished, you don't want to be cheap with your own forgiveness towards yourself and others.

But this story is not only to inspire us to forgive, we also hear that we are commanded to forgive. God says, "If you don't forgive the sins of others, neither will I forgive you your sins." And we hear this threat. So God not only inspires us to forgive; he then commands; then demands forgiveness from us.

I wish we prayed the Lord's Prayer according to Matthew's version instead of Luke's. You know Luke's version of the Lord's Prayer. It is marked indelibly into your memory chip: "Our Father.......forgive us our sins, as we forgive those who sin again us. And lead us not into temptation." But Matthew's version has this twist: forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us. For if we do not forgive the sins of others, neither will God our heavenly father forgive us our sins. Ouch. What if you and I prayed that version of the Lord's prayer every day instead of Luke's version, I think it would make a difference. We would know that forgiveness is also God's demand, God's command.

Two chapters before, in Matthew 16, Peter had been given the keys of the kingdom, the master key to the house of life, the keys of forgiveness. He didn't know how to use those keys yet, and so two chapters later, in the story for today, Peter asked Jesus, "And how often should I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Three times? Seven times?"

And Jesus said "seventy seven seventy seven seventy seven seventy seven seventy seven seventy seven" (said as I the preacher walked to my seat and sat down), and Peter's mouth dropped in shock by what Jesus said. Amen."

by Steve Kindle

The biggest difficulty in the ability to forgive is to confuse forgiveness with reconciliation. These are two entirely different issues and require two entirely different approaches. The pastor who counsels an abused wife "to just forgive her husband and go back to life as usual," illustrates this confusion. Because we think forgiveness means reconciliation, that is, a restoration of the relationship, people either balk at forgiving or refuse it altogether. I don't blame them.

But this is all unnecessary. If we can distinguish between the two, we can forgive without having to established a restored relationship first, or even have that as its goal.

So let's define our terms.

Forgiveness is the decision one makes, irrespective of the conditions in the life of offender, to no longer be an obstacle to the well-being of the offender.

The offended party is then available to pursue reconciliation, put forgiveness precedes it.
Whether reconciliation happens or not, forgiveness has. If reconciliation is a condition for forgiveness, we make forgiveness a contingency on the right behavior of the offender, not on mercy.

by John McCauslin

We expect forgiveness from others, either because we don't feel our misconduct is all that wrong, because we said the magic words (e.g., I'm sorry) or because we think we are just too dear of a human being not to be forgiven.

And yet we are quick to determine that the misconduct of others is too condemnable to merit forgiveness, or to merit forgiveness yet.

Steve's point about our refusal to forgive serving as a poison only to us is a timeless truth.

Maybe Jesus' point was that forgiveness is a non-negotiable aspect of what it means to love. If you can't forgive, your claim to be a loving member of the community or in a loving relation with another is a matter of serious doubt.

by The Rev. J. Curtis Goforth, O.S.L.

Gospel: Matthew 18:21-35

One of the most striking forms of Christian witness, one even the world at its worst will occasionally stop to notice, is the forgiveness of a perpetrator by a victim. One of the greatest gifts I received during my time in seminary was learning about how real people lived out Christ's example of forgiveness despite horrific injustice. During my third year of seminary I took a class called "God and Caesar: The Church's Struggle Against Apartheid." The class was taught by Peter Storey, a retired South African Methodist minister, who worked side by side with Archbishop Desmond Tutu as Christian leaders in bringing down the unjust system of Apartheid. In the course of his ministry, Dr. Storey served as Nelson Mandela's prison chaplain on Robin Island.

Mandela became a high profile case of a victim forgiving his perpetrators. He was unjustly imprisoned for 27 years for no crime other than his convictions. When apartheid was ended in 1994 and elections were held where he was elected President of South Africa, the tables were turned. The prisoner had become president. If you had been wrongly imprisoned and had the opportunity to seek justice on those who had taken away 27 years of your life, what would you do?

Amazingly, one of Mandela's first public gestures was to invite his white jailer to his inauguration as an honored guest.. When asked why he forgave those who wronged him rather than exacting vengeance, Mandela replied that he was held captive for 27 years and that if he held onto hate and vengeance, then he would still be imprisoned. Only in forgiving those who wronged him would he truly be free.

In our gospel lesson today, Jesus tells us the story of a man who owed today's equivalent of 10 million dollars or more to the king. The king ordered that the man and his family and his possessions be sold to help get some money back. But the man fell on his face and begged the king to be merciful and to be patient with him. The king must have been having a good day that day, and he forgave all the past debts this man owed him. But later on, this same servant who was forgiven so much was found shaking down someone who owed him a fairly small sum, and when this man begged for mercy and patience, the forgiven debtor had him thrown into prison.

It is difficult to see our own situations in the stories of the Bible sometimes. I personally like to think about the topic of forgiveness, but I like to ignore it when it applies to me personally. It is so easy to hear the instruction of Jesus and go on with our lives just as before. E. Stanley Jones wrote something I will never forget. He said, "We inoculate the world with just enough Christianity so that when we are exposed to the real thing, we are immune to it." We hear Jesus tell us to forgive others and we pray in the Lord's Prayer to forgive us as we forgive those who sin against us, but really…how many of us truly take the matter to heart? I don't. I have the hardest time in the world forgiving people or companies that have wronged me. I even keep a list. I have on the list those businesses that have wronged me in some way. Let me read it to you.

1. Marriott Corporation (treated me terribly as an employee in college)

2. Rob Dolard Photography (ruined our wedding photos)

3. Enterprise Rent a Car (charged us $500 for something we didn't do)

4. LaTonya Ellis (gave collection agencies my number instead of her own)

I have over 11 persons or companies listed on my list that if I ever rule the world will pay for their transgressions. Whether or not we keep an actual list, we have one in our minds, and it is just as real if not more so than one written on paper.

We all have a bag full of rocks that we carry around with us. Whenever somebody wrongs us, we throw another rock in that bag. Whenever your girlfriend or boyfriend in high school dumped you for somebody else, you put a big rock in that bag. Whenever you didn't get that job you were more than qualified for, you put another rock in the bag. Whenever your spouse wouldn't let you make that purchase you've always wanted and truly deserve…there goes another rock in the bag. Whenever your in-laws made that hurtful comment about you, still another rock went into the bag. Whenever your spouse cheated on you, whenever your child lied to you, whenever your friend stole from you, whenever that company sold you something that just didn't work and they wouldn't take it back and give you a refund…there went still more rocks.

What we end up with is a bag full of rocks that is awfully heavy. It has some big rocks, some little rocks, some medium-sized ones, but they weight us down and they pin us underneath their heavy load. Whenever we are wronged, we want retribution, we want justice, we might call it many different things, but what it really should be called is revenge. When we are wronged, when our family is wronged, when our community is wronged…we want, no, we demand revenge. We might as well be saying, give me another big rock to carry around.

Jesus doesn't call us to seek revenge, he calls us to forgive. And, he calls those whom we may wrong to forgive us as well. Forgiveness is not easy, it is not the way we operate, but it is the only way we will ever live our lives with freedom, with joy, with peace.

In that class I took with Nelson Mandella's prison chaplain, I also learned a lot about the work of Desmond Tutu, who was on the front lines of the struggle against apartheid for decades. He went through horrific things. Many people he loved were tortured and murdered because of his and their convictions. He was the victim of scare tactics and was imprisoned for his work. Yet, through it all he remained the theological spokesperson for non-violence and reconciliation.

In class we learned about the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa. Tutu was chosen to chair the commission. This commission was set up to uncover the atrocities that occurred under the apartheid system. Two types of testimony were heard by the commission: the wrenching personal stories of the victims and their families and the depositions of the perpetrators who sought amnesty by confessing their crimes. The commission focused especially on enabling the wrongdoers to repent and publicly ask for forgiveness. In his book No Future Without Forgiveness Tutu tells the story of his chairmanship of the commission.

Forgiveness was neither cheap nor easy…True reconciliation is not cheap. It cost God the death of His only begotten Son. Forgiving and being reconciled are not about pretending that things are other than they are. It is not patting one another on the back and turning a blind eye to the wrong. True reconciliation exposes the awfulness, the abuse, the pain, the degradation, the truth…It is a risky undertaking but in the end it is worthwhile…In forgiving, people are not asked to forget…Forgiveness does not mean condoning what has been done…It involves trying to understand the perpetrators and so have empathy, to try to stand in their shoes and appreciate the sorts of pressures and influences that might have conditioned them. Forgiveness is not sentimental….Forgiveness means abandoning your right to pay back the perpetrator…, but it is a loss that liberates the victim…He then continues, asking: Does the victim depend on the culprit's contrition and confession as the precondition for being able to forgive?…Jesus did not wait until those who were nailing him to the Cross had asked for forgiveness. He was ready, as they drove in the nails, to pray to his Father to forgive them.