Dear Friends,
A father and son had been estranged for a very long time. Finally, aching for reconciliation but unable to get his son to communicate with him, the father placed an ad in the local paper’s classified section. It read, “Paco, meet me at noon this Wednesday at the Hotel Montaña. All is forgiven. Papa.”
As noon on Wednesday approached, Paco’s father walked to the Hotel Montaña, wondering if his son would be there and praying that he would be. Turning the corner onto the hotel’s street, he encountered a large crowd of young men, all named Paco. Each hoped that it was his father who was offering reconciling forgiveness, and each had responded in that hope to the simple classified ad. How very much we want and need forgiveness, and how deeply we need to offer forgiveness!
As we prepare to explore Jesus’s parable about forgiveness, please share this prayer for illumination with all your sisters and brothers who join you in reading today’s note:
Merciful God, in this moment of stillness, we ask you to wash us clean of presumptions. Receive us as your weary children, and then, by the power of your Spirit, bless us with your reviving word. We ask this in the name of Jesus, your living Word. Amen.
Forgiveness is a central doctrine of Christianity. The prayer we say most often is the Lord’s Prayer, and every time we pray it, we ask for forgiveness. “Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.” The word “debt” here means far more than monetary or social debt. It also includes transgression, insult, trespass, and sin, to name a few. Not only do we rarely consider the full meaning of the words of this familiar prayer and that line in particular, but all too often, the words slip far too routinely from our mouths. When we stop to think about them at all, most of us focus on the confession that’s implicit in our request for forgiveness. Seldom do we consider the words that end the plea: “as we forgive our debtors.”
Just as we must ask for forgiveness, so must we forgive. Peter approached Jesus and asked, “How often should I forgive? As many as seven times?” (18:21) That last part is such an unexpected question. He’s not asking how to forgive, but how many times to do so. Perhaps he was trying to impress Jesus by exaggerating the depth of his piety and understanding. But in many ways, his question actually betrayed how shallow his understanding was.
Jesus responded, “Not seven times, but I tell you, seventy-seven times.” (18:22) If Peter was expecting praise for suggesting seven times, Jesus’s answer would certainly have been a surprise; his proud seven times suddenly becomes weak and ineffectual.
And Jesus may have actually been suggesting a much higher number. Our understanding of the Bible is always handicapped by translation (and translations of translations!). Many commentators say that this passage could be more appropriately translated as 7 times 70, which would mean forgiving 490 times. It could also be translated as 7 times 77, which would mean 539 times.
Seven is a number with distinct meaning in the Bible, and 77 would not simply have popped into Jesus’s head, just as the number 7 was far from random for Peter. In Genesis, for example, when Lamech, the great-great-great grandson of Cain, returned from battle, he sang a deeply disturbing victory song to his wives that concluded with, “I have killed a man for wounding me, a young man for striking me. If Cain is avenged sevenfold, truly Lamech seventy-sevenfold.” (Genesis 4:23-24) What I find so disturbing here is the emphasis on revenge, and that the thirst for revenge had continued from Cain through the generations to Lamech.
No matter how we read the number Jesus gives to Peter – whether we must forgive 77, 490, or 539 times, it’s a number that’s hard to keep track of. It’s not a one-to one or even a two-to-one exchange like a quid pro quo. All that said, the exact number is not what’s important here; what Jesus is saying is that forgiveness is endless: we must continually be willing to forgive, and forgive again, and yet again.
In his response to Peter, Jesus was replacing a deeply-ingrained attitude of revenge with an attitude of forgiveness. As Martin Luther King, Jr. said “Forgiveness is not an occasional act; it is a permanent attitude.” Forgiveness is an attitude of life, an attitude of faithful life.
Such an attitude of forgiveness requires maturity of vision and understanding. When my brother and I were just little boys, and my mother caught him in the act of hitting me, she immediately intervened, of course, and told him in no uncertain terms to stop. I’m sure you can guess his defense: “But he hit me first!” And as you’d expect, she replied with the time-worn, “Two wrongs don’t make a right.” It’s almost impossible to reason with two little boys when they’re tangled up in a fight, and reason definitely fell by the wayside when, without missing a beat, my brother responded, “But they make it even!” I grant you, he was wickedly clever, though I think he simply said the first thing that came to mind. His response was certainly a reflection of his wit but also of his youth.
To live in a world of getting even – a world of revenge – is to live in a world of the lowest common denominator. And that is not the world of faith, mature faith, that we aspire to. You might think that such a world is governed by the Golden Rule, which is found in some form in nearly every religion and across the centuries. It can be traced as far back as the time of Confucius, five centuries before the time of Jesus.
We know the Golden Rule as “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” Those, however, weren’t the words from the Bible. The words Jesus would have known come from Leviticus. “You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against any of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” (Leviticus 19:18)
Jesus sought to break the cycle of revenge, radically expanding the rule from Leviticus, when he said in the Gospel of Matthew, “In everything do to others as you would have them do to you; for this is the law and the prophets.” (Matthew 7:12) There is not even a suggestion of vengeance here. Instead, Jesus is telling us not to look to past actions as our guiding principle, but rather, to look toward the future, with actions that we initiate ourselves.
C. S. Lewis wrote, “Everyone says forgiveness is a lovely idea, until they have something to forgive.” Jesus’s parable of the Unforgiving Servant demonstrates this perfectly; forgiveness in the abstract is far different from forgiveness in the face of real debt, sin, or insult.
The parable makes it clear that forgiveness must come unconditionally; it must come from our hearts, not from some pretentious, contrived number in our rational minds. And it suggests that forgiveness should beget forgiveness. The radical forgiveness of this parable changes the dynamic and enhances the forgiver, the forgiven, and the community as a whole.
In her book, Dead Man Walking, Sister Helen Prejean tells the story of Lloyd LeBlanc, a Roman Catholic layman, whose son was brutally murdered. He had to go to the field where his son’s body lay in order to identify him. Mr. LeBlanc knelt by his son’s body and prayed the Lord’s Prayer. When he came to the words, “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us,” the depth of the commitment he was making became real to him for the first time. “Whoever did this,” he told Sister Helen later, “I must forgive them.” Mr. LeBlanc described how hard that was in real time and space. He was nearly overwhelmed with bitterness and the urge for revenge many times. We can only begin to imagine how hard and painful it was for him to overcome both his despair at his loss and the urgency towards vengeance that he felt despite his sincere resolve to forgive. Indeed, he said that forgiveness must be prayed for, struggled for, offered, and won every day.
It’s easy for us to say, “Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.” It’s easy for us to say we must forgive, and forgive again and again. Mr. LeBlanc’s reality tells us how hard it is to actually do so. His was a continual effort, one he had to make each and every day, and one to which he remained committed.
This is the kind of disciplined commitment that’s required if we are to truly learn how to forgive and thereby grow in our faith. As you contemplate those acts and people you wish to forgive, and the people you’ve hurt by your own actions, I encourage you to recognize and embrace how difficult it is, and how often you’ll slide back into hurt, bitterness, and even revenge. Forgiveness includes forgiving yourself.
Remember Jesus’s words. He doesn’t say, as Peter may have expected, that forgiveness is a “one and done” commandment. Forgiveness is ongoing. It requires practice. It requires repetition. Forgiveness “from your heart,” as Jesus says at the end of the parable, is not easy, not superficial. It is deep, thoughtful, and intentional every single time it occurs and re-occurs. It is truly a permanent attitude of faith, a skill that requires constant practice and application.
Ultimately, forgiveness is what brings healing. Forgiveness is the embodiment of the message of mercy and love that Jesus preached.
May we, in our own way, join with Mr. LeBlanc in his struggle and prayer; may we join with Peter in seeking to fully understand the depth of commitment our faith requires. Secure in the eternal supportive presence of Christ, may we live into an authentic attitude of loving, faithful forgiveness.
Joys and Concerns:
For those affected by the wildfires in the West, for the terrible losses of life, property, personal history, and forest, and for those who voluntarily and bravely respond to fight the fires.
For those all around the world who have volunteered to be a part of the Covid vaccine trials, and for the dedicated researchers who are working so diligently to find a safe and effective vaccine.
For those seeking an effective treatment for Covid-19 as it continues to ravage our nation and nations across the world.
For all the people of faith and energy, including here at Scottsville Presbyterian Church, who are working so valiantly to understand and confront the issues of racism and social justice that have exploded across our national awareness these past months; may we find common understanding and solutions.
Let us pray together:
Gracious and loving God,
You live for us even when we have not lived for you.
You forgive us even when we have failed to forgive others.
You love us even when we have not loved ourselves and one another.
Take pity on us, and forgive us.
Help us to forgive ourselves and any whom we’ve hurt. Help us to live for you.
Make your love for us bear fruit in our forgiveness of others, that in this life we may know your all-embracing compassion and in the world to come receive the everlasting joy of fellowship with you, your Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.