A sermon for Year A Proper 19, particularly Matthew 18:21-35

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It’s not often that Jesus answers a question with a straightforward and immediate answer. I’m not entirely certain that’s what Jesus is doing here, either: Peter asks how often he should forgive a fellow church member for sinning against him: as many as seven times? And Jesus answers right away, depending upon your translation, “Not seven, but seventy-seven (or seventy times seven) times!”

The difficulty is immediately apparent. We don’t even know what number Jesus quoted: how are we to know how many times we have to count to ten before we get to the number after the one Jesus set as the outer limit for forgiveness?

And that’s the point, isn’t it. It’s the point of the parable that Jesus tells before circling back to Peter with some pointed words about forgiving from the heart. From the heart. As from the heart of God that knows no outer limits of forgiveness.

The amount owed by the slave in the parable was astronomical. There was no way that king was ever getting all of his money back! How the slave had accumulated such a debt is not addressed: was the interest punitive? Was it the product of embezzlement? There is something not right about this debt from the start; yet the king, who has the power to do so, decides to forgive not only the debt, but the servant himself. He doesn’t even ask for a payment plan!

Then the forgiven one goes out and, despite the mercy shown to him, fails to extend that mercy to others. Having failed to extend it, he falls victim to his own failure, and ends up in prison after all. Not through his original debt but through his refusal to offer mercy to others does he fall.

So, Jesus concludes to Peter, that’s what happens when you don’t forgive from your heart. You are imprisoned, hoist by your own petard, bound by your own fetters, your own meanness and unmercy.

If you are counting how many times you have had to forgive this brother of yours, then in your heart of hearts, you have not really forgiven him. The wound is still festering.

This whole discourse about forgiveness, offence, discipline, the community of mercy that we have been following for the past few weeks is exposed, laid bare, solved by Jesus’ unmathematical formula. Seven, the perfect number of creation, used biblically to represent what is holy, is itself multiplied until we no longer know even what the number is supposed to be. Seven, the number that crowns creation with sabbath, with rest, is multiplied toward the peace of God that passes understanding.

It is not the quantity of forgiveness that is in question, then, but the quality.

We’ve talked before about the need to be careful of language that makes forgiveness a foil or cover for abuse. Forgiveness is not trying to make ourselves feel better about what has been done wrong. It is about trying to bring justice, not vengeance or punishment, but healing to a wrongness, to make it as right as we are able.

Sometimes, that has to happen from afar. Our forgiveness cannot depend upon the repentance of the other, since that would rob us of our ability to be merciful without the other’s permission. That doesn’t sound very Christlike.

But sometimes, sometimes we are implicated in helping make the situation whole, so that the sin doesn’t keep on happening seven times, or seven times seven. Sometimes, if we are to forgive from our heart, unlike the slave in the parable, we need to change, perhaps allow ourselves to be changed.

Can I talk about something hard for a moment (none of this is easy!)?

On Wednesday, I wrote the following in response to some nasty news out of Euclid:

The headline [read]: 10-year-old girl shot in arm in Euclid, suspect arrested.

It was the middle of the afternoon, and her school had just let out. She was about home. Thank God, she is reported as recovering from her injury; how long it will take her, her family, her friends, her community to stop shaking was not speculated upon in the article.

The report went on to say that she was hit by a stray bullet. … Think about it: stray bullets with no home nor owner, wandering our streets, looking for somewhere to lodge. …

Calling a bullet stray, like a wandering and mangy dog, is akin to brushing off offence without regard to healing the conditions that gave rise to it or the harm its kind can continue to cause as long as we refuse to call it what it is. Justice is not just a matter of calling the bullet-owner to account. It is coming to terms with our loose culture of bullet-ownership.

The way of the Cross calls us to look death (its dominions and its minions) in the eye and call it what it is, not in fear but in faith that Christ has already trodden this path for us. There are no stray bullets, just as there were no stray nails pounding themselves into the Cross.

What good is forgiveness that doesn’t make a difference? That keeps the offences coming? No, it’s not about the quantity of forgiveness, but about its quality.

Later this morning, a small group of us will gather to continue our work toward Becoming Beloved Community through our Sacred Ground curriculum. We learn about our history and the ways in which it has divided and categorize us and continues its aftershocks of racism throughout our communities. We learn not only for information, but in hope that we can change the patterns, little by little, with God’s help, one breath at a time.

On Wednesday, I wrote:

Last evening, at Bible Study, we discussed our responsibility not only to forgive, but to change situations, structures, and relationships that give rise to trespass, so that the sin does not keep repeating; to create conditions where true repentance and healing are possible. We talked about the need not to paper over patterns of harm, but to confront them with truthful, hopeful, discerning hearts, in order to bring mercy not only to sinners but to the sinned against.

True forgiveness does not enable continuing harm. That was not Jesus’ purpose on the Cross. Rather, his forgiveness is something that changes hearts, changes lives, turns our souls toward God. Remember the Centurion who witnessed it all, who could not help but cry out, “Surely this man was innocent, righteous, the Son of God!” (Matthew 27:54, Mark 15:39, Luke 23:47).

How many times must we practice such forgiveness from the heart before we begin to make a difference in our world? It starts with a single breath, a heartbeat, and multiplies to fill God’s creation with the love that we have received, and that we are called to share with all whom we meet, seventy time seven, or as far as Christ’s love can reach.

Amen