Shepherd of the Springs
Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod

          . . . Lord, how often will my brother sin against me and I forgive him?  As many as seven times?  Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you seven times, but seventy times seven.

          Traveling the road to the cross with a repentant appreciation of all that the Lord would accomplish for us there is the objective of the Church’s worship life during the Lenten Season. But at the same time, the hazzards that might derail such a journey are also worthwhile being considered. It is not enough to consider our problem of sin to find the treasure in the cross of Christ . . .we must also consider what will be the implications or perhaps, we should say, the cost of buying into an embrace of His gift of grace. The life that He is calling us to live in the cross of Christ and his atoning death requires a radical revision of how we would life with God and others - a life that would be completely re-ordered by grace . . . and not by law. God requires that we be consistent here - we can live by grace, or we can live by law - and the Parable of the Unforgiving Servant wishes to place this matter of consistency - living by grace or law - in bold relief this evening. And the object of the lesson will help to sharpen our awareness and our appreciation that only a life that hungers for only grace can go to the cross of Christ and get what our Lord has for us there.

          Here is your choice. You can live life committed to the fairness doctrine in all your dealings with others . . . Or, you can tear up the accounting ledgers that would show what you and everyone else deserves. That is to say, you can either deal with yourself and others on the basis of a standard of what would be fair - what would fit the standards of justice - where everyone gets what they have coming to them . . . Or you can throw in and live in accord with God’s crazy sense of justice which is quite something else. The point to appreciate here, however, is that you cannot have it both ways - its either a life of fairness . . . or a life where everyone gets what they do not deserve. Let’s see how the parable presents these important alternative.    

          When the parable is understood aright, Jesus will teach us that it is not sin, not even lots of sin - but rather the demands for what we have coming to us that really abuses and separates us from the Gospel of forgiveness. In the parable, the King has gone out of the debt collecting business in life entirely.  He has died to the whole business of debts and getting His due. . . but not the servant.  The servant plays the King for a stupid businessman, not a gracious ruler.  He ends up in prison, not because he doesn’t measure up to the required obligations of pro quid pro quo, he ends up in prison because he wants to have it both ways.  He wants to take the forgiving grace of the King, while at the same time demanding his just rights according to what is fair with his fellow servant who owed a pittance compare to his own debt. He wants it both ways. He will not die with the King to a life of demanding obligations and live under grace.  He will not have a life ruled by forgiveness.  And that is just what Peter and we here this evening need to understand.  Forgiveness is not about second chances to meet your obligations.  Nor is it about others getting second chances to give you everything you deserve. It is not about anyone getting more time to make things right.  Grace is all about tearing up the ledger of obligations - but not just yours toward God - but also those who transgress you.  Forgiveness and forgiving are all a part of the same cloth in the human heart that lives by grace not by law . . . day in, and day out.

          The journey to the cross is an invitation to follow Christ and leave a life of Law and ledgers for a life of grace. To live with others and God would there live with us. In Christ, the Father dies to heavenly bookkeeping against all of us sinful debtors of the world.  He does so by practicing His own sense of justice - punishing the innocent Jesus and forgiving all of us guilty sinners. And that is just what we must do. To hold on to grace requires that you give it away. For those who owe you, for those who have let you down, treated you unfairly, trampled over your rights and your dignity . . . you must tear up their debts and forgive them . . .not seven times, but as a way of life. The life of grace for you, must be the life of grace from you. If you demand fairness and justice for others to you, So will God. It’s Gospel all the way, or Law all the way in your personal dealings with God and others. Any demand to get even . . . to take the fairness way of life with you to the cross of Christ will derail a beneficial journey.

Those who would live in the cross and God’s justice there must die to sin and legal obligations.  Most will not do this. Most refuse to die to sin and rather strive to live by what obligation requires.  They are forgiven, but they are refusing to die, that they might live.  Even those in Hell cannot be taken out of prison, because they will not be taken in by the outrageous unfairness of grace. They cannot accept the death to sin and all legal considerations by Christ or by themselves. So they get what they want . . . which is what they deserve. There is nothing in the cross of Christ for those who want only what is fair and what they deserve.  Grace is a way of life, or there is no life. And for us poor debtors, this is a life of grace.  You are forgiven. All debts are cancelled . . . forever . . . yours and theirs. Let this Lenten season be your commitment to unfairly treating those who do you wrong . . . so you can go to the cross of Christ and let God treat you unfairly in the face of have done Him wrong.

          In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. A-men!