Fifteenth Sunday After Pentecost – Pastor Ellen Mills
I am offering you two ways to receive this. In print, you will need to read the scriptures for yourself, and then the prayer and reflection that follow in this post. If you click on the audio link below (below), you can hear all of it, including the scripture.
Fifteenth Sunday After Pentecost
The Lord be with you.
And also with you.
Let us pray,
O Lord God, merciful judge, you are the inexhaustible fountain of forgiveness. Replace our hearts of stone with hearts that love and adore you, that we may delight in doing your will, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord. Amen.
Genesis 50:15-21
Psalm 103:1-13
Romans 14:1-12
Matthew 18:21-35
So, after Jesus has told his disciples how to resolve hurts within the church community, Peter asks how often he should forgive a member who has sinned against him. I’m not sure what Peter was expecting, but probably not such a large number. It is not clear in the Greek if the number is seventy-seven or seventy times seven, and it doesn’t matter. Jesus is not being precise – he is giving them what must seem an impossible task. And I will add to that, that forgiveness is rarely a single action, a “once and done” sort of thing. It is a process. We must become willing. And we must continue to be willing, as we will often be tempted to take it back. What often helps is seeing the action in a larger framework. As long as we think that no harm should ever come to us, as long as we believe that we are God’s favorite child and everything should go our way, we will want to hold onto our grievance. We will want to keep seeing ourselves as the one who was hurt, and the other person as the bad person who hurt us. We get stuck in this and become unable to see all of us as God’s loved and forgiven children, who will continue to be sinner as well as saint. Jesus does not call us to harden our hearts against one another. And so often, if we pray for the person who has harmed us, we begin to see them with compassion. But I will add: if you are the victim of physical, verbal, or emotional abuse within a relationship, forgiveness does not mean accepting more. Forgiveness is not the same thing as pretending it never happened. Forgiving is letting go of our desire to do harm in return.
Then Jesus tells a parable. And he includes some shocking details. We have a king, a wealthy man who has slaves. And for some reason, the king desires to settle accounts with these slaves. They owe him various amounts of money. And he started with one who owed him an immense sum, an amount worth 15 years of wages for a laborer. As this begins, the king wants to be repaid the full amount. And the slave is unable to repay the king. And since he is a slave, the king chooses to sell him, his family, and all their possessions to repay this amount. The slave falls to his knees and asks for mercy, for time to repay. And the king pitied him and forgave his debt. Other than the immense sum of money owed, I’m not sure that this first part would have troubled the people listening to Jesus. The king had that right over his slaves. It might, though, have amazed them that the king would be so generous as to forgive. But the king was that generous, and it was done.
Then off goes the slave with his immense debt forgiven. How would you feel if you owed an immense mortgage that suddenly came due? A mortgage that you would have no way of paying immediately? And if you could not pay, you would be thrown out of your home onto the street. If then the mortgage company suddenly decided not to collect this from you and that you actually didn’t owe them a thing, that the house was fully paid off, what would you do next? What the slave does next as soon as he encounters a fellow slave who owes him just one day of a laborer’s wage, is to demand that it be paid immediately. Does that seem unfair to you? It apparently does to the other slaves who hear about this. Mercy did not result in more mercy. The man forgiven much didn’t want to forgive anything at all.
What have you experienced that softened your heart towards others? Are there some people or some things that you find very difficult to forgive? And why is it so important for you to hang onto that hurt and anger? What benefit does it bestow on you? There must be something it does for us, or we would be more willing to let it go. All that Jesus says is said in the context of a community, and is about relationships within that community. In Genesis, when Joseph’s brothers fear retaliation because they had sold him into slavery years ago, Joseph not only forgives them, he reframes their act in a larger perspective. He does not deny that they did harm to him. But he has given up his desire to harm them, and states that, “Even though you intended to do harm to me, God intended it for good.” He reframes it not only in a bigger view of God as merciful and over all of us, but also in a long view over many years of his life. Yes, it was rough to be sold into slavery into Egypt. But not only was God with him, many circumstances in his life in Egypt softened his heart towards his brothers. His life was not only about the thing done to him. His life was about so much more, including helping the people of Egypt survive a time of famine. He did not need to pay his brothers back for the harm done to him. He had been made whole.
The psalm this morning repeats a phrase from Exodus, said to Moses as the second set of tablets of the ten commandments were made. God declares “The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.” We were taught in Hebrew class that this is one of the oldest phrases of the Bible. And it is repeated again and again in the psalms. Who is God? God is the One who is merciful, gracious, and abounding in steadfast love. This is what Jesus came to show to us. Who is Jesus? Jesus is the One who is merciful, gracious, and abounding in steadfast love. Jesus is the One we follow, and this is how our lives are to be molded, what our lives are to become. We, too, are to become merciful, gracious, and abounding in steadfast love. Amen.
Drawn together in the compassion of God, we pray for the church, the world, and all those in need.
You welcome us when we are weak in faith. Uphold your church throughout the world; make it a place of welcome. Strengthen faith through Bible studies and Sunday schools, confirmation classes and youth ministries. Nurture new ministries of education and growth. Lord, in your mercy.
hear our prayer.
The heights of the heavens show us the vastness of your steadfast love. Have compassion on your creation. Where human selfishness has brought ruin and destruction, we look to you to heal, renew, and redeem your world. Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.
Make your ways known to the nations. Speak kindness to our bitter grudges. Settle our hearts when we want to settle accounts with violence. Bless our leaders with patience and wisdom. Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.
Bring healing and justice wherever harm is dealt. Provide vindication for all who are oppressed. Free victims of human trafficking and forced labor; deliver all who are bound by debt. Feed all who hunger, and guard refugees fleeing famine, poverty, and war. Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.
Teach us to forgive. Remind us that you do not always accuse us. Still our tongues when we are tempted to pass judgment and argue over opinions. Make this congregation a community of mercy for one another and all our neighbors. Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.
Loving God, thank you for your guidance in our search for a pastor. Continue to walk with Pastor Will Bevins and St Stephen’s as we start a new chapter in our faith. Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.
Whether we live or whether we die, we are yours. We thank you for those who have showed us faithfulness, for the knees that taught us how to bow to you and the tongues that taught us to praise you. Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.
All these things and whatever else you see that we need, we entrust to your mercy; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
The Lord bless you and keep you.
The Lord’s face shine upon you with grace and mercy.
The Lord look upon you with favor and give you peace.
Amen.