By PASTOR SUNIL – 22nd October 2017
– Grace is not grace if it is not dispensed both ways. That means God’s grace become valuable or precious in our lives if we give away freely what we have received freely.
– Someone once said that “The reality check of the gospel in our life is to the extent with which we give grace and forgiveness to the person who has hurt us the most and deserves it the least.”
– When we give grace to someone who has hurt us, that is the moment we understand grace. It is that moment that makes grace come alive in our lives. Many a times we do not value grace if we only keep on receiving it. Hence, we should ask God and learn to give grace to others just as God has showered grace upon grace over us.
– In Matthew 18:21, Peter asks a mathematical question to Jesus. “Lord how many times shall I forgive my brother or sister who sin against me? Up to 7 times?” Early traditions stated that you should forgive anyone who sins against you 3 times and after that you don’t need to forgive. Forgiving is not an easy task. Peter was trying to impress Jesus by giving the number 7 because he felt forgiving a person 3 times itself is a very big thing. So, here actually Peter wanted to know when is our hurt greater than grace? When does the pain in our life becomes greater than grace?
– Jesus answers Peter’s question in the same chapter in verse 22, that not seven times but seventy times seven. So, here Jesus is trying to explain that grace is never less than anything, but always greater than our hurts. Even if we are at the receiving end who has been constantly hurt by someone, even if it does not seem to be fair, even if it does not seem to be true, the truth is that grace is always greater than everything.
In our lives, we feel that grace always runs out when we are at the receiving end. Many a times it’s hard for us to forgive, hence Jesus gives us a parable to make us understand the importance of grace.
The Parable of the unforgiving Debtor as narrated by Jesus in Matthew 18:21-35 is as follows;
“For this reason, the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his slaves. When he had begun to settle them, one who owed him ten thousand talents was brought to him. But since he did not have the means to repay, his lord commanded him to be sold, along with his wife and children and all that he had, and repayment to be made. So, the slave fell to the ground and prostrated himself before him, saying, ‘Have patience with me and I will repay you everything.’ And the lord of that slave felt compassion and released him and forgave him the debt. But that slave went out and found one of his fellow slaves who owed him a hundred denarii; and he seized him and began to choke him, saying, ‘Pay back what you owe.’ So, his fellow slave fell to the ground and began to plead with him, saying, ‘Have patience with me and I will repay you.’ But he was unwilling and went and threw him in prison until he should pay back what was owed. So, when his fellow slaves saw what had happened, they were deeply grieved and came and reported to their lord all that had happened. Then summoning him, his lord said to him, ‘You wicked slave, I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. Should you not also have had mercy on your fellow slave, in the same way that I had mercy on you?’ And his lord, moved with anger, handed him over to the torturers until he should repay all that was owed him. My heavenly Father will also do the same to you, if each of you does not forgive his brother from your heart.”
Let us understand what Jesus was trying to explain about forgiveness from the above passage.
– 10,000 talents is a huge amount. If we look it in terms of Indian currency assuming that the average salary per month is Rs. 20000, so in about 20 years, his salary would be worth one bag worth of talents or rather say 1 bag of talent would be around Rs. 48 Lakhs. So, to repaying it would almost take about 2,00,000 (2 Lakh) years’ worth of wages.
– This is an unbelieving number, because the servant can never repay back the master even if he works throughout his lifetime. But Jesus surely wants to make a point here. It’s a debt that the nobody can ever pay. In the olden times it was the norm to give severe punishment. They would be bashed up and sold into slavery and not just the man his wife and children as well.
– This parable here reflects each one of our standing with God, that all of us have sinned. And the sin has accumulated so much of a debt that we can never repay it. We have various ways of denying that we don’t have that much of a debt, by comparing ourselves to others. We feel we are not as bad as others. We trust in God, but trusting in God does not mean we do not have a debt to pay. We may try to work our way out of it by doing good deeds etc., but there is no amount of good deed, act or anything that can help us settle this huge amount of debt. The Bible says that we all have sinned and fall short of the Glory of God, which means we all owe a debt which will always fall short of repayment. Bible also says that if we break one commandment we have broken all. He keeps track of all our sins, we cannot hide them. God knows it all. He knows the debt we are in.
– In the parable, we can see that there is no way this person could have ever paid back the debt, yet he pleads to the master. The Bible gives such a huge number to make the point that repayment is never an option. We simply cannot repay, no matter what we do. WE cannot REPAY.
– Verse 27 says that the master took pity on him and he cancelled the debt worth trillion of Rupees and he let him go. He does not lower the EMI, he does not say take more time to repay. Bible says that the master just cancels the debt completely and lets him go.
– Now this man who owed 10000 bags of Gold or trillion of Rupees, when he finds out that another person owes him only 20 silver coins or 160000 Rupees, he goes to that man asks for his debt of Rs. 1,60,000 to be repaid. He is the same man whose entire debt was completely forgiven. And verse 29 says his fellow servant fell to his knees and begged, “Be patient with me and I will pay it back.” This is exactly the same quote which this man had requested to the master just few moment ago. This man is asking for the same grace that he had received a little while before. If you had not heard the story before you would assume that this man would forgive Rs. 1,60,000 worth of debt. Of course, he should forgive because he just received forgiveness for about trillion of Rupees. He just was in a similar situation and he was expected to understand the importance of Grace.
– Verse 30 says “But he refused and instead had the man thrown into the prison until he could repay the debt.” Verse 31 is often over looked but it is an important verse in the story. “When his fellow servants saw what had taken place, they were greatly distressed, and they went and reported to their master all that had taken place.” Jesus says that the fellow servants reported the incident to the master. The fellow servants saw how much grace this man had received a little while ago which he could not extend to the other man who needed it, they were outraged and complained it to the master who forgave.
– Verse 32 says “Then his master summoned him and said to him, ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. And should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you?’ And in anger his master delivered him to the jailers, until he should pay all his debt.” Could that servant really pay the huge amount? No, it was not possible to earn trillions of Rupees, and definitely not in the prison, which means this servant was going to spend the rest of his life in prison.
– Verse 35 says “So also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother from your heart.” This means that it’s really important to extend the grace and forgiveness to others. The grace that we have received, the grace which we do not deserve, the grace which we never qualified for.
– It is hard to extend the grace to someone who has always let us down, to someone who has constantly made us cry. It is hard to receive someone whole heartedly who had constantly been stabbing us. But remember that we will never be asked to give more than what we have received.
– So, to answer Peter’s question in technical terms, Jesus says that Trillion Rupees is always greater than 1,60,000 Rupees. Jesus is trying to say that you have been forgiven Trillions of Rupees and hence for you forgiving 1,60,000 Rupees should not be a big issue.
– What we have been forgiven of is much lesser than what we are asked/expected to forgive. The more we think about this equation, the more we understand the power of Grace. The more we stand in the holiness of God, the more you understand the power of grace and the easier it is for us to forgive.
– Grace is greater than repayment. Repayment means to settle out the accounts, or set the accounts correct. We have been brought up with the teaching that if we hurt someone we should say sorry and that should set the records right. When we make Grace dependent on the action of the other person then again that is not Grace.
– Grace is greater than revenge. Many a times we want to take revenge before we forgive the person
– We always say that Grace is free but when we put a price when we have to give it to others.
– Grace is always greater than everything but this grace is equal to Jesus who is full of grace and always forgives us of all our sins. (John 1:14says “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.”)
– God has freely given us this grace to us, but are we extending God given grace freely to people around us? Let us ask God and exercise grace in our lives.
