The Church and Forgiveness (Margaret Scott's Sermon from 9/11/2011)

The church and forgiveness

September 11, 2011

Matthew 18:21-35

Margaret Scott

3 weeks ago we saw Peter being named as the Rock, the building block of the church; 2 weeks ago he was called Satan, the stumbling block.  Today, he’s catching on, he’s getting this Jesus-mind kin-dom alternative that Jesus is offering.

After hearing what we heard last week, about how the kin-dom, the community of Jesus, is supposed to deal with conflict and power, perhaps Peter wants to show how he’s coming along…

The Pharisees taught that the upper limit of forgiveness was three times.  Peter offers an upper limit of 7.   Pretty bold and generous; he knows Jesus is expansive, so he’s pretty safe with this, right?  Absurd by rabbinic standards of the day, but a holy number, and surely Jesus would like it.

But Jesus says, nice try Peter.  But there’s room for much more.  And he proceeds to give an even more absurd number, 77, or some translations say 70x7=490—both absurd exaggerations.    It’s as if Jesus is saying, if you have to count, and keep track, it’s not forgiveness…you need to forgive beyond your ability to keep track.

Now this is an ongoing conversation from last week about life in the kin-dom community—the holy space we’re invited into and invited to co-create.  And Jesus tells a story about this community as a kingdom, where the king settles accounts. How on earth does this translate to our present day kin-dom community?  The monarchy is a foreign concept to almost all of us, and this story would be absurd even in those days.  What king would ever behave in this way?   And we’re not used to thinking about judgment and settling accounts  as part of the Jesus community.  We don’t even like the word, judgment.

Yet it happens all the time in the Jesus life.  God holds us accountable every day, and as we heard last week we hold each other accountable.

Today may be just such a day for US to be held accountable.  What humungous offence have we suffered that God calls us to forgive? Or What small debt of hurt are we holding on to and will not forgive?  

Not rocket science.

This text asks at least 5 very disturbing questions:   how many times do I forgive?

And if God’s meant to be like the king in the story, does God sell  us off when we can’t pay back something?

And if so, can God be talked out of it just by our making some flimsy promise to do better?

And if it’s about forgiving 77 times, or 490 times, how come the king fogave once then the at the next slip-up condemned the guy?

And seriously, God will hand us over to be tortured?

So it’s hardly an allegory.  It’s a parable, and not about God but about the absurd nature of the kin-dom,

         where we are building blocks sometimes and stumbling blocks other times,

        where we fall and get up and fall and get up,

        but  where the community lives differently, absurdly differently, from the prevailing culture

            where we live and develop a space John talked of last week, a space for life not death, a space of revolution, not violence, a space where there is no coercion, retaliation or threat.

Sure, we can get tied up in those troubling questions, but they’re really distractions to help us avoid the really tough question, the one I’m left with, especially today, 10 years after the horror of September 11, 2001:

Can I, can we, forgive those who sin against us?

Forgive us our sins as we forgive others, we pray every week; some of us several times a week, some of us daily.   Seriously?  Do we want God to forgive us the way we forgive others?  Do we really pray the LP or do we just spout it.

 Or do we maybe pray to learn to forgive others the way God forgives us?

Impossible as it may seem, and absurd as it is, it can be done.

And impossible as it may seem, and absurd as it is, it can ONLY be done by our heartfelt understanding of how much WE’ve been loved and forgiven by God.  And that takes some soul searching – most of us don’t think we’ve been particularly bad and so don’t really need mega absurd doses of such forgiveness.   We need to spend some time on our own self-righteousness until we can understand what incredible love has been poured out on us through Jesus, forgiveness in action that ended, apparently, with a crucifixion.

And impossible as it may seem, and absurd as it is,  it can only be done by practice.  The more we practice the more forgiving we will become.   There are some things so awful that we can’t just decide to forgive the person who does them to us once and be done with it.  We have to decide to forgive them over and over – every time you see that person or a memory button is pushed -- until it finally begins to stick.

What happened 10 years ago shaped us—how we respond continues to mold us into who we are becoming….but we must ensure it doesn’t define us as revengeful warriors masked as pseudo Christians.

Christians, Jesus followers, can and do have many perspectives and approaches to war, violence and conflict.  But what we can’t afford to erode in our philosophical and theological diversity is the primacy of love forgiveness and grace.   Internally it is the redemption of Christ on the cross, and baptism, that set us apart as God’s people.  But externally it’s the manner of love we live day-to-day which is meant to set us apart for all the world to see. (Rick’s blog)

Impossible as it may seem, absurd as it is, it can be done.  It must be done, and the Church must model it for the world. We love and offer forgiveness even when we feel unable because God loves and forgives through us.

If not through me, then who?

If not now, then when?

How can anyone know the forgiving love of God unless I, you, we, give it to them?

WE know that loving, forgiving God because someone showed it to us…showed us that

Goodness IS stronger than evil;

love IS stronger than hate;

light IS stronger than darkness;

life IS stronger than death;

victory is ours through God who loves us.

As we move forward from this day, will we remain stuck in old ways of evil, hate, darkness, death?   If so, the enemy has won.  Or will we go forward with new determination, new commitment to developing a space, a community,  a nation, and a world, where we live our personal lives, church lives, political lives, and economic lives based on the Jesus way….by wesleys 3 simple rules, for example:

Do good, do no harm, stay in love with God

Or by Micah’s:

Do justice, love mercy, walk humbly with your God. 

And above all, this special day, let us commit to practice forgiveness.

Will it be easy? No.  Is it abusrd? Yes, Is it possible?  Yes, God helping us.  Amen.