Prison and Mercy

Prison and Mercy

Matthew 18:21-35

One of the most famous parables that Jesus told was about separating the sheep from the goats. The sheep, who are gathered into their Father’s pleasure, are those who offer radical hospitality to those persons who are hunger, thirsty, and strangers; as well as offering hospitality to the naked, the sick, and those who are in prison. The goats, who are cast away from the Father, are those who only offered hospitality to others if there was something in it for them. The sheep are surprised by this welcome, for they were only doing what God would have them do for others. The goats are also surprised by this rejection, for they were only being smart about what they had to do for others.

This is why I want to thank the men of the Inside Church for being the sheep of God. They gave those of us who were hungering and thirsting for an opportunity to serve the Bread of Life. You welcomed us as friends, even if we are sometimes sick in our sin and imprisoned by our sense of righteousness. Because of your hospitality shown to us, we are now all clothed in the glory of Jesus Christ – and for this, again, we give you thanks.

Now I know that to persons outside of the church, and maybe even to some inside the church, that this may sound like an odd thing to give thanks for. But the truth is that being a Christian is often an odd sort of thing to do. The truth is that being a Christian creates in us an odd way of looking at the world. And a prime example of this is our reading for today. It is an odd request, followed by an odd parable. Yet, when they are taken together, and are seen against the fullness of the gospel, they give us a reason to rejoice again.

Let’s start with the parable. This is a really odd parable. We miss this because we have heard it many times before, in its broad outlines. Someone with a large debt has their debt forgiven, and then doesn't extend that courtesy to someone who owns him a much smaller debt. The ungrateful one is then imprisoned until he can pay back his debt – which will be never. In this interpretation, the moral is simple – our choice is either prison or mercy. Our choice is between hell or heaven.

If these are our only choices, then it is pretty clear that we should choose mercy and heaven, over prison and hell. But then, if this was really this clear, we would live in a world that is a lot more merciful than this one. If it was really this clear, then there would be no one in our prisons.

Still, a lot of people like this parable. What they like about this parable is that it seems fair. The king, who is a stand in for God, acts just like us. I do something good for you, you refuse to do the same good for someone else, the original good gets rescinded, and I lay the smack down on you. If we were all-powerful, if we were God, it is exactly what we would do. It's all very – human. We can understand a God who acts like that.

And that is the problem with this understanding of the parable. It seems fair, until we think about it a little more closely. If God is that interested in fairness, then why does God forgive the original debt in the first place? If we are supposed to do what is fair, all the time, then why doesn’t God make the original debtor pay the bill from the start? When we are faced with this kind of problem, I find it helpful to put things into context. That’s how we discover that this parable is not about money or fairness, but instead about the grace of God revealed in Jesus Christ.

This chapter in Matthew’s gospel began with the disciples asking Jesus who is the greatest in the kingdom of God. Jesus tells them the greatest are those persons who are like humble children. Even though they don't have any power in this world, they gladly welcome others into theirs. In other words, the kingdom of God is filled with people who live graciously together.

That passage is followed by considering what we are to do in those inevitably human moments when we are not so gracious towards each other, when someone offends us. Jesus answered that we are to remember our witness of grace, our experience of being forgiven and shown mercy. Continuing the earlier theme of grace, Jesus invites us to live into the grace again.

Which brings us to Peter's question: how often can anyone reasonably be expected to forgive someone else? Last week, we talked about the difference between sins against the law and sins against grace. The rabbis taught that sins against the law could be forgiven up to four times. Peter should already know this limit. By asking his question, Peter may have been trying to be “more religious” than the rabbis, since Jesus certainly seemed to be closer to God than any rabbi he had dealt with before.

If Peter is thinking about sins against the law, then seven times does seem extremely patient and forgiving – almost gracious. If Peter is thinking about sins against grace, however, then his understanding of grace is grossly limited to the point of not really being grace. Most of us can keep track of seven sins against us, which would mean that on the eighth sin, we don’t have to be forgiving or gracious anymore.

Jesus wants to disavow Peter of this notion. Not seven times, but seventy-seven times. Or as some ancient manuscripts have it – seventy times seven times. The point is the same either way – we forgive more than we can ever keep track of when dealing with each other. But that is a problem begging for abuse if we are talking about sins against the law. If our sins against the law are always going to be forgiven, then there is very little reason for us to not keep breaking the laws.

Fortunately, the theme of this chapter is grace, and Jesus is telling us about how often we are to forgive sins against grace. This is the point of the parable Jesus tells. The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his slaves. One of the slaves owed an outrageous amount of money. It can get confusing talking about the first slave and the second slave and the other slaves, so let’s give this first slave a name. Let’s call him “Nick.”

This amount that is owed by Nick is more money than he could ever imagine, in that day before there were internet and oil billionaires. The amount then, in that culture, would have been understood as the biggest number you can imagine multiplied by the biggest number you can imagine. That's how big the debt is. It is unimaginably, incomprehensibly big.

In our modern world, we might think that 10,000 doesn't sound like such a big number, whatever a talent may be may be worth. Some scholars,with more facts than imagination, put pencil to paper, and they figured out that 10,000 talents was about what one person could earn in 150,000 years – if they never spent any of it. If they occasionally needed to eat or have a place to live, it would take them longer to raise that kind of money.

The flip side of this debt is that it is more money than Nick could ever hope to run up as a debt. It doesn’t matter if we are talking 150,000 years’ worth of debt, or if we are talking about a “biggest number multiplied by biggest number” kind of debt. So maybe, Nick is not just one person who owes the king. Maybe, Nick is all of us together who owe this unimaginably, incomprehensibly big debt to God.

And the question is: how did this debt get so big? Did the king just not care about collecting his debts? In the parable, the king is settling his accounts, so it can't be that. Do we just not care about paying our debt? Or, do we always have an excuse as to why we can't pay our debt on time, or why we can’t pay our debt in full?

Perhaps we should ask ourselves this question– for what is it that we owe God? Well, God give us life and breath and being. God created the world and placed us in it with everything good that we need. God gave us the Law and the Prophets. God came in Jesus to show us how to love and live, and he died for our debt of sins. God gave us, and continues to give us the Holy Spirit. God gives us family and friends, opportunities and challenges, which can help us grow and go to perfection in love as we are held accountable in God’s grace. All of these things, and unimaginably, incomprehensively more come to us as gifts from God. And these gifts come to us day by day, week by week, month by month, year by year, for as long as we live.

And yet instead of paying our debt of gratitude, worship, and service, we make our excuses. I worked hard for everything I have. I am the master of my fate, the captain of my destiny. I deserve what I have, and I don't owe anybody anything, except what I have bargained for. My time is valuable, and I choose to spend it on the things which please me, or which enables me to get what I want. I am sure there are many, many more excuses we use to justify not being grateful, or worshipful, or in service to those whom God still chooses to come to us in – but I will leave that to you to figure out.

The king asks Nick for the debt to be paid, which is impossible. The king then declares that Nick’s wife and children will be sold into slavery. This is something Nick cares about, more than his own life, and there is a renewed plea to be given more time to pay the debt. The king, moved by this display of caring for others, forgives the entire debt – and that tells us something about God, as well.

The king can forgive the entire debt for two reasons. One, which speaks to the greatness of God, is that God can forgive all of this debt, and it does not bring God to ruin. God is not harmed or diminished by forgiving this debt. God is still great.

And two, which speaks to the goodness of God, is that God values the one being forgiven more than the debt. God cares more about our heart than our stuff or our list of accomplishments and failures. God is enriched and satisfied by having us in God’s life and love. God is still good.

Together, the greatness of God and the goodness of God reveal the grace of God. Not seven times, not even seventy times seven, but “biggest number imaginable multiplied by biggest number imaginable” times, does God forgive us our sins – both those against the law and those against grace.

We might be impressed by the miracle of Jesus multiplying the loaves and fish. We might be awed and amazed that Jesushealed the sick and lame. But we are changed by the power of God’s grace and love revealed in Jesus Christ, whose sacrifice on the cross for our sins was the atonement, or forgiveness proclaimed.

Or, at least, it could change our lives. But sometimes we miss the point. We have to accept that we are ourselves forgiven before we can be changed. But we also have to accept that God can forgive others. And, somehow,we miss that this means we are to forgive others in return. That is certainly the case in our parable.

Nick goes to find another slave who owes him one hundred denarii – about the amount of money the average worker could make in three months. That amount of money can really help when things are tight, but it is not life-changing money. Particularly in an Roman-occupied territory, where even the poorest of the poor could have an 80% tax rate, collecting this debt willonly net you about 3 weeks’ worth of money.

But for some unknown reason, this money seems like everything to Nick. There is no forgiveness, and there is no mercy, and the second slave is thrown into jail. The second slave is thrown into jail because there are only two choices offered here: prison or mercy.

That doesn’t seem all that fair to the other slaves, and the king agrees with them. If Nick wants things to be fair, and he chooses prison over mercy, then the only fair thing to do is to throw Nick into prison until his unimaginably, incomprehensively large debt is paid off – which will be never. And the parable ends with Jesus saying, “So my Father will do to you if you do not forgive others from the heart.”

This parable ending reminds me of my New Testament professor in seminary, Dr. Lindsey Pherigo. He suggested that, when we were preaching, that if we tell someone the house is on fire, and we tell them what the fire can do to them, and we tell them they are currently in the house on fire, and then we tell them where the door is which will allow them to escape the fire, we don’t really have to say to them, “I think you should choose the door.”

So, this morning, I am not going to tell you to choose mercy over prison. I am not going to tell you that you should pick heaven over hell. As a matter of faith, it is still your choice. You can still choose prison, if you really want to make that choice. But the house is on fire, and Jesus has opened a door. You will recognize it because, instead of an exit sign, it has a big lighted “Mercy” sign shining over it.

What I will do, however, is invite you to sing a new hymn based on that familiar parable we started with. Usually, we hear the parable of the sheep and the goats as if it is up to us to choose live as the sheep, offering hospitality to all. What makes this hymn new is that it is oddly sung from the vantage point of the ones the sheep helped. I am going to sing it because I want to give thanks again to the sheep of the Inside Church, who showed me hospitality this week.

I invite you to sing it with me. And maybe then, if we understand the difference it makes when we show mercy, we will choose to go through that door!

Hymn “Blessed, Blessed”