Twenty-second Sunday after Trinity (Reformation Day, Observed)

Then Peter came to Jesus and said, “Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? Up to seven times?” Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven. Therefore the kingdom of heaven is like a certain king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants (Mt 18:21–23). Peter wants to know when a man can be permitted to withhold forgiveness. Jesus’ answer does not begin with a man, but with God: The kingdom of heaven is like a certain king who wanted to settle accounts with His servants. If we’re going to talk about forgiveness, we must begin with the fact that God wants to settle accounts. He does not want debts with His servants. This is why Jesus teaches us to ask: Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. This is the will of God.

Notice that the story of forgiveness isn’t the servant’s idea. He would have continued forever in his debt, but not God. God says, “No. Let’s take care of this debt now.” The man owes 10,000 talents. A talent is an ancient unit of measurement equivalent to a man’s weight in gold or silver. As of last Friday, gold is at $2,764 an ounce! A talent of gold is a huge sum—just shy of $9,000,000. And this man owes that times 10,000! None of this times seven stuff. He owes 10,000 times his own weight in gold! And the Greek word for 10,000 here is “myriad.” I don’t think it’s even meant to be a calculable number. The very, very technical, very, very scholarly dictionary of the Greek New Testament says that he owed “zillions of talents” that is, “an extremely large or incalculable number.”

How could anybody accumulate a debt so large? How is that even possible? I don’t know. Ask yourself, “How did this happen?” because you are this man. Jesus is talking about your debt of sin. If one sin earns you temporal and eternal punishment, what does a lifetime of sin merit? Notice that the man doesn’t dispute the debt. There’s no quibbling with the One who knows all and sees all. Perhaps you might fool your neighbor or your spouse. “It wasn’t my fault. I didn’t do anything, and anyway, you can’t prove it!” But before God, the intents and motives of the heart are laid bare. No one can stand before Him and say, “I am blameless!” Instead, the man does the only thing that a sinner can possibly do; He begs for mercy. “Master, have patience with me, and I will pay you all” (Mt 23:26).

But the man’s insane! He could never pay this back, and God knows it. The only talent the man has is the talent for sinning, daily adding more and more to his debt. More time? No. You’ll just sin more. Instead, the Master simply forgives him. Why? Because this is what God wants to do. He is not willing that any should perish. Instead, He desires to forgive abundantly. Moved with compassion, He released him, and forgave him the debt (Mt 18:27).

This is what God has done for you. How much did you owe? A lifetime of sins, compounded daily? A zillion talents? God wipes it out in an instant. Your sins are forgiven. Gone. Wiped clean, simply because God desires to be merciful. This is why God commands us to pray: Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.

But this is where the story goes wrong. Having been forgiven everything, the man immediately the man goes out, finds his neighbor who owes him 100 silver coins, and begins choking him, “Pay me what you owe!” Unlike God, who desires to forgive, this man desires to collect on his debt. Why? Because it’s profitable! Why forgive sins, when there’s such an opportunity to profiting from them? This was the catalyst that led to the Reformation. Instead of forgiving the sins of sinners, which is what the church is supposed to do, the church had monetized the whole enterprise. “You want time to pay of your debt? It’s going to take millions and millions of years? You’ll have all the time you need in purgatory. But for a few silver coins, we can cut 10,000 years off your debt.”

The sin business is profitable, and like the credit cards companies, the church in Luther’s day wanted everyone to be carrying a balance. “Forgiveness? No, you can’t make money that way! We’ve got no leverage when people have a clean slate.” This is how the mafia operates. They don’t want to settle accounts. They want you to owe a favor. It’s how the business works. It’s how many churches work. It’s how many marriages work—husbands and wives collecting dirt on each other, useful debts to be brought up as leverage at just the right time. “Why forgive this small debt when I could collect interest on it over the next forty years?”

Some people think that Martin Luther fixed everything with the Reformation. But no, the abuses that led him to nail the 95 Theses to the church door are still happening today. The money changers keep coming back, because sin is big business. Why else is there so much gossip in the church? It’s useful to keep track of the dirt on everyone else because you never know when it may come in handy.

Take this servant, for example. He’s got outstanding debts on his fellow servants, debts he’s perfectly content to leave in place for a rainy day. “You owe me 100 silver coins? Don’t worry about it. We’ll take care of it later.” And by later, he means in the event that God calls him to account for being a sinner. Then, suddenly it’s time to collect, “Yes, I’m a sinner, but so is Bob. I’ve got some dirt on him.” Instead of being the place where forgiveness is given freely, the church turns into the black market of sin, where guilt-ridden sinners buy, sell, and trade injustices on each other, all to prepare for the day when our own great debt is called in.

The wicked servant’s problem is ultimately one of unbelief. He cannot believe that God could be so generous as simply to forgive. So, he prepares in advance for the Day of Judgment, collecting the sins of his neighbors to use as collateral against his own debt. And when he’s called before his Master, he’s so consumed with his plan, he can’t even hear or believe it when the Lord says, “Your debt is forgiven.” He immediately implements Operation Choke Neighbor. That was always the plan because forgiveness is simply unthinkable.

To what degree have you acted as this wicked servant? How many debts have you collected on your brother, your neighbor, your spouse? These are useful debts, little sins and injustices to be cataloged and stored and brought out in times of emergency. “My conscience is pricked by the Law of God? Quick, remember the time that Harry sinned against me. I need to win an argument: Remember that nasty thing you said to me?” What a sad, petty way to live: whether within a friendship, a marriage, or as members of the church. It’s why Jesus had to turn over the money tables in the temple. It’s why the Holy Spirit used Martin Luther to start a Reformation. It is why you need a personal Reformation in your heart and mind this morning.

How does this Reformation start? It begins and it ends with the mercy of God and His desire to settle accounts with His servants. The just shall live by faith—words central to the theme of the Reformation. The just shall live by faith. Faith in what? Faith in these words of Christ, “Your sins are forgiven.” Great. Thanks. Now back to the program of collecting dirt on my neighbor in order to start paying for my sins…” No. Your sins are forgiven. “Sins? Did you hear what Bertha did last week?” No. Your sins are forgiven. Stop the bean-counting. Stop the injustice collecting. Stop everything, hear and believe these words. Your sins are forgiven. The whole, incalculable debt of a zillion talents, every last sin against God, all forgiven. It can’t be earned. It can’t be paid back. This forgiveness can only be forgiven. Such is the mercy of God towards you. In the stead and by the command of my Lord Jesus, I forgive you all your sins. Do you believe this? Then the Reformation has come home to you. Salvation has come to your house today.

It is because of God the Father’s abundant and merciful desire to settle accounts with His servants that Jesus has taught us to pray: Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.

What does this mean? We pray in this petition that our Father in heaven would not look at our sins, or deny our prayer because of them. We are neither worthy of the things for which we pray, nor have we deserved them, but we ask that He would give them all to us by grace, for we daily sin much and surely deserve nothing but punishment. So we too will sincerely forgive and gladly do good to those who sin against us. Amen.