Forgive because you have been forgiven.

If you have a bible this morning open it up to Matthew 18. I have titled the message this morning Forgive because you have been forgiven. Pray with me.

We end this challenging chapter with again a challenging text a text that most of you know quite well if you have been in church awhile or a Christian for awhile and its one of the texts that are challenging because we even as Christians who have been forgiven really struggle sometimes to forgive others, and as we unpack the text today we will see that true forgiveness comes from being forgiven.

In fact if I could have you understand anything from this text it would be that very thing.

For our main idea.

Born again Christians forgive others because we have been forgiven.

This is a biblical principle that we need to know and need to say often and our master teacher shows us why this is the case.

Matthew 18:21–35 ESV

21 Then Peter came up and said to him, “Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?” 22 Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you seven times, but seventy-seven times. 23 “Therefore the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his servants. 24 When he began to settle, one was brought to him who owed him ten thousand talents. 25 And since he could not pay, his master ordered him to be sold, with his wife and children and all that he had, and payment to be made. 26 So the servant fell on his knees, imploring him, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you everything.’ 27 And out of pity for him, the master of that servant released him and forgave him the debt. 28 But when that same servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii, and seizing him, he began to choke him, saying, ‘Pay what you owe.’ 29 So his fellow servant fell down and pleaded with him, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you.’ 30 He refused and went and put him in prison until he should pay the debt. 31 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. 32 Then his master summoned him and said to him, ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. 33 And should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you?’ 34 And in anger his master delivered him to the jailers, until he should pay all his debt. 35 So also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother from your heart.”

Christians are always called to forgive.

I talk about this all the time words matter, so a word like always here should not be taken lightly.

Now Peter asks an important question in verse 21 that we cannot quickly look over. He says Lord how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?

Now remember this question is being asked right after the subject of church discipline. So Peter may be inquiring how many times do we need to forgive the sinners for his sins. So peter throws out the number 7. And you might wonder why 7.. Why this specific number. Well if you understand the context to which Peter is ministering to then you would understand that Jews had a forgiveness limit, and that number was not so high in fact is was 3.

And they get this number from various texts in the book of Amos, and in the book of Amos there is this pattern that you see several times pretty much saying that God is going to revoke punishment after 3 offenses not four 3, and so they Jews took that and limited forgiveness to 3 times. So Peter knowing Jesus is so gracious says how about 7. Sounds pretty good to Peter maybe, and Jesus is like not so fast Peter. I do not say to you seven times, but seventy-seven times. And why would he say such a number here because now instead of 3 mess ups you get 77 now no that is not the point of Jesus response at all.

Instead Jesus wants us to not count our brothers and sisters sin over and over again he wants us to be people who forgive.

And before we go and say you dont know what so and so has done to me we talked about this last week as well that is not the point. Jesus is saying forgive over and over again, now that does not mean that sin does not have real consequences. Because it does, we would should not let others continually sin against us , we should not put ourselves our family our children in bad situations in the name of forgiveness, but when others come to us asking for it we forgive.

Listen to this from a bible scholar.. (What Jesus says in 18:22 is that Christians must forgive other Christians who ask for forgiveness and must forgive them (if needed) over and over.)

Now, will another Christian actually sin against you 490 times? Perhaps. I don't know about you, but I think it's safe to say that I sin (intentionally or unintentionally) at least once a day. ( This guy is better than me but keep listening ) So let's do the math. There are 365 days in the year. I'm forty. That's over 14,000 sins. Well then, just imagine if my wife, my children, my church kept count. Just imagine if God kept count of my sins (not to mention yours). Through Christ, God doesn't keep count. So don't you keep count! That's the point. Got it? As God in Christ forgives us again and again and again, so we are to forgive our brothers and sisters in Christ again and again and again.

that illustration leads to my next point.

God forgives Christians for all our debts.

Lets look at part of the parable again.

Matthew 18:23–27 ESV

23 “Therefore the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his servants. 24 When he began to settle, one was brought to him who owed him ten thousand talents. 25 And since he could not pay, his master ordered him to be sold, with his wife and children and all that he had, and payment to be made. 26 So the servant fell on his knees, imploring him, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you everything.’ 27 And out of pity for him, the master of that servant released him and forgave him the debt.

Jesus is using this dramatic illustration to show us a few things. One Jesus forgives massive amounts of debt. The illustration is so powerful because the amount of the debt this slave got himself into is not even feasible and it could have never been paid by this slave which is the point. In fact many many scholars will say this debt is worth more than Zillion dollars. Zillion is used informally to convey an enormous, but indefinite, quantity of money, and here is the lesson behind Jesus using a number so large like this its because we as slaves of sin, cannot ever come close enough to paying our debt.

Too many people I know maybe even sitting in these pews or watching online have this thought that my sin is worth x amount and ill repay it, there is no pendance for this kind of debt. That means no matter how good you try to be in the eyes of God your debt to him is so severe that you could never repay it back, even if you tried.

And to me and to you as we read this passage we should see the weight of our very sin in the eyes of God its massive, and so all we have left that we can do is plead with God for forgiveness.

Listen to this.. With Jesus' calculation, the implications are obvious. He puts to rest any notion of works-righteousness. It's a zillion-mile chasm! It's a zillion-dollar debt! Good luck with the climb. Good luck with a bank loan. You won't balance that budget or bridge that chasm by yourself. You'll only balance it and bridge it by clinging to that old, rugged, and colossal cross! A cross deeper and wider and vaster than you can ever fathom For if one person's debt (one person!) is a zillion dollars, what is the debt for the sins of the whole world for which Christ pays?"' Christ's cry on the cross, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" (27:46), was the cry of a zillion times a zillion sins laid on one man. Yes, the cross of Christ is deeper and wider and vaster than you can ever fathom. And that's no exaggeration.

So with this huge debt the slaved owed he pleads and the King and the king has pity on him. He did not have to earn a chance to be forgiven he was forgiven the word pity can also be translated to compassion, and we see clearly that Jesus had compassion on this man. God forgives Christians of all our debts, and we should never forget that.

Next point is this.

Christians should never forget they have been forgiven.

Imagine the weight of this man just been forgiven of a debt he could not pay, great feeling if you have ever paid off a car or a cc, medical debt or a student loan its a good felling its freeing isnt it, makes you think ill handle things differently next time if I can. But this man what does he do after being forgiven of a zillion dollar debt. Lets listen again.

Matthew 18:28–30 ESV

28 But when that same servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii, and seizing him, he began to choke him, saying, ‘Pay what you owe.’ 29 So his fellow servant fell down and pleaded with him, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you.’ 30 He refused and went and put him in prison until he should pay the debt.

Somebody forgot about forgiveness didn't they. But the thing about sin which we see so often is its alot easier to be forgiven than to forgive others. And this is a reminder than we can be like this even after this great forgiveness that we receive from Jesus Christ. This man got freed of a zillion dollar debt and now he is looking to cash the debts owed to him. The kind of debt this man owed to the man who was just forgiven was not chump change. It was alot money most believe about 4 months salary who couldnt use 4 more more salary, but thats the point. The point is this debt is nothing in comparison to what was just forgiven.

Even listen to this illustration. Our debt to God is like the distance from the earth to the sun. But our debt to one another—you sin against me or I sin against you—is like the distance between Chicago and Indianapolis as viewed from the sun.'' There's real distance, but it's not comparable. And if God can bridge the first gap, we should bridge the second.

and did not you notice the man pleading for mercy does it in the same way that the other man does, and what Jesus wants us to see in doing that is to say man I was just forgiven when I was down on my knees pleading for it, I can forgive as well, but instead he throws the man in prison saying stay here until you pay me back. In both illustrations there is the reality that in prison a debt cannot be paid, so this man who was just forgiven gives a death sentence to him because he cannot pay him back.

What is the lesson behind all this. Jesus has forgiven you of this massive debt a debt that even the white house and all the world leaders could not comprehend, and so you Christian should forgiven your brothers or sisters of any small debt in comparison . See we so often forget about what Jesus did for us, and not give that back to people is because our hearts are not in the right place.

One scholar said this… ”from your hearts" (plural), literally "from the hearts of you all!" Jesus is teaching about heart-attitude here. He is teaching that "true forgiveness may not simply hang from the lips.?" It's not the reluctant and mumbled "I frg you" from the big sister after being ordered by mom to forgive her grouchy younger brother's, "I said I'm so. mr... y!" Rather, here is it repentance and forgiveness from the heart.

Even earlier in this book… Jesus teaches how God the Father shows indiscriminate love in that he makes the sun rise and the rain fall for the good of both the good and the bad. He doesn't hide the sun from immoral people. He doesn't fail to water the fields of the wicked.

In the same way, Jesus says, we are to love all people our brothers (those who usually love us) and even our enemies (those who usually don't love us).

That's perfect love. We are to love God. This is the tip of the triangle. But we are also to love our neighbors, the nice ones. They are the right point of the triangle. But if we stop there, it is imperfect love. We must also love those on the left, who we'd naturally like to kick to the curb.

Everybody, even the worst of people, loves their own. You won't find an Italian mobster who doesn't love the family or the most brutal inner-city gangbanger who won't take a bullet for his grandmother. But what kind of love is that? It is lopsided love. It's a one-pointed triangle.

We are to love with perfect or complete or whole love, as the Father daily demonstrates, and as the Father most fully demonstrated in the cross of Christ (cf. Romans 5:8, 10). So "perfect" forgiveness is not much different than "perfect" love.

If someone begs you for mercy for whatever sin and however many times a sin has been committed against you, you are to have compassion, and you are to offer forgiveness, now doesn't mean there are not consequences because they are maybe even legals ones in some cases, but you Christian are to never forget you have been forgiven because if you do there are real consequences.

This leads to my final point…

Those who do not take forgiveness seriously face eternal judgement.

Lets again listen to the scriptures. Matthew 18:31-35

Matthew 18:31–35 ESV

31 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. 32 Then his master summoned him and said to him, ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. 33 And should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you?’ 34 And in anger his master delivered him to the jailers, until he should pay all his debt. 35 So also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother from your heart.”

There is real judgement in this text why because of the lack of forgiveness by the one who was forgiven. The servants went and told the master everything that had happened. And what did the king think of it? This servant is Wicked. And I believe he sent this man to hell, why do I believe that because the man could not pay his debt. There was no way he could escape, and He took the forgiveness granted to him, and he did not let that change his heart. His heart was hard and forgiveness was not in it even though he was forgiven

There is a warning even to us saved people in the text that we should as we continue walking the Christian life live with the reality that hell is real and use that as a reminder to forgive.

I love what one man said because I believe it gives us a right perspective.. You see, we all stand between the cross and the chair, the day of God's first salvation (the cross) and God's final salvation (the chair), God's first judgment on sin (the cross) and God's final judgment upon sinners (the chair).

Christians stand between this past event and that future reality, and thus our heads need to be constantly turning-looking back and looking ahead- appreciating the King's forgiveness, yet fearing the King's judgment. Forgiveness and fear are not directly opposed realities to Jesus, and thus they shouldn't be to us. In our pilgrimage to the celestial city, God uses both —forgiveness and fear—to push us along.

Now, to be clear, our forgiveness of others is not a condition of salvation, but it is a consequence of it. We can apply any Christian principle to that.

"There will be no forgiveness in that day [judgment day] for unforgiving people," J. C. Ryle has rightly said. I say it this way: There is no such creature as an unforgiving Christian. That being doesn't exist. Christians forgive. We forgive because we have been transformed by the power of the gospel.

What makes us different from everyone else in the world is our ability to forgive because we have been forgiven.

We have been given this grace upon grace for a debt that was so high we could not even comprehend how high the debt actually is. And times that by however many people will call upon his name he paid all the debt for his children.

Jesus paid it all we are debt free if we are in Christ, and the debt that he paid was dealing with this sin we have, and taking it upon himself to the point of death on cross, and saying I will debt take Luke’s debt.. Use names.. So that these slaves of sin, can be a children of God.

And in turn what are we to do? Show that same kind of grace. Because why forgiven people forgive.

This is hard….. but its what Jesus calls born again Christians to do forgive, and many people have a weight so heavy on them because they need forgiveness, and some need to forgive.

I even was thinking as I prepared this sermon there is so many people I feel hurt by or have hurt me and on the flip side so many people I have hurt, and Jesus is showing me and you that circumstances don’t dictate forgiveness he does.

Listen to this powerful story that I read..

A few years ago when bumper stickers were popular, one stood out to me: “I don’t get mad, I get even.” It was meant to be humorous, but it had a chilling effect on me, because it described my attitude just a few years prior. I was raised by a stepfather who caused my family and me a great deal of pain. He left our family when I was in my early teens, and I carried a deep animosity toward him for years. When I was in Vietnam, my animosity became almost obsessive, and I vowed that the first time I saw him on my return, I would kill him. I would make him pay for what he had done to our family. I returned a few months later and within a year had become a Christian. My world began to change, and I put that stepfather out of my mind. I had not thought about him much until about four years later, when he suddenly showed up where my wife and I and our little girl were living. He had tracked us down. My wife, being the loving person she is, invited him in. As we sat and talked politely, that vow came to my mind. I then told him, “I made a vow in Vietnam that the first time I saw you, I would kill you. Today is that day.” I will never forget the look of terror that came over his face. He started to sweat and slide down on the couch. I went on, “But I now know that I’m no better a person than you. God has forgiven me. And if he can forgive a sinner like me, I can forgive you. I will not allow you to hurt my family again, so don’t think that this is made out of weakness. Rather, I forgive you because I have been forgiven.” I probably was as shocked as he was. I had not thought about saying those words of forgiveness, but they came easily. I was deeply aware of the mercy and forgiveness that God had extended to me. I knew my sin better than anyone. I may not have been as abusive as my former stepfather. I may not have hurt people in the same way he had hurt our family. But I had also abused and hurt people in my own self-seeking way. When I came to that awareness, I knew that I needed mercy and forgiveness. And in receiving the gift of life that Jesus extended to me through his work on the cross, extending mercy and forgiveness to my former stepfather was a natural response. My vow had been the rash, irresponsible reaction of a deeply hurt, bitter young sinner. However, my ability later to forgive came from the eternal, loving act of grace in Jesus’ sacrifice for my sin. I discovered that the key to forgiveness is to stop focusing on what others have done to us and focus instead on what Jesus has done for us.

If you don’t have that kind of forgiveness in your heart do you know Jesus? Jesus as we know says things start with the heart as we see in verse 35. I am asking you today have you been forgiven for your sin?

It starts there..See many people try to work their way to God many religions have been founded with that idea, some have twisted the Christian faith to say works get you there, but the bible states that the sin we have separates us from a Holy God, and in order to have forgiveness of that sin you must repent, turn away from the sin and believe by faith that Jesus alone can save you, and as simple as that seems its the hardest thing you will ever do in this life, but its most freeing thing as well.

Just like getting a debt paid feels so relieving the weight all your sin past, present, and future is a weight so freeing you will want to remember it every moment of your life. And not only will you want to remember you will want to extend it to others who have wronged you, because the Debt Jesus paid covers even the wrongs of one another. O what a savior we have who offers forgiveness for the greatest of sins, and covers all of our debts.

Church what do you this text at the end of the day what we make of it, will be something that will make us different that world we live in let us pray.