The King & Forgiveness (Matthew 18:21-35)

Introduction

In an early scene of the 1990’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Movie there is a line on forgiveness. The line is set up as one of the turtles, Michelangelo, is waiting on a pizza delivery from what appears to be Domino’s Pizza. And the pizza is late. As the guy finally finds the address for the pizza, he notices that he has been shorted $3. And states, “this is a $10, the tab is $13.” But Michelangelo replies, “Forgiveness is divine, but never pay full price for late pizza.”

It’s a silly opening illustration I know. One that I do not expect most of you to fully pick up. But I think we can all grasp a bit of this reply that forgiveness is divine. And the reason we can relate a bit to this quote is because if we are honest with ourselves, forgiveness is hard.

Forgiveness does not come naturally to us. In fact, just the opposite. In our sinful nature waging war within us, it is more natural for us to continue to allow hate to dominate our hearts when we have been wronged.

A hatred that only grows if we continue to be wronged and offended by the same person or the same situation over and over again. This is our natural tendency, a tendency that comes from the sin within ourselves.

Yet the message of the gospel, the good news of Jesus presses against this sinful tendency of hatred. It presses against our hearts and begins to work in our hearts. Turning our hearts from hatred to that of forgiveness. A forgiveness that is rooted in the gospel itself. And this kind of gospel rooted forgiveness is what I want to talk about this morning as we dive into Matthew 18:21-35.

Please then open your Bibles with me to Matthew 18:21-35. Feel free to use the table of contents in your Bible or if you do not have a Bible, there is a Red Bible there in your seat and you can find Matthew 18:21-35 in that Bible on page #979 (2x).

While you are getting there, let me help set us up for where we are this morning. The Gospel According to Matthew has been working on establishing how Jesus is God’s forever king who has come to bring blessing to the nations. For in the very opening of the gospel account, we see Jesus revealed as the one who is both, the son of David and the son of Abraham. Jesus then is to fulfill the promise to David to be the one to sit on the throne forever. And then he fulfills the promise to Abrham in bringing blessing not just to Abraham’s family line, but to all the nations.

Then, as this gospel account closes, it closes like this:

Matthew 28:18–20 ESV

18 And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

The rule of God’s forever king has then been established. A rule that commissions us to go and make disciples to further advance this rule. Disciples who are made as we go and proclaim the gospel, as people believe and repent and are baptized and then are taught to obey all that Christ our King has commanded.

And so, part of Jesus’ teaching that we are instructed to teach others about is forgiveness. A forgiveness that is rooted in the forgiveness that we have received in Christ.

But, before we read Matthew 18:21-35. I want us to read this well, understanding exactly from the outset where we fit into this story. For in Matthew 18:21-22, we will see what is at stake. But in Matthew 18:23-35, this is going to be unfolded in the form of a parable. A parable being an allegorical story calling to action according to the point of the allegorical story.

And in this parable, there are three characters, the king, the first servant, and the second servant. The King is meant to be understood as God our Father as directly told in V.35. Then there are these two servants. And we are the first servant, the ungrateful servant. While our brothers and sisters are the 2nd servant. It is my job now to help unpack this more. But we need to see from the beginning how we are to be connected to this unforgiving servant and how it is to pierce our hearts.

Let’s now read the word of the LORD from Matthew 18:21-35…

Main Idea: As Christians we have been greatly forgiven our debts by the blood of Jesus, so we are to freely forgive others. We are going to unfold this in 3 points that are three lessons we need to see from this text: (1) we are to freely forgive others, (2) we are to see the greatness of our own forgiveness, and (3) we are to beware withholding forgiveness from others.

1. We are to Freely Forgive Others

The disciples' heads are likely spinning. Jesus has been teaching them that they must become like little children to enter into the kingdom of heaven. That is they must humble themselves and become dependent on another, namely him if they are to enter the kingdom.

But not only are they themselves to become like little children, they are to realize others alongside them are little children too. They are weak and dependent upon Jesus too. And so, disciples of Jesus are to be careful to not to cause other little ones to stumble and sin.

They are to be careful of this by watching their own lives, killing sin within themselves so that they are not a temptation to other little ones to follow in their same path of folly.

But still they are given another means in caring for little ones and not allowing them to stumble, they are to go after one another in their sinful wandering. This is what we looked at last week in church discipline, calling us to go to a brother or sister who has sinned and confronting them in it, hoping to have them hear us and be restored. Failure to hear these warnings and repent would in the end bring them to being removed from the church and barred from the table of the Lord’s Supper.

But now, a question arises from the disciples. A question wondering how many times are they to put up with sin and go through this process? V.21…

This seven times that Peter asks of Jesus was twice the amount that the Jewish Rabbis called for. For they said that we are to forgive someone three times, but not four. For they looked to the book of Amos to get this. For in the book of Amos there is a repetitive use concerning the nations, as well as both the Northern and Southern Kingdoms of Israel. A phrase that goes, for three transgressions and then for four.

This was where they got their idea that forgiving someone three times was the limit and the proper response. Peter gets that forgiveness should be more than this though, that his fellow Jews were wrong in their interpretation and application of this matter. Which should come as no surprise to us. Poor and wrong interpretation of a passage will always lead to poor and wrong application of the text.

But despite Peter’s generosity of seven times, he once again has spoken too hastily in thinking he has understood the matter at hand. And so, Jesus responds, V.22…

In saying seventy-seven times that we are to forgive someone who has sinned against us, Jesus is reaching way back in the Bible, to the beginning in Genesis 4. Genesis 4 from our Scripture reading earlier in the service. He is considering Lamech’s words and how Cain’s vengeance was sevenfold and his being seventy-sevenfold.

For this language of vengeance was coming from one who was the seed of the serpent. Lamech was of Cain who was of his father, the devil. He was a seed of the serpent who rejected God and his rule and was exiled. And Jesus here is now undoing the curse brought about by this seed of the serpent. He is undoing it as he now sets the standard for God’s kingdom, a kingdom in which forgiveness extends to such great lengths when one is wronged, not vengeance.

This forgiveness while called to be given freely, we must remember that it is set within the context of church discipline. This means that this question regarding forgiving someone is not a call to not hold people accountable. The call to forgive is not telling us to not confront them in their sin. The call to forgiveness is not a call meaning that we do not set boundaries, maybe even the boundary of removing them from our midst in the final step of church discipline.

The call to forgive freely is a call to not harbor hatred towards the one who has wronged you. It is to forgive them fully within your heart from what they have done. Even if that forgiveness is a call to forgive and love our enemies.

"What a happy world it would be if this rule of our Lord’s (Matthew 18:21-22) was more known and better obeyed! How many of the miseries of mankind are occasioned by disputes, quarrels, lawsuits, and an obstinate tenacity about what men call “their rights!” How many of them might be altogether avoided, if men were more willing to forgive, and more desirous for peace! Let us never forget that a fire cannot go on burning without fuel. Just in the same way it takes two to make a quarrel. Let us each resolve by God’s grace, that of these two we will never be one. Let us resolve to return good for evil, and blessing for cursing, and so melt down enmity, and change our foes into friends. (Rom. 12:20.)" [1]

Therefore as disciples of King Jesus, we are to understand that what is expected of us as followers of the King is to forgive freely in this way. Our forgiveness is to be limitless. We never stop forgiving others for we are to forgive freely. That is point #1. To now illustrate this point, Jesus turns to a parable, which leads us to point #2, great forgiveness.

2. We are to See the Greatness of our Own Forgiveness

The call to forgive freely is rooted in the great forgiveness that we have received as Christians. A forgiveness that is illustrated by this parable. Let’s again read the first part of it, V.23-27…

Again here, the King is to be understood as God the Father as told by Jesus down in V.35. A king who comes to settle his accounts with his servants. And one particular account comes up. An account of a man who owes ten thousand talents.

Ten thousand is said to be the highest numeral in Greek that exists and a talent is the largest known amount of money. And so the two together make an elaborate debt to be owed. Some have attempted to do the conversion from then to now and it lands somewhere between several billion to the zillions that would be owed. Making this debt one that was impossible to be repaid.

And since it was impossible to repay the debt, what awaited this man was for him to be sold, along with his wife and children to at least retrieve some of the debt. But as this judgment is cast down, the man falls down and pleads with the king for patience and mercy. He seeks to be given the chance to try and pay him everything.

But what is the king’s response there in V.27? He has pity, compassion on him. He forgives his debt and releases the servant.

Now, again, remember this is a parable. Jesus is not calling in this story for those who fall into such a debt to have their wives and children sold into slavery to pay the debt back. He is using hyperbole to get the severity of the debt across and the greatness of the forgiveness that is being extended here.

A parable that is to show us the extent of our own debt to the King, to the LORD our God. 10,000 talents would not be enough to measure our debt. A debt that was not forgiven by the erasing of an accounting book, but the shedding of the blood of God’s own Son, Jesus.

Just consider the extent of our debt to the Lord. How many times have we knowingly or unknowingly rejected the LORD and his word? How have we forsaken the ways of his path? Turning to other paths that appear better and easier, but that lead to the path of destruction.

How many times we have worshipped an idol, declaring it to be the Lord. How many times we have failed to keep the Sabbath holy. How many times we have failed to honor father and mother. How many times have we been guilty of murder and adultery in our hearts? How many times we have bore false testimony with our lies. How many times have we coveted that which our neighbors had, jealousy wanting it for ourselves?

This is the debt of our sin. This is the debt that we owe in repayment to the LORD. A repayment that we could not repay. Despite this debt, despite our rebellion against him, the Lord’s compassion is poured out. In that he who was offended would make a way to forgive sinners of their sins while also upholding his righteous judgment. His own Son, Jesus, would be sent into the world to lay down his life in the place of such sinners, such rebels.

Jesus’ blood would be shed as he was nailed to a cross on our behalf. As he paid the debt that we owed for our sin. For our sakes he was stricken, smitten, and afflicted. He was a sheep slaughtered as the payment for our sins.

Our debt was great, it could not be repaid had it not been for the love of God that came down to rescue us through the bloody cross of Calvary. It is no wonder then why Isaac Watts was able to come to this closing line in the hymn Alas, and Did My Savior Bleed [2]:

But drops of grief can ne’er repay the debt of love I owe;

Here, Lord, I give myself away; tis all that I can do.

Because we have been forgiven much, we are then being called to forgive much. But lest we fail to take this seriously, we have been left with a sobering example in the 2nd half of this parable. For we see the great forgiveness of the king in the first half, and that is what we have covered here in point #2, but now we turn to the second half in point #3 as we consider an ungrateful servant and his withholding forgiveness.

3. We are to Beware Withholding Forgiveness from Others

In the 2nd half of the parable, we have this same servant who has been cleared of a great debt now free. And what does he do? Look again with me at V.28-34…

This servant goes out and now seeks and finds one who owed him, one of his equals. This fellow servant owed the first servant this hundred denarii. A hundred denarii was thought to have been about 4 months worth of wages. Wages that the first servant demands of this other servant as he begins choking him.

And now, this other servant almost does exactly what the first servant had done before the king in his falling down and pleading with him for mercy. Yet, this first servant fails to imitate the king in having pity, in showing compassion. He demands the repayment be made and throws the man in prison until the debt is repaid.

The hypocrisy of this servant is known now by others. And as we see there in V.31, they go and tell the king. The King who calls him out on this hypocrisy, who calls him out on his wicked action. For instead of having received mercy and showing mercy to others, this man expects mercy from others, but is unwilling to show mercy himself. And because of such, he now is thrown into prison after having thought he had escaped.

And then Jesus gets to the point of the parable in V.35, where we read….

Those who have rightly tasted the height and the depth, the width and breadth of God’s forgiveness, will be those who show forgiveness to others. Because we understand what we ourselves have been forgiven.

But for those who withhold forgiveness to others, they themselves have not rightly tasted of God’s forgiveness. Their own unforgiveness is proof of such. And so, though they may think themselves in the clear from their own debt, their wickedness will be exposed and their doom is sure unless they repent of such matters and begin to show the forgiveness of Christ now.

Friend, if you are one who has been struggling with forgiveness, look to the cross and see the extent of forgiveness that has come in Jesus. Taste that forgiveness this morning by turning from your sinful heart and trusting in Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, no matter how great they are.

Come taste what you yourself have been unable to give others, because you have not experienced such forgiveness. A forgiveness given by the loving sacrifice of Jesus himself! A forgiveness that is now being extended to you!

For the Christian, you who have tasted such forgiveness in Christ, let this be what fuels you then to forgive freely and not withhold forgiveness from others. Just as you have been forgiven much, forgive much.

Let’s pray…

Endnotes

[1] J. C. Ryle, Expository Thoughts on Matthew (New York: Robert Carter & Brothers, 1860), 230.

[2] Isaac Watts. The Sing Hymnal: Hymn #243: Alas, and Did My Savior Bleed. (Wheaton, IL, Crossway, 2025).