Forgiven Living

Through the conversations with fellow students, mentors, teachers, pastor and parents, we hope that Dustin and Jarrett have been growing in knowledge and experience of the Gospel, building an understanding of what Holy Baptism will be meaning to them now and in the years ahead.

We hope that it is a life-shaping process and experience, and we are only marking one point along that path.

We're not marking a graduation today.

The learning isn't completed; it is barely begun.

As Americans, we are predisposed to want to deal with everything from a position of strength.

But we are discovering in the lessons today that in the most profound sense, this is simply not true.

Where do we locate ourselves in the story that Jesus told?

Are we the king in charge of everything? No.

Are we the one with the little debt being beaten up by the bigger guy? No.

The only character left is the one who was forgiven an impossibly huge amount who in turn refused to forgive the small debt of the third person.

If we are to identify with any character in the parable, we are the ones who have been forgiven much but who refuse to reflect it in other relationships around us. Ouch!

But it is so impractical, we tell ourselves as we try to have this story point to someone other than us.tIt's too impractical and must have been written when things were easy in the church.

Not so! The Gospels were prepared in those early decades when things were confused at best.

These early Christians were realists.

When they took the stories of the words and actions of Jesus and pieced them together in the Gospels, the church was young and green and struggling.

They were beset by a multitude of deep conflicts.

--Rome pressed on them.

--Greek culture twisted them.

--There were sexual and ethical problems.

--It was a mess.

One of the things that Matthew wanted to do was to help the struggling church find its way through the problems.

They were hungry for help for how they might get hold of real community, and sustain it.

So today's parable was remembered and written down, and used, rather than being put aside as impractical.

Indeed, the parable was given a prominent place here in the Gospel.

70 x 7 is how often we are to forgive.

And Jesus does not mean exactly 490 times; it is a way of saying to Peter and to us: “Put away your calculators and scorecards. Forgive as you have been forgiven.”

Utterly impractical in our eyes, and yet it is the one way that Jesus has given us to get through the mess.

As the Civil War was ending, a group of folks gathered outside the White House and President Lincoln came out to chat with them.

Lincoln talked about how important it was to get back together again after the war.

He then said, “In a few moments I want the band to play, and I'm going to tell them what I would like them to play.”

Everyone thought it would be “Battle Hymn of the Republic”, which was vastly popular then.

But he turned to the band and said, “I want you to play “Dixie.”

They nearly dropped their instruments in surprise, but after a long and awkward pause, they got themselves organized and played “Dixie.”

And there was not a dry eye anywhere.

I don't know if that story is true or not, but it fits what we know of the character of Lincoln, and it also fits the need of that moment.

After his assassination, tragically, his attitude was not adopted by those who followed him.

Retribution became the mode of operation for a generation rather than forgiveness, and it caused even more sorrow and hardship.

Robert Coles was a child psychiatrist who fifty-some years ago went to Mississippi to help children deal with the trauma of integrating the schools there.

Ruby was the first black child to go to a formerly all-white school.

Every day she had to be escorted by Federal marshals through angry crowds of protesters.

Dr. Coles asked Ruby every day,

“Are you sleeping OK?”

“Fine”, she said.

“Are you eating OK?”

“Just fine” she said.

and similar questions, day after day.

Then her teacher noticed that she seemed to be talking to herself as she was escorted through the crowd each day.

And so the psychiatrist asked her, “What are you saying every morning?”

She replied, “I say, Father, forgive them, they don't know what they are doing.”

She quoted Jesus in his time of most profound forgiveness offered to us in his death on the cross, as the way that she could deal with the ill-will of that crowd.

She was powerfully right.

The power of God is unleashed when such words are announced.

Jesus didn't get into trouble for performing miracles.

It was when he announced God's forgiveness for their sins that the Pharisees went ballistic!

And there they are near the beginning of our worship service.

The pastor dares to announce that God not only forgives sin in general, but also that specifically us who hear those gracious words:”...by the authority of Christ, I announce to you the forgiveness of all your sins, in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

It is not an announcement made lightly nor to be heard flippantly.

They are words of power, words which change lives from the inside out.

They are good words for Dustin and Jarrett, and indeed for all of us.

We will be able to live, forgiven and forgiving.

What good news!

One of the stanzas of the Hymn appointed for Morning Prayer on this past Friday [LBW#468.2] is suffused with this positive attitude about a forgiven and forgiving life:

When those whom I regarded

As trustworthy and sure

Have long from me departed,

God's grace shall still endure.

He cares for all my needs,

From sin and shame corrects me,

From Satan's bonds protects me;

Not even death succeeds.

The Spirit guides our ways

And faithfully will lead us

That nothing can impede us.

To God be all our praise!

Amen.

Please note: The preceding sermon is provided as a resource for the thought, prayer, and meditation of the members and friends of St. Mark's. It is the residue of a verbal event, and thus it does not have academic footnotes and other details that would be expected in a written document. The writer gladly acknowledges the prior thought and work of many Christians before him.