When Forgiving is Hard to Do (Rev. Dr. Charley Reeb)
Forgiving is hard to do. All of us have scar tissue to prove it. We have all been hurt, betrayed, cut down, rejected and wounded by others and the last thing we feel like doing is forgiving. We know the Bible commands us to do it, but let’s get real. It’s hard to forgive.
I can tell you that I have never felt like forgiving anyone. I’ve done it, but I never felt like doing it. In fact, a while back someone hurt me very much. What did your sweet loving pastor want to do in response? Not forgive! I wanted to hurt them like they hurt me. You will be glad to know that I didn’t, but I wanted to!
I know I am not alone. We have all been wounded by others – the betrayals, the lies, the deceit, the abuse, the insults, the bullying, the infidelity. It makes our blood boil. It makes our heart ache. It makes forgiveness seem impossible.
In fact, you may be thinking, “I know you are supposed to preach on forgiveness Charley, but quite frankly it is easier said than done and you have no idea what some people have done to me. I know I am supposed to forgive but I just can’t bring myself to do it.”
I believe one of the reasons it is so hard for us to forgive is because the idea of forgiveness is misunderstood. There are a few myths in the church about forgiveness. One of them is that forgiving means forgetting. Some Christians say, “You need to forgive and forget.” The idea is that when we forgive God will give us emotional and spiritual amnesia about the person who hurt us.
This not what the Bible calls us to do. Forgiving does not mean forgetting. It is humanly impossible to forget when someone hurts us. God gave us memories so we would not get hurt again. And trying to forget the pain is emotionally unhealthy and can lead to unhealthy coping behaviors.
Forgiving does not mean pretending like nothing ever happened, nor does it always mean trusting the one who hurt us like we did before. Forgiving also doesn’t necessarily mean continuing the same kind of relationship with the person. When we forgive, we do not throw away the need for boundaries or overlook that there are consequences to hurtful behavior.
Another myth of forgiveness is that it is something that happens overnight. No, forgiveness is a process. Sometimes, it takes time and healing before we can forgive.
Having said all that, the Bible is very clear that we are called to forgive. There is no way around it. So, how do we bring ourselves to do it when it is so very hard to do? How do we learn to forgive when every fiber of our being wants to stay bitter? How do we remove the heavy weight of resentment that steals our joy and peace?
Well, would you believe that Jesus told a story that teaches us how to forgive? Like so many of his parables, this one contains exactly what our heart needs to forgive. The parable appears in Matthew 18 and Jesus tells the story in response to a question from Peter. Take a look:
Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me? Up to seven times?” -Matthew 18:21
Peter’s question is a good one. We have all wondered this. Shouldn’t there be a limit to forgiveness? I mean, we can’t go around just forgiving all the time, right? That does not seem right. So, Peter, thinking he is being generous says, “Okay, Jesus, what about 7 times? That’s a lot. I will give someone 7 free passes and then that’s it. Done. What about that?”
Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.” -Matthew 18:22
77 times! Was Jesus giving us an exact number? I mean, do we need to keep calculators in our Bibles? “Okay, George, you have crossed me 68 times. You’re getting close…”
No, Jesus was being symbolic with the number 77. He was basically saying, “There is no limit to forgiveness. The Kingdom runs on reconciliation and forgiveness. It never stops” (Tom Long).
“Peter might as well have asked, ‘How many times should I obey the law of gravity?’ In the Kingdom of God, forgiveness is not the exception, it is the rule” (Tom Long).
As Peter’s jaw hits the floor, Jesus shares a story:
23 “Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. 24 As he began the settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand bags of gold was brought to him. -Matthew 18:23-24
Ten thousand bags of gold was worth about fifteen to twenty years wages for a daily worker. Essentially, this slave owed the king a bazillion bucks! It was a crazy amount of money.
25 “Since he was not able to pay, the master ordered that he and his wife and his children and all that he had be sold to repay the debt.” -Matthew 18:25
The servant could never pay back all that money, so the king decides to cut his losses by selling the servant, his family, and his possessions for whatever he can get. End of story, right? No, this peculiar story keeps going.
26 “At this the servant fell on his knees before him. ‘Be patient with me,’ he begged, ‘and I will pay back everything.’” -Matthew 18:26
The servant does not explain how he intends to come up with a bazillion bucks. It is insane to think he could pay back this crazy amount of debt.
Then there is a big surprise:
27 “The servant’s master took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go.” -Matthew 18:27
Tom Long says of this verse, “The king, seeing his servant on his knees in the posture of worship, and hearing him beg for patience has pity on him and forgives the whole debt; the entire bazillion is wiped off the books, and the slave is free to go.”
Can you imagine? That servant must have been over the moon! “Whoopee! I am free of this huge debt!” Well, not exactly, because Jesus’ parables are never predictable.
28 “But when that servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred silver coins. He grabbed him and began to choke him. ‘Pay back what you owe me!’ he demanded.” -Matthew 18:28
So, let’s get this straight. This servant is supposed to be skipping away from the throne room of the king, thrilled to be set free from a massive amount of debt. And the first thing he did was not throw a party with his friends and family. And he didn’t post something on Facebook about the overwhelming generosity of the king. No, the first thing he did was find another servant who owed him money, grab him by the throat and demand to be paid.
That servant had a short memory. Not only that, but the amount of money he was owed was a pittance compared to what he owed the king. And not only that, he choked the man!
29 “His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged him, ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay it back.’” -Matthew 18:29
This servant did the same thing the first servant did before the king. He got on his knees and begged him for more time to pay it off. What did the first servant do? He didn’t do what the king did for him.
30 “But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt.” -Matthew 18:30
Well, did you know that people talk? They certainly did here. Other servants were witnessing all of this and thinking, “Talk about ungrateful!” Look what they did:
31 “When the other servants saw what had happened, they were outraged and went and told their master everything that had happened. 32 Then the master called the servant in. ‘You wicked servant,’ he said, ‘I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. 33 Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?’ 34 In anger his master handed him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back all he owed.” -Matthew 18:31-34
Long reminds us that it would’ve taken that servant one hundred life sentences to pay off a bazillion dollars. Basically, he would be tortured for the rest of his life.
Let’s be honest. We get some satisfaction from seeing this guy getting what’s coming to him, don’t we? It feels similar to when we watch those action movies where Liam Neeson shows up and brings wrath to those wicked men who kidnapped his daughter!
But then things get really somber, real dark, really quick. Jesus then says:
35 “This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart.” -Matthew 18:35
And that’s how the parable ends. Ouch. What are we supposed to do with that? That’s not a very pleasant picture of God, is it?
This deserves an explanation because it feels like Jesus is telling us that God is some monster who will torture us if we don’t forgive.
Well, I don’t believe that’s what Jesus is saying exactly. Remember, this is a parable and parables are often cartoon like, exaggerated to get a point across.
I believe what Jesus is saying is that we have a big choice to make. The preacher and scholar Tom Long suggest that Jesus is telling us that we have before us two worlds. One world is the Kingdom of Heaven that runs on unlimited grace and unforgiveness. The other world is a dark and bitter dog eat dog world that runs on resentment. Which one are you going to choose? If you choose the dark world, God will honor that decision, and that is what you will get – self-inflicted torture trying to pay off debts and choking on resentment the rest of your life.
I will never forget a man coming to see me in another church I served. He told me that he was released from prison a year before back for a crime he had committed. He served time for many years but had finally been released. He looked at me and said, “I should be happy that I am free, but I am not. I still feel like I am behind bars. I am still in the prison of hatred, resentment and retribution, and I want to get out!”
It is like the old quote, “Resentment is like drinking poison, expecting the other person to die.” Who wants to live in that world? Wouldn’t it more liberating and joyful to live in the world of the Kingdom, where grace and forgiveness abound? Not to choose that world would be foolish. As Lewis Smedes says, “When we forgive, we set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner we set free is us.”
Kenneth Hart is a psychology professor in Canada. He studied 66 recovering alcoholics and they all had one thing in common. They had resentment in their hearts. They were driven by resentment. They wouldn’t let it go. Hart wondered about that and said, “If there is a way I can allow these recovering alcoholics to get rid of their anger and hate by forgiving, perhaps I could break the cycle of these alcoholics relapsing because it would get rid of one excuse to drink.” You know what he found? It worked. In fact, one recovering alcoholic said, “Forgiveness set me free.”
Maybe you need to be set free today. Resentment and bitterness are choking you. They have stolen your joy, hope and peace. They have affected your relationships and your ability to enjoy life. So, how do we forgive? How does the parable teach us to forgive? How can we be set free?
The key is to look at the sharp contrast between what the first servant owed the king and what the second servant owed the first. Forgiveness becomes possible only when we see and experience the magnitude of God’s forgiveness for us in Christ. When Jesus spoke about the outrageous forgiveness the king showed the servant, he was talking about what he was about to do on the cross for you and for me.
Are you having a hard time forgiving someone? Then take a trip to Calvary and learn how you have been forgiven. And stay there awhile to learn how to forgive. He did it all for you. He forgave you and you didn’t deserve it. He paid your debt, and you didn’t deserve it. He forgave you and does not hold it against you.
We can forgive because we have been forgiven.
You see, when it comes to forgiveness most of us are terrible at math. We overestimate the sins of others and underestimate our own sin. That was the servant’s mistake after he had been forgiven by the king.
In the Kingdom, we aren’t expected to treat others the way we have been treated by others. We are expected to treat others the way God has treated us. We don’t forgive because the other person deserves it, or has apologized, or feels terrible enough (chances are they never will). We forgive because we have been forgiven. Period.
And I can’t think of more critical message we need right now than the one today on forgiveness. I have learned that resentment is one of evil’s greatest tools. Did you feel the anger and hate that came out of the servant when grabbed the throat of the one who owed him. That’s evil. And that image hits too close to home because it’s an illustration of what is going on all over our country right now. Evil is loving the division and bitterness in our nation. Evil has us exactly where he wants us. Evil is dancing because of the hate people have for others. Evil wants us to point fingers and malign and demonize people we disagree with because evil knows that’s how we destroy each other.
But forgiveness is evil’s kryptonite. It is the only thing that saves this world. Jesus proved that on the cross.
I loved Mr. Rogers growing up. I was raised on his TV programs. What many don’t know is that Mr. Rogers was an ordained Presbyterian minister. Once when he was invited to deliver the Commencement address at Pittsburgh Seminary, he told a story about one of his professors there, Dr. William Orr. Fred Rogers had gone to see Dr. Orr, toward the end of his life after a stroke left him partially paralyzed, but his professor was still bright in mind and spirit. Mr. Rogers asked him about something that puzzled him for a long time. It had come up again during the Sunday morning worship service earlier that day. One of the hymns sung that morning had been Martin Luther’s A Mighty Fortress Is Our God. What puzzled Mr. Rogers was the verse that says:
The prince of darkness grim, we tremble not for him; his rage we can endure, for lo! his doom is sure, one little word shall fell him.
“Dr. Orr,” Fred Rogers asked, “what is the one little word that will fell the prince of darkness? That one word Luther claimed would strike down evil?” After a quiet moment, the professor answered, “Forgive. The word is forgive. Forgiveness is the only thing evil cannot tolerate” (Christianity Today, March 2000).
And this I know, for the Bible tells me so. Amen.
-I am grateful for Dr. Tom Long’s commentary on this parable. It was a helpful resource for me as I prepared this sermon.