11th Sunday After Pentecost

Matthew 18:23-35

In the Gospel reading for today, we hear of a man who was deeply in debt, owing a great fortune to the king. The king wanted to settle his accounts with his servants and therefore demanded the payment of this debt. The poor servant could in no way pay back this great amount and so the king ordered that he and his wife and children should be sold into slavery to repay the debt. The man fell on his knees and begged the king for mercy and patience to give him time to try to pay back what he owed. The king was moved to compassion by the cries of the debtor and, with a loving heart, forgave him everything.

When this man went out he found one of his fellow servants who happened to owe him some small amount of money. This time, the one who had just been forgiven so much, showed no mercy and threw the debtor into prison. When the king heard about this, he called the first man before him and said, ‘You wicked servant, I forgave you the great debt that you owed and you have turned around and shown no mercy on he who owed you so little.’ In anger and righteous indignation the king put this man into prison until he was able to pay back all that he had originally owed.

Our Lord Jesus Christ concludes this parable telling us that this is how our Heavenly Father will treat each of us unless we forgive our brother from our heart. The message is very clear – if we expect to be forgiven, then we must forgive and show love toward others.

As Christ emphasized elsewhere in the Gospels: ‘Just as you want men to do to you, you also do to them likewise. Therefore, be merciful, just as your Father also is merciful. Judge not, and you shall not be judged. Condemn not, and you shall not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven.’ 

Do we wish for the world and our homes to be a kinder place? Then it is up to us to take the lead and be kind. Do we wish others to treat us with love and kindness? Then we need to take our focus away from any perceived injustices of others and place our focus on our own behavior and thoughts… assuring that we do our utmost to treat others with love and kindness. It is sad but true that many of us tend to carry around with us our resentments and remembrances of wrongs. These things cloud our thinking and darken our vision of the world. Why do we so jealously cling to such poison? We need to let it go.

I am reminded of the story about two monks who were traveling together. These monks had taken vows of poverty, obedience, and chastity – including never even touching a woman. They also had taken a vow of silence. So, these two brothers were walking along when they came to a river. There by the river was a young woman who was having great difficulty because she could not cross the river due to its strong current. As the monks approached the river bank, one of the brothers picked up the woman and carried her across to the other side. Once they reached the other side, he let her down and continued to walk forward toward his destination. The other monk was shocked! How could this monk so casually break his vow of never touching a woman in such a way! He hurried to once again walk alongside his brother, but he was bursting with anxiousness and the desire to scold the monk who had broken his vow. One mile passed, then two miles and three… finally he couldn’t stand it anymore and he stopped to turn to his brother and broke his own vow of silence, crying out: ‘How could you do it? How could you have tempted yourself by carrying that woman in your arms?’ The accused monk kept his calm and said: ‘Brother, I let that woman down on the banks of the river, but you’ve been carrying her for over three miles now!’

We need to let these resentments go, we need to drop them, to surrender them to God. To forgive someone does not mean that we are excusing their wrongdoing. The person who committed some offense is accountable to God for their sins. When we forgive, we’re simply saying that I no longer choose to hold this resentment in my heart. I am letting it go. I am placing it in God’s hands.

The evil one will continue to try to seduce us with remembering wrongs, assuring us that we have the right to be offended… but if we respond to every such suggestion with prayer… praying for peace, praying for forgiveness, then we will deflate those thoughts and turn a weakness into a source of strength.

And it must be added… does forgiving our offenders mean that we then need to rush right back into their embrace? We should be sober and realistic, there are people and circumstances where that would be a foolish thing to do. We must never judge or condemn others… but there may be cases where keeping out of harm’s way is the wise thing to do.

Let us stop excusing our resentments by telling ourselves that it is ‘only human’ to remain angry, to remain offended, to hold on to our grudges. Perhaps we can say this is ‘human nature’… but we have to acknowledge that it is FALLEN human nature. This is not what we were created for, and by God’s Grace, we can be freed from the tyranny of such passions and experience the healing of our misdirected souls.

Forgiveness of others is an essential step toward this healing of our souls. Forgiveness restores connections between ourselves and God, and ourselves and others.

We are called to be merciful as our Heavenly Father is merciful. We must seek mercy and healing, not cold-hearted justice. St. Isaac the Syrian said: ‘Never say that God is just. If he were just, you would be in hell. Rely only on His injustice which is mercy, love and forgiveness.’

Glory be to God for His lovingkindness. Let us express our gratitude to Him and His mercy by showing kindness and mercy to others, being quick to forgive so that no resentment can make its lair in our hearts.