Proper 19 (24) (Year A)

 Matthew 18:21-35 (TIB[1]; adapted):

Peter came up and asked Jesus, “When a sister or brother wrongs me, how many times must I forgive? Seven times?”

22“No,” Jesus replied, “not seven times; I tell you seventy times seven. 23And here’s why.

“The [Realm] of heaven is like a ruler who decided to settle accounts with the royal officials. 24When the audit was begun, one was brought in who owed tens of millions of dollars. 25As the debtor had no way of paying, the ruler ordered this official to be sold, along with family and property, in payment of the debt. 

26“At this, the official bowed down in homage and said, ‘I beg you, your highness, be patient with me and I will pay you back in full!’ 27Moved with pity, the ruler let the official go and wrote off the debt.

28“Then that same official went out and met a colleague who owed the official twenty dollars. The official seized and throttled this debtor with the demand, ‘Pay back what you owe me!’

29“The debtor dropped to the ground and began to plead, ‘Just give me time and I will pay you back in full!’ 30But the official would hear none of it, and instead had the colleague put in debtor’s prison until the money was paid.

31“When the other officials saw what had happened, they were deeply grieved and went to the ruler, reporting the entire incident. 32The ruler sent for the official and said, ‘You worthless wretch! I cancelled your entire debt when you pleaded with me. 33Should you not have dealt mercifully with your colleague, as I dealt with you?’ 34Then in anger, the ruler handed the official over to be tortured until the debt had been paid in full. 

35“My Abba in heaven will treat you exactly the same way unless you truly forgive your sisters and brothers from your hearts.”

Other readings: Exodus 14.19-31; Psalm 114 (or Exodus 15.1b-11, 20-21; Genesis 50.15-21 and Psalm 103.(1-7), 8-13); Romans 14:1-12

Gathering Prayer:

God of infinite mercy, grant that we who know your pity may rejoice in your forgiveness and gladly forgive others for the sake of Jesus the Christ our Saviour, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and ever, and unto the ages of ages. Amen.

                                   

Oof. What a troubling passage. Is Jesus really telling us that Abba God is like the ruler in this story? That Abba “will treat [us] exactly the same way unless [we] truly forgive [our] sisters and brother”? Some people think so. They have no problem with a vengeful God who doles out judgement like this — sending people to be tortured. Except, of course, those same people also believe that God won’t do that to them because they “believe in Jesus” and “Jesus paid it all” and, therefore, they aren’t subject to any of God’s judgements.

There are others, though, who refuse to see God acting this way. My Abbess, for example, tends to spin these stories on their heads. She points out that a very troubling image of God gets painted when we suppose the “ruler” is Abba God. In the past she stated that stories like this could be seen as Jesus exposing the fallacy of the then current view of God. Jesus is purposefully shining a light on this understanding of God to reveal just how far removed from the true image of God that view actually is. 

And she’s right, of course. In another place, Jesus stated quite plainly, “Abba and I are One” (John 10.30; TIB). And when he was asked to show Abba to the disciples, Jesus said, “Whoever has seen me has seen Abba God” (John 14.9; TIB). Finally, at the beginning of his telling of the Jesus story, St John said, “No one has ever seen God, not so much as a glimpse. This one-of-a-kind God-Expression, who exists at the very heart of [Abba], has made [God] plain as day” (John 1.18; MSG[2]).

What we gather from this is that, not only is Jesus like God, but God is like Jesus! From John 1 we learn that “no one” — neither any of the matriarchs or patriarchs nor any of the prophets — ever showed us a true image of God. It’s only in Jesus that we see who Abba God truly is and no less than when Jesus was crucified. There, Jesus said, “Abba, forgiven them.” Instead of destroying the very people who murdered him, Christ forgave them.

We can see, then, the conflict this passage brings. On one hand, God is said to be equal to Jesus — that when we look at Jesus, his life, and most notably his crucifixion, we see the truest image of Godself, the One “who would rather forgive his enemies than kill them.”[3] On the other hand, however, Jesus is telling us that if we don’t forgive others God won’t forgive us. In fact, Jesus goes so far to say in this story that God would hand us over to be tortured until we forgive others.

And, just to make sure we understand the gravity of this passage, in another place Jesus said — 

Matthew 5.43-48 (CEB; adapted):[4] “You’ve heard that it was said, ‘You must love your neighbor’ and hate your enemy. 44But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who harass you 45so that you will be acting as children of your [Abba] who’s in heaven. [God] makes the sun rise on both the evil and the good and sends rain on both the righteous and the unrighteous. 46If you love only those who love you, what reward do you have? Don’t even the tax collectors do the same? 47And if you greet only your sisters and brothers, what more are you doing? Don’t even the Gentiles do the same? 48Therefore, just as your heavenly [Abba] is complete in showing love to everyone, so also you must be complete [and show love to everyone].”

So which is it? Are we to act like God and love and forgive everyone or is God to act like us and only forgive us after we’ve been tortured to forgive others?

Well, commentaries aren’t really helpful with this passage. All the ones I’ve checked say that Jesus does mean the ruler is God and that this depiction is exactly how God will treat people who don’t forgive others — God will torture them (some even say people will be sent to “hell”). But it’s right at that point (God torturing people in “hell”) that a big problem arises. 

In the story, Jesus said that the ruler sent the person to be tortured until the debt is “paid in full” (verse 34). This indicates that the person will be released at some point. But, those who believe that God will torture people in “hell” understand that to be an “eternal” torture — i.e., there is no release, there’s no time when that debt will ever be “paid in full.” We can see, then, that this view falls flat if we understand this to mean God will send people to “hell.”

So, how are we to see this?

As I stated above, commentaries weren’t much help. That is, until I checked the Celtic Bible Commentary for Matthew — The Winged Man. The commentary for this chapter, written by Teresa Cross, makes the following observation — 

“The order in which Matthew tells his story in this chapter of his Gospel, however, frames Christ’s severe recommendation on each side with other comments about forgiveness and the restoration of relationship, indicating the overall message Matthew wants us to hear Jesus saying. Forgiveness brings healing, both between individuals and between God and ourselves.”[5]

This shows us that we need to step back from this isolated passage assigned by the Lectionary and look at the whole message. Once we do that, we’ll see that Teresa is right — the message of the Gospel is one of forgiveness. “God was reconciling the world to [Godself] through Christ, by not counting people’s sins against them” (2 Corinthians 5.18; CEB). Because of the “faithfulness of Christ,” we have the same Grace through the Holy Spirit to forgive others, not just seven times, but “seventy times seven.” The point of the Lesson is not that God will supposedly torture us but that we should forgive abundantly like Abba God has forgiven us.

~~~

In the Love of the Three in One,

Br. Jack+, LC

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[1] Scripture quotations marked (TIB) are taken from The Inclusive Bible. Copyright © 2007 by Priests for Equality. Used by permission.

[2] Scripture quotations marked (MSG) are taken from The Message, copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. Used by permission of NavPress. All rights reserved. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.

[3] Zahnd, B., (2019). The Monster God Debate.

[4] Scripture quotations marked (CEB) are taken from The Common English Bible. Copyright © 2011 by Common English Bible.

[5] McIntosh, K., (editor, 2017). The Winged Man: The Good News According to Matthew (Celtic Bible Commentary Book 1), pg. 212. Vestal, NY: Anamchara Books.