Sermon - Trinity 17 Forgiveness

Matthew 18.21-35
+ May I speak in the name of God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. AMEN
Matthew’s 18th Chapter contains a series of instructions for the daily life of the Christian community. Forgiveness is one of them. Peter wants to know how often we should forgive (v.21). Jesus gives the question a broader horizon: we must always forgive. That is the meaning of the mysterious expression “seventy-seven times” (v.22) There may also be an allusion – taking the opposite position – to Genesis 4:24 “If Cain is avenged seven times, then Lamech seventy-seven times."
It means there are no limits; love doesn’t work with obligations that can be counted. Mutual forgiveness builds up the community, and it implies trusting people.
Jesus’ statement is illustrated in one of the most beautiful parables in the Gospels, one only found in Matthew. The “settling of accounts” will vanish because God’s justice is based on gratuitous love. At the Kings request, the servant forgives the debt, “ten thousand talents” is a huge amount of money, that could never be repaid (it is something like the foreign debt of many poor nations). This is why the slave’s promise is merely an attempt to move the Lord. The kinds forgiveness is totally free; he forgives simply, as it says “out of pity”, out of love, not because he expects, at some point in the future to receive what is owed to him.
Do not hold grudges against your neighbour
This parable in the Gospels doesn’t leave any room for manoeuvre, the conduct of the slave is the exact opposite of the Lord’s action. The fellow slave barely owes him a hundred denarii, not an insignificant amount, but it wasn’t that much really, it could easily have been repaid, but the debtors plea is not heeded. The “wicked slave” hasn’t learned his lesson. According to the strict justice, he can send the debtor to jail, but the King has shown him another kind of justice based on gratuitous love that asks for nothing in return. This justice considers people for what they are, rather than for what they have.
The God of Jesus loves because he is good. In the presence of the boundless love, people’s merits as secondary. Those who believe in this God must love the same way. The love of God is the model of our conduct – we might be imperfect, however that is not an excuse for us not trying to change.
The Lord is always ready to renew his covenant (his promise) with us, to turn over the page and start again. This is what challenges us to start again and try better next time. Open our hearts to others.
In the presence of this love, the question “how often should I forgive?” becomes a redundant question really. Don’t for a moment think that this is easy however – if you were thinking that this nice story is a comfortable fireside chat it isn’t. There is nothing more difficult than forgiveness.
God does however guarantee that we will be changed – and even the people we forgive can (sometimes) be changed – it is a two way street after all.
There are a few standard stories that reappear in different guises, in many different scenarios. It’s a bit like all those action films of the 90’s (and some now) – Good guy, bad guy, love interest, danger, car chase, gunfight, big finale, good overcomes evil, light beats darkness.
The standard faith story is this - A man of retribution and violence through grace becomes a man of forgiveness and peace in the blink of an eye. People around him can’t believe the transformation and he is tested, but God has transformed. We all know the story in so many different genres.
They are absolute rubbish– the man of retribution and violence has a constant battle to be a man of peace – it is only because with each and every painful interaction, each and every person he forgives when he doesn’t have to, each and every time he is goaded and decides to answer with peace, every time he lets a little piece of his integrity get chipped away by having to behave and count to ten.
That’s the real test of the seventy-times seven, that’s what it really means – it means that it is a constant battle – not a quick fix. Forgiveness is costly and I believe it is sent from God, because it seems so other worldly.
Some quotations about forgiveness to think about.
Love is an act of endless forgiveness, a tender look which becomes a habit.
Peter Ustinov (1921 - 2004)

Life is an adventure in forgiveness.
Norman Cousins (1915 - 1990)

The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.
Mahatma Gandhi (1869 - 1948)

It is difficult to give practical advice on forgiveness because the point Jesus is making is not something we can hide from. We can just say that ‘for the record’ it isn’t easy, and there are lots of issues at play in this complicated minefield of a Gospel reading.

Finally, I suppose there are just two things left to say;

Firstly, it really doesn't matter if the person who hurt you deserves to be forgiven. Forgiveness is a gift you give yourself. You have things to do and you want to move on.

Secondly, forgiveness does not always lead to a healed relationship - it might be wise to let them go along with their belief that they have somehow won, when they haven’t. Wish them well, and let them go their way.

Thirdly, let me know if you discover a pain-free way to forgive others. We will make millions!

Forgive from the heart in the name of God; Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

I also blessed a new shop that opened in the villiage.......

Blessing of The Mustard Seed
Lord Bless this Shop – all who come to browse or buy, those who come for coffee or chat, those who are seeking and those who say you are Lord of All.
Lord Bless this shop - as it blesses the community and people from far and wide, that it may be an oasis of calm in the storms of life.
Lord Bless this shop – and those who run it, for Denise and Natalie, Neil and Patrick and their families, that they may feel your presence through this place and the customers that call. May it be successful spiritually and financially.
Lord Bless this shop with love and peace, in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. AMEN

SERMON - Trinity 16 Pentecost 17

The Gospels are great books, not only because they tell us about Jesus, but also because they let us know what it was like to be a Christian all those years ago. The gospel of Matthew stresses this in a clear way. At every step of the text, we find the experience of a community with its successes, its difficulties, its norms, its conflicts, and its hopes. Thus the central theme of this gospel deals with discipleship. The passage we are reading today is a clear example of the ecclesial experience which forms the background to the gospel.
Here we are dealing with the proper behaviour toward members of the community who have fallen short in some way, those who have failed, or are failing in their role as disciples of Jesus. Matthew suggests the member at fault should be corrected by another member and that he or she should be reminded of the demands, the evangelical demands.
The purpose of this is clear: to invite that person to return to the way of the followers of the Lord. If this does not happen then other members of the community must be called. This will add to the objectivity – it wasn’t meant to be a courtroom hearing, at least I don’t think so – it was about getting back on track.
If this didn’t do the trick, the church, the assembly of disciples had to take care of the matter. This was because, by the outside world, the church would have been judged by the behaviour of all the members individually and collaboratively - In that sense, each member of the early church was an ambassador for the rest – and indeed an ambassador for the faith!
So, at the beginning of our faith, at the beginning of the church, there was some attempt to establish order – and not order for the sake of it – order that the church might survive. I never thought that I, myself, would be singing the praises of order in the Church of God.
LOVE however, requires us to pay attention to another member’s errors. We have to warn others so that they may “turn from their ways” as it says in the reading from Ezekiel.
When I read this gospel reading, I get the sense that I am a ‘fly on the wall’ of a rather sensitive matter, which is difficult to handle. However, it is a strong reminder to me of the necessary requirements to BELONG in an authentic and responsible way.
The last verses of Matthew’s text, as well as the text from Romans make us see the profound meaning of this apparent harshness. The correction in question has to be done lovingly. The context is clearly all about communication and community.
Being Christian however means that WE THINK it is to let things go – LOVE OF NEIGHBOUR does in fact require that we maintain the right direction and movement. We NEED to be able to challenge our own apathy in dealing with problems.
The community – the church – is responsible for the behaviour and commitment of ALL its members, and we are all called to live and announce the kingdom. If we are not doing that, then there is a problem.
When Paul wrote to the church in Rome, it was a letter of introduction to a church he had never met. The Gospels hadn’t been written. Among the stories about Jesus, Paul is echoing one – his statement that ‘love is fulfilling the law’. He would have been instructed on this, not by Christ of course, but probably by Gamaliel his teacher. Paul’s concept of ‘the flesh’ needs some understanding. For Paul, the flesh, our bodies, are the place of rebellion against God. It is the ‘Spirit’ where we encounter God. Christ – according to Paul – has freed us to live in the Spirit – not being concerned about the ‘flesh’ – by wearing the armour of Christ.
That is a bit more complicated to place rather that the more understandable gospel reading.
So, what does it mean to us as a church?
It means that we need to;
• Deal with division as a church
• Be seen by the outside world as ONE body – with MANY members
• Having the same message and zeal for the gospel and the community around us
• Never being afraid to raise issues that affect the future of the church
• And also, we need to appoint people to positions of authority who are able to deal with conflict – all this and more!
I pray regularly that the church is seen as a group of people more in agreement than division – however I know that the difficulties of the church will always be far more appealing to the outsider than the successes. This is true, mainly because we have failed to grasp the nettle of the gospel reading – finding it to be rather intrusive, and not quite Anglican.
In our own churches we too allow some to continue with rather strange practices for the sake of keeping the peace, being better not to rock the boat. However for Ezekiel this was not an option – God tells him he is accountable for the blood of all those he doesn’t warn – he, I am sure was quite diligent in sharing wisdom and instruction about the ways of the Lord.
There is an English proverb that says “Use soft words and hard arguments.” I think it means stick to your cause, but never at the cost of being civil.
However, William Penn a 17th Century religious leader said “Truth often suffers more by the heat of its defenders, than from the arguments of its opposers.” So we need to be careful.
Finally, thinking about the wise words of Paul, the terrifying charge to Ezekiel, and the more practical advice of Matthew’s Gospel, I started to wonder if all this is part of life ‘in community’ if the ecclesia (which we tend to translate as church) enjoys a bias toward dispute and disagreement? Perhaps, I am the latest in a long line of clerics wanting to change something that has always been. I won’t lose too much sleep over it hopefully.
There is one more saying that I quite like about arguments and dispute;
A lot of good arguments are spoiled by some fool who knows what he is talking about.
May God give us to be the courage to be the fool who is willing to stand up and know what they are talking about, in the name of God; Father, Son and Holy Spirit. AMEN