Forgiving a Brother
Matthew 18:21-35
The topic of our text from Matthew 18 today is forgiveness. C.S. Lewis wrote this about forgiveness:
To be a Christian means to forgive the inexcusable, because God has forgiven the inexcusable in you. This is hard. It is perhaps not so hard to forgive a single great injury. But to forgive the incessant provocations of daily life—to keep on forgiving the bossy mother-in-law, the bullying husband, the nagging wife, the selfish daughter, the deceitful son—how can we do it? [1]
In Matthew 18:21-35, Jesus teaches us about forgiveness. It is part of Jesus’ fourth major teaching discourse that Matthew presents to us here in Matthew 18. This whole chapter is all about how the children of God relate to one another in the kingdom of God as it is manifest in the form of the church. At the beginning of the chapter, Jesus had taken a small child in His arms as an example of the child-like humility of those who enter the kingdom. Jesus receives humble, child-like believers and so must we (Matt. 18:5). Because Jesus loves His little ones who believe in Him, He takes sin seriously, and so should we (Matt. 18:6-9). God is not willing that even one of His little ones should perish, so He seeks to restore the wandering sheep, and so should we (Matt. 18:10-14). Jesus even gave us step-by-step instructions for how to restore a brother who sins against us (Matt. 18:15-20). And today, we learn from Jesus that God offers unlimited forgiveness, and so should we.[2]
Having heard Jesus teach all these things about humility, purity, and restoring unity among brothers in Christ, Peter then asks Jesus a …
1. Question about Forgiveness (Matt. 18:21-22)
I suspect that the things the Lord had said about pursuing a fallen brother or sister had raised some concerns in Peter’s mind. So Matthew 18:21 says, “Then Peter came to Him and said, ‘Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? Up to seven times?’”
Peter knew that Jesus had been teaching about restoring a brother who sins against us, and what to do if he does not repent. But what if he does repent? That’s the goal of the whole process, right? Peter instinctively knew from the character of Jesus and the forgiving nature of God that he should forgive that brother who sinned against him. But also, knowing human nature and our propensity to sin, Peter wonders, “But what if he sins against me again? And then again? How far does this forgiveness thing go?” If I keep on forgiving when someone continues to sin against me, couldn’t they take advantage of that? Doesn’t there come a point when I can stop absorbing the hurt? Isn’t there a point where they have used up their fair share of forgiveness?
Stop and think of how this might look. Someone comes to you, confesses that they did something wrong to you, and asks your forgiveness. You graciously forgive them because, after all, that’s what good Christians do. But then, they commit the same offense against you and come again to ask for your forgiveness. Like a good Christian, you forgive them again. But then, they do it again, and come to you once again for forgiveness. At this point, your human nature wants to override your Christian nature and say, “Now look! This is the third time! Get your act together already!”[3] Don’t we all think like Peter that there must be a limit to forgiveness?
The rabbis in Jesus’ day taught that you should forgive a person three times, but not the fourth. (“If a man commits a transgression, the first, second and third time he is forgiven, the fourth time he is not forgiven.”[4]) They derived this idea from interpretations of passages in the prophet Amos (cf. Amos 2:4, 6), where God forgives Israel’s sins “three times” before declaring judgment for a fourth sin.
I’m sure that Peter thought he was setting a generous limit by saying, “Up to seven times.” Forgiving a man seven times is commendable. Most of us get frustrated if we have to forgive somebody twice. By human standards what Peter said is enormous. He was exceeding even the traditions of the teachers of his own people. I’m sure Peter knew by now that Jesus’ righteousness and compassion always exceeded the current religious traditions.
But Jesus even exceeded Peter’s generous offer of seven times. In Matthew 18:22, Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven.” That number, “seventy times seven” calls to mind the account of Lamech in Genesis 4. Lamech was a descendent of Cain who murdered his brother Abel. Recalling how God had warned about a sevenfold vengeance on anyone who tried to take revenge on Cain, Lamech boasted, “I have killed a man for wounding me, Even a young man for hurting me. If Cain shall be avenged sevenfold, Then Lamech seventy-sevenfold.” (Gen. 4:23-24). Lamech vowed unlimited vengeance. The young man had merely wounded him; Lamech responded with murder. Jesus turns this completely around and calls for unlimited forgiveness. Jesus’ point is not that we can withhold forgiveness after the seventy-seventh or four hundred and ninetieth offense. Rather, His point to Peter was that he shouldn’t even bother to count. Jesus is saying the Christian’s capacity for forgiveness must be as unlimited as the human capacity for revenge. He was teaching us to be ready to grant forgiveness to a repentant brother or sister in Christ each and every time they come back and ask forgiveness. Think about it; by the time you have forgiven someone seventy times seven, you have developed a heart of continual forgiveness.
There is to be no limit placed on the number of times we are to forgive our repentant brother or sister in Christ. You might be thinking in response to Jesus’ words, “How can I possibly forgive like that? How can I possibly put no limits on my forgiveness? That’s beyond me. That’s super-human.” And you’re right! It is beyond us.
And yet, it isn’t unreasonable at all when we remember that that’s exactly how the heavenly Father forgives us in Christ. Haven’t there been times without number that we’ve each had to come to our heavenly Father and humbly ask forgiveness? And isn’t it often for the same sins over and over? And yet, has the Father ever placed a limit on the number of times we may come to Him in repentance and receive forgiveness?
There has never been a limit to how many times we may come to the Father and ask forgiveness—and what’s more, there never will be! The Bible promises us that, “where sin abounded, grace abounded much more . . .” (Romans 5:20). Each time we come to Him in sincere repentance, He gladly welcomes us, freely forgives us, and completely washes us clean of our sin (1 John 1:9).
The Father never counts the number of times we ask forgiveness. He is ready to offer forgiveness to us without limit. And now, our having tasted of His unlimited forgiveness for our every sin in His Son Jesus Christ, He now calls upon us to do the same toward our repentant brother or sister.
And now, to illustrate what a great wickedness it would be if we were to withhold forgiveness from our repentant brother or sister—especially after we ourselves have been forgiven so much—the Lord goes on to tell Peter the …
2. Parable of Forgiveness and Unforgiveness (Matt. 18:23-34)
This is a simple parable with a clear meaning. It has three scenes. First, the king forgives his servant. Second, the servant has no mercy on his fellow servant. Finally, the king reverses his mercy show to the servant.
Jesus says in Matthew 18:23, “Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a certain king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants.” Because of the high amounts of money involved, these probably were not servants involved in menial labor. Very likely these were high ranking civil servants, responsible for collecting taxes under the king’s jurisdiction. They were entrusted with great responsibility and large sums of money, and now the king calls them before him to settle their accounts. The servants of the king are accountable to the king.
Matthew 18:24 goes on, “And when he had begun to settle accounts, one was brought to him who owed him ten thousand talents.” We don’t know how this servant managed to be so far in debt to the king. Perhaps he greatly mismanaged the king’s affairs or embezzled the kings money. However it happened, the man was now owed the king an astronomical sum.
A “talent” was a unit of weight used to measure gold or silver, and a talent of silver was roughly worth approximately 6,000 times a normal working man’s daily wage. This man owed the king ten-thousand talents! The word translated as “ten-thousand” is the largest number that was used in the Greek language. We get our English word ‘myriads’ from it. You could not even think of a larger sum; it represents an uncountable number. Some Bible scholars estimate the value of his debt to be in the tens of millions of dollars; and others estimate it to be much more than that! The point is that it was an debt that the servant could not, in any way, ever come close to paying back.
Jesus goes on to show how the king acted justly with respect to this servant. He said, “But as he was not able to pay, his master commanded that he be sold, with his wife and children and all that he had, and that payment be made” (Matt. 18:25). This was a typical practice in those days. A man would be sold into slavery to work off his debt. Sometimes, a man’s whole family would also be sold into slavery along with him; because his family was considered a part of all that he owned. Of course, with such an enormous debt, their slavery could never even begin to pay it off.
This is a picture of our situation before God. Each of us have sinned against an infinitely holy and almighty God. We owe God a debt we can never repay. An eternity of service will never repay the debt we owe God because of our sin. And that’s why the Bible teaches the awful truth of eternal punishment for sin. We have all sinned against God. So, when our day of accounting comes, what will we do?
What else could the servant do but make a pathetic offer? Jesus says, “The servant therefore fell down before him, saying, ‘Master, have patience with me, and I will pay you all’” (Matt. 18:26). And again, isn’t this like so many of us? We think that, if God would just be patient with us, we could work off our debt of sin. We think that we can reform our lives, and devote ourselves to doing enough good deeds to outweigh our sins. We think that we can ‘earn’ God’s favor and forgiveness. But how can we work off our debt of sin when the wages of sin is death?
And so, this man’s only hope was in the mercy of the king. Jesus tells us, “Then the master of that servant was moved with compassion, released him, and forgave him the debt” (Matt. 18:27). Isn’t this exactly what we learn that God does for us? He has “compassion”; He “released him”; and “forgave him the debt.”
In forgiving the man his debt, the king didn’t simply ignore it. Rather, he bore the loss himself. And that’s what God the Father has done toward us. He doesn’t just ignore our sins or excuse our sins. He pays the full price for our sin Himself—once and for all—through the death of His Son Jesus Christ. Paul writes in Ephesians 1:7, “In Him [that is, in Christ] we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace.” Jesus paid it all so that the Father could forgive it all.
Now if Jesus had stopped there, this would have been an amazing parable as it is. There’s so much we learn just from the first half of the parable. Our sin against God is an incredible debt which we can never repay, but God in his goodness offers us grace that is greater than all our sin. The master canceling the servant’s debt is shocking. It’s amazing. It makes a great parable all by itself. But Jesus really adds the zinger when he steps into the second part of the parable.
Jesus goes on to say, “But that servant went out and found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii; and he laid hands on him and took him by the throat, saying, ‘Pay me what you owe!’” (Matt. 18:28).
First, notice his timing. We see that Jesus says that the man “went out and found” this other servant—suggesting that his actions followed immediately the remarkable grace he had been shown by the king.
Then, notice his concern. He sought out this fellow servant—his equal—with respect to a debt of a hundred denarii. This would roughly equal one-hundred days of the average working man’s wages. That’s not a small sum, of course; but in time, it could be paid off. And it was nothing compared to the impossible debt this man owed the king!
And then, notice his manner. He is utterly merciless—even violent—with respect to the one indebted to him. Jesus goes on to say, “So his fellow servant fell down at his feet and begged him, saying, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you all’” (Matt. 18:29). Those were almost the same exact words the first man had said to the king. You would think that hearing them would have reminded him of the mercy he had just been shown. But Jesus says, “And he would not, but went and threw him into prison till he should pay the debt” (Matt. 18:30).
It wasn’t that he “could not” be patient with his fellow servant; but rather that he “would not”. His manner toward his equal was utterly out of keeping with the grace the king had shown him! It’s appalling!
But the story is not over. Jesus says, “So when his fellow servants saw what had been done, they were very grieved and came and told their master all that had been done. Then his master, after he had called him, said to him, ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you begged me. Should you not also have had compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had pity on you?’ And his master was angry, and delivered him to the torturers until he should pay all that was due to him” (Matt. 18:31-34).
Two things stand out in this. The first thing is the verdict of the man’s wicked character. The king didn’t call him a “wicked servant” when he found out about his great debt. But he was declared “wicked” after grace had been shown to him—that is, after he had been forgiven of his great debt by the king, but after he then refused to show forgiveness to his equal. It is a profoundly wicked thing for us to receive God’s gracious forgiveness for our great sins; and then to turn around and withhold forgiveness from those who sin against us.
The second thing to notice is the nature of the man’s wickedness. The king said that he had forgiven the servant of all his debt “because you begged me”. That is the only condition God asks of us—to depend on His mercy and grace alone for the forgiveness of our sins. God already assumed the cost of our sins upon the cross of His own beloved Son. And He gives us the promise in His word that, when we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive our sin and cleans us of all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9). And yet, when another servant asked for mercy with the exact same words, this man refused to have compassion on him.
Listen, all that we have a right to expect of anyone who sins against us is that they confess their offense and ask our forgiveness. The principle that the Lord teaches in this passage is that there is to be no limit to our readiness to forgive someone who sins against us. And the parable He told shows us that it is a very wicked sin for us to withhold forgiveness from someone else after we ourselves have been forgiven so much by God.
This leads us, finally, to Jesus’ …
3. Warning about Unforgiveness (Matt. 18:35)
In Matthew 18:35, Jesus concludes the parable by saying, “So My heavenly Father also will do to you if each of you, from his heart, does not forgive his brother his trespasses.”
We might have expected that the Lord would have put the lesson in more positive terms. After all, He could have said that He wanted His disciples to be as merciful as the king had been merciful to his servant. Instead, he delivers a warning: if we are unmerciful, then we cannot complain if the Lord is unmerciful in His treatment of us. This is not the first time Jesus has put the lesson in such terms. Do you remember what He said in His Sermon on The Mount? Do you remember how He taught us—among other things—to pray, “And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors” (Matt. 6:12)? And do you remember how He followed that up with an explanation just a few verses later? “For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses” (Matt. 18:14-15).
Now, let’s be clear about our salvation and the forgiveness of our sins before God. In a strictly “legal” sense before God, all of our sins are paid for on the cross. There is nothing left for us to do before God to be declared righteous in His sight than to confess our sins and trust in the cross. But in what we might call a “relational” sense, our Father will withhold His forgiveness from us—even if we have placed our trust in the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross—if we don’t respond faithfully to His grace toward us by receiving our repentant brothers and sisters, and forgiving them of their sins. We are still a child of God; He does not disown His children. But our fellowship with the Lord is strained, His Holy Spirit is grieved, and we may find ourselves under the chastening of our loving Heavenly Father.
If you do not forgive, you will provoke God’s anger and discipline. You will experience loss of fellowship with God, loss of joy, loss of God’s favor on your life. Warren Wiersbe comments, “The world’s worst prison is the prison of an unforgiving heart. If we refuse to forgive others, then we are only imprisoning ourselves and causing our own torment.”[5] It will be torture—the hidden tortures of anger and bitterness that eat your insides out; the torture of frustration and malice that give you ulcers, anxiety, high blood pressure, and worse; the tortures that make you lie awake at night on your bed stewing over every rotten thing that happened to you; the torture of an unforgiving heart that stalks you day and night and sucks every bit of joy from your life.[6]
D.A. Carson comments,
Jesus sees no incongruity in the actions of a heavenly Father who forgives so bountifully and punishes so ruthlessly, and neither should we. Indeed, it is precisely because he is a God of such compassion and mercy that he cannot possibly accept as his those devoid of compassion and mercy … those who are forgiven must forgive, lest they show themselves incapable of receiving forgiveness.[7]
Christianity is supremely a religion of forgiveness. It begins with God and comes down to us. Our sins against God are immeasurable. We could never repay the debt we owe to Him. God has only one solution to the problem of human sin—the act of forgiveness. God freely forgives our many sins through Christ. If we do not receive His forgiveness by faith in Christ’s death and resurrection, we cannot be saved.
Compared to our sin against God, people’s sins against us are relatively small. God has shown us how to forgive others: humbly, freely, and completely—as He has forgiven us in Christ. A key indicator that you have been saved and forgiven is that you become a forgiver. Is there someone you need to forgive this morning? Someone you need to forgive from your heart? Don’t waste any more time in resentment or bitterness. You have been forgiven far more than you will ever have to forgive. God offers unlimited forgiveness, and so should we.
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[1] C.S. Lewis, Essay on Forgiveness, Macmillan Publishing Company, Inc. N.Y. 1960. https://www.maitlandpres.org/post/cslewis
[2] Ray Fowler, God’s Forgiveness and Ours, https://www.rayfowler.org/sermons/matthew/gods-forgiveness-and-ours/
[3] Greg Allen, The Sin of the Forgiven, https://www.bethanybible.org/archive/2007/102807.htm#f1
[4] Yoma 86b; cited in Leon Morris, The Gospel according to Matthew (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1992), p. 471.
[5] Warren W. Wiersbe, The Bible Exposition Commentary, vol. 1 (Wheaton, IL: Victor Books, 1996), 67.
[6] Ray Pritchard, How Can I Learn to Forgive?, https://www.keepbelieving.com/sermon/how-can-i-learn-to-forgive/
[7] D. A. Carson, “Matthew,” in The Expositor’s Bible Commentary: Matthew, Mark, Luke, ed. Frank E. Gaebelein, vol. 8 (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1984), 407.
