Reserves
This week is on Matthew 18:23-35:
The kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. The king is so good that he will cancel a huge debt when asked. How abundant must his reserves be that he can afford to do that? And how good he must be to be OK with letting that kind of money go? How deserving of our respect!
The servant doesn't respect the king though. He doesn't see that he's effectively been handed a gift of ten thousand bags of gold. He doesn't see that he deserved to be tortured over what he caused himself to owe. He doesn't take his freedom in the proper context. Having rid himself of that pesky king's noisome attempts at bill collection he can now act as king himself. He has no legal obligations. He is free to rule.
He beats another servant for owing him a tiny fraction of the money he's been forgiven. It wouldn't have been wrong for him to ask the money back. Tacky perhaps, but it's not wrong to point out a debt. Maybe the other servant had the money and didn't need mercy. What's wrong is to demand it be enforced, to lay out punishments over it, and to be outraged by it. That's disrespectful to the king. How can the servant's grievances be valid if the king's are not? Are his needs greater than the needs of the king? Is his justice more important than the king's justice?
The king drew from his great reserves of love and patience to cancel the servant's debt. The servant then pocketed all that love and patience and gave none of it away. If some stranger has bought you a coffee, how heartless must you be to turn down someone asking you for help buying a cup for themselves? And now imagine that in proportion, where someone has paid off your million dollar mortgage and you're refusing someone a cup of coffee. Is that a good character trait? Is that going to make the home-giver proud of his investment in you?
You're paid ahead one million dollars and you can't spare one or two? Are you some kind of sinkhole for wealth, a vortex that swallows up blessing? A black hole of selfishness that pulls in all light and love and goodness, emitting nothing in return? God is love, and if you're in desperate need of love but unwilling to give even a little of it to others, you're the opposite of who God is. You're not his ambassador, you're his enemy.
Jesus' parable is about forgiveness of sins, but it also touches on other blessings. Where God has given us so much, who are we not to share? Where he's decided not to prosecute on such major things, who are we to press and agitate for a verdict of our own? How is a God of love going to be glorified by selfishness?
That's not an invitation to ignore trouble. We need to be vigilant about that. Someone who owes a debt is not someone who is in the process of stealing. That's a different issue. What Jesus is telling us is that people need a chance to start over, and they need our love.
If you have the means to set someone else free, and you deny it after all you've been given, you've pretty much missed the whole point of the gospel. That's a scary thought. Be aware of the reserves God has given you for the forgiveness of sins and blessing the needy. There's nothing anyone could ask of you that's more than he's already paid.
“Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. As he began the settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand bags of gold was brought to him. 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.
“At this the servant fell on his knees before him. ‘Be patient with me,’ he begged, ‘and I will pay back everything.’ The servant’s master took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go.
“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.
“His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged him, ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay it back.’
“But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt. When the other servants saw what had happened, they were outraged and went and told their master everything that had happened.
“Then the master called the servant in. ‘You wicked servant,’ he said, ‘I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?’ In anger his master handed him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back all he owed.
“This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart.”
The kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. The king is so good that he will cancel a huge debt when asked. How abundant must his reserves be that he can afford to do that? And how good he must be to be OK with letting that kind of money go? How deserving of our respect!
The servant doesn't respect the king though. He doesn't see that he's effectively been handed a gift of ten thousand bags of gold. He doesn't see that he deserved to be tortured over what he caused himself to owe. He doesn't take his freedom in the proper context. Having rid himself of that pesky king's noisome attempts at bill collection he can now act as king himself. He has no legal obligations. He is free to rule.
He beats another servant for owing him a tiny fraction of the money he's been forgiven. It wouldn't have been wrong for him to ask the money back. Tacky perhaps, but it's not wrong to point out a debt. Maybe the other servant had the money and didn't need mercy. What's wrong is to demand it be enforced, to lay out punishments over it, and to be outraged by it. That's disrespectful to the king. How can the servant's grievances be valid if the king's are not? Are his needs greater than the needs of the king? Is his justice more important than the king's justice?
The king drew from his great reserves of love and patience to cancel the servant's debt. The servant then pocketed all that love and patience and gave none of it away. If some stranger has bought you a coffee, how heartless must you be to turn down someone asking you for help buying a cup for themselves? And now imagine that in proportion, where someone has paid off your million dollar mortgage and you're refusing someone a cup of coffee. Is that a good character trait? Is that going to make the home-giver proud of his investment in you?
You're paid ahead one million dollars and you can't spare one or two? Are you some kind of sinkhole for wealth, a vortex that swallows up blessing? A black hole of selfishness that pulls in all light and love and goodness, emitting nothing in return? God is love, and if you're in desperate need of love but unwilling to give even a little of it to others, you're the opposite of who God is. You're not his ambassador, you're his enemy.
Jesus' parable is about forgiveness of sins, but it also touches on other blessings. Where God has given us so much, who are we not to share? Where he's decided not to prosecute on such major things, who are we to press and agitate for a verdict of our own? How is a God of love going to be glorified by selfishness?
That's not an invitation to ignore trouble. We need to be vigilant about that. Someone who owes a debt is not someone who is in the process of stealing. That's a different issue. What Jesus is telling us is that people need a chance to start over, and they need our love.
If you have the means to set someone else free, and you deny it after all you've been given, you've pretty much missed the whole point of the gospel. That's a scary thought. Be aware of the reserves God has given you for the forgiveness of sins and blessing the needy. There's nothing anyone could ask of you that's more than he's already paid.
Wow!!! How close this hits to home!
ReplyDelete