Matthew 18:21-35 with
Romans 14:1-12
This morning’s readings are all about
how to be the church together. Last week
we found Jesus offering us a step-by-step process for addressing conflict in
the church. This week he is answering
Peter’s question regarding forgiveness, and we find Paul offering ideas for how
we can be the church together if we are all so different. I thought both of these readings had good
things to offer us in our modern context.
We will start with Matthew. Peter asks just how many times he is supposed
to forgive someone in the church who sins against him. He offers the number of seven times, thinking
this is a perfect answer since 7 was considered a perfect number. Jesus’ reply of 70x7 shows Peter that he
shouldn’t even be counting, rather our forgiveness should be limitless.
In case his disciples failed to
understand his point, Jesus offers a parable.
It is a story of exaggeration and excess. Somehow a slave has amassed an incredible
debt, more money than can be imagined, and when he asks for mercy he is
forgiven by the master. Jesus is
painting with a broad brush for drama here as no slave could ever amass such a debt,
or could ever imagine earning that much to pay it back. No master could be imagined to forgive such
an impossible debt either.
After having been shown such
extravagant mercy, this slave turns around and is a jerk to his neighbor. One who owes him a small debt is violently
mistreated and told to pay up or else.
Again, the story is told with drama and zeal. When these unscrupulous actions are reported
the master calls the ungrateful slave back and offers him the punishment he
really deserves. He is given over to be tortured
until he dies because he will never be able to pay his massive debt. It is a shocking ending, and Jesus intends to
shock, as he threatens God will do the same for us if we are as merciless as
the slave.
This is rather frightening if we
decide to take the whole thing literally.
God will torture us for all eternity if we are unable to forgive with
the same overwhelming grace and mercy of our God. I’m not sure anyone can meet those standards.
But, if we understand this as a
parable, as a story pointing us to a deeper truth, than we can understand that while
He might not require perfection, God does require us to forgive. This is especially true within the Christian
community. Remember, Peter was asking
about how much he needed to forgive another member of the church. Folks in the church community know how much
God has forgiven them, they know how great their debt is, and so they of all
people should know that they are called to forgive each other.
Only when we truly acknowledge our own
sin, can we truly understand the depth of God’s mercy. And as forgiven people we are called to show
that mercy, to share that peace, with those around us. As we say “Peace be with you” each Sunday we
also say “Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.” At least to some measure, our ability to
forgive is connected to our own forgiveness.
If we can’t show grace within the church community, then we won’t be
able to show it anywhere else. And, I
imagine we will have a hard time receiving it ourselves.
In his letter to the church in Rome, Paul
is also talking about grace and mercy within the church community. The church of Rome was made up of two very
different kinds of people, the Jewish followers of Jesus and the Gentile citizens
of Rome. These two groups were people
from very different backgrounds. One was
used to being the chosen people; being holy, separate, other, and special. They showed their “chosen-ness” through
specific behaviors like practicing ritual cleanliness and only eating kosher
food. The Gentile Christians were
citizens of the empire. They were
followers of Rome, not part of the “elect”, and not ones to practice fancy
rituals of purity.
As I am sure you can imagine, when
these two groups got together to form the church, it was difficult to blend. Paul is referencing their meal fellowship
when he discusses who would eat meat and who wouldn’t. Kosher Jews would remain vegetarian at meals
as a means of avoiding something that wasn’t prepared following the kosher laws,
but Gentile Christians would partake of meat without any worries. “Is one better than the other?” people were
wondering, “Is one stronger in their faith?”
Paul encourages the folks to look to
their similarities instead of their differences. “Who cares if you eat meat or not” he seems
to say, “and who cares if you think one day is better than another.” Paul wants us to know that the only thing that
matters is how we stand before God. And
when it comes to God, we are all the same.
“If we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord; so
then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s.”
Paul encourages us not to judge each
other in the Christian community. We may
notice differences but we shouldn’t use this as a basis for judgment. Only God has the power to judge us, and when
we stand before God, we will all stand the same way. Paul doesn’t want us to waste time holding
grudges or comparing ourselves to each other.
In the end we are all only accountable to God.
In the modern church, we aren’t likely
to get up in arms about who may be eating what at the potluck. But that doesn’t mean we don’t notice the
differences in this community and secretly judge each other in our hearts. Paul is concerned that certain differences
will prevent true fellowship in the body of Christ. I don’t think we are going to get upset about
food choices here, but I am sure we can get upset about other things.
Take politics for instance. Can a Republican and a Democrat share a pew
or the same table at a potluck? I am
sure Paul would remind us that one may follow Trump and one may long for Obama,
but we are all one in the Lord. What
about other divisive issues?
Homosexuality, abortion, racism, feminism, immigration, and global
warming are just a few of the topics with the power to divide.
There is great danger in allowing opinions
on these issues to have power in our lives.
Once we start to associate someone with the opposing view to ours, then we
begin to dehumanize them. As we continue
to mentally identify people with the issue that they disagree with us about,
then they become less of a person and less of an individual child of God. To use Paul’s example, before we know it, we
are no longer seeing Sally the church member, rather we are seeing Sally the
meat-eater and bad Christian. We can
hardly stand the sight of this person anymore, let alone gather around the
table in Christian fellowship.
Paul
reminds us that it doesn’t matter what we think, how we vote, or what foods we
consume. It doesn’t matter if we have
our NRA bumper sticker or our Bernie Sanders bird logo. It doesn’t matter if we voted for Trump or
just started reading Hillary’s new book.
“We do not live to ourselves, and we do not die to ourselves. If we live or if we die, we are only ever the
Lord’s.” This is a community that
practices peace and forgiveness, so this has to be a community where we can
tolerate opinions that are different from our own.
Today I chose the Apostles Creed for
our declaration of faith because I think it reminds us of our unity under the
big umbrella of the church. We share
this confession with Christians of all stripes, the church universal. And yet, we all understand the words a little
differently. You might believe in the
virgin birth as a historical reality and your neighbor in the pew might believe
in it as a theological truth instead, and yet we can all stand together and say
“I believe.” You might believe in an
afterlife of bodily resurrection and your neighbor might believe in a
resurrection of a purely spiritual body, and yet we can all stand together and
say “I believe”. This confession unites
us as a church, even while we gather as diverse people under that one name.
Our readings for today remind us that
the church is a place of diversity, grace, and peace. This is a place where we are called to
forgive each other countless times. This
is a place where we are told to gather together, even if we have different
opinions about the table we are gathering around. This is a place where all are welcome,
stranger and neighbor and where we join with other Christians from all times
and places under the one big umbrella of the church.
Today I am glad we are all gathered
together in this community of forgiveness.
I thank God for the church and I pray we may continue to be a place of
grace, peace, love, and diversity. Amen.
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