A college professor reports that whenever she asks the students in her religion class what they believe to be the most important part of the Christian message, they almost always respond by speaking about forgiveness. Jesus came to bring a message of forgiveness, they say. Some of the more thoughtful students remember to add that he came to teach us how to forgive one another.
Forgiveness permeates the Christian message. It is a common theme running through our worship together.
- In the confession we hear, “your sins are forgiven.”
- In the creed we say, “I believe in the forgiveness of sins.”
- We pray in the Lord’s Prayer, “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.”
- In the communion liturgy we hear, “this is my blood of the new covenant shed for you and for all people for the forgiveness of sins.”
Forgiveness also happens to be the theme of our Scriptures today. In our Old Testament reading we hear about Joseph who suffered mistreatment, false accusations and imprisonments all stemming from the wrong done to him by his own brothers. And in today’s beautiful final scene, Joseph completely forgives his brothers for everything and they are reunited as a family. Joseph serves as an inspiring example of forgiving from the heart. He does not count his brothers sins against them, but graciously and generously forgives them and erases their debt to him.
Which is all fine and good, but in our Gospel reading, Peter is doing the math on this and wonders just how long a person can keep doing this kind of thing. “How many times should a person forgive his brother?” He asks Jesus. He thinks 7 times is pretty generous. That many times? Exponentially and infinitely more, Jesus says. 70 x 7 or 77 times. The equation doesn’t matter. The point is there is no limit. In New Testament Jewish way of speaking, Jesus’ answer means ALWAYS! Always forgive.
And then Jesus tells a story about forgiveness – about a man who is forgiven much yet refuses to forgive. In spite of the very generous and gracious forgiveness he had experienced – some suggest his debt was in the millions of dollars — he was not ready to absolve his neighbor of a very small debt – perhaps a few bucks. He too was doing the math and wanted all the equations to end in his favor.
And that’s where all the forgiveness business gets personal. Yes, we got a lot of forgiveness going on here. In the Scriptures – in the means of grace. The forgiveness of sins characterizes our worship and our theology. It is everything that Jesus is about – YES, everything Christianity is about. It oozes out of everything that has to do with Jesus! In fact, Martin Luther uses a funny sounding German word to describe the over abundance of God’s grace and forgiveness. He says God is überschwenglich with forgiveness. He is superabundant in showing mercy. Forgiveness gushes out of him. And he just piles it on us over and over again without conditions.
But what about us? Are we gushing forgiveness? Joseph’s treatment of his brothers is inspiring. We’d sure like to be like him. And Jesus’ parable makes clear the consequences of NOT forgiving. So what gives? Why do we struggle with forgiveness?
One of the news stories of this week is the coincidence of today’s assigned Scripture readings. In the lectionary used by most Christian churches, the readings from the Bible assigned for this Sunday just happen to be stories about forgiveness! No one decided that on the anniversary of 9/11 a majority of Christians should be hearing these readings. It is just how the calendar ended up! But it’s hard not to contrast the message of forgiveness in worship today with the prevailing mood of our country even 10 years after an unimaginable offense was inflicted on the nation. Revenge, someone said, is the new forgiveness. Which doesn’t really make sense. But you can feel it. To talk about forgiveness in the face of the attacks on our nation even ten years later sounds weak and foolish.
In a sin-cursed world, evil wreaks havoc on our lives and it needs to be dealt with. And to combat and curb evil in the world, God works through law with what Lutherans call God’s LEFT hand. The work of justice is the divine work of resisting evil and punishing the wrongdoer, and we do well to pray for those who bear the burdens of justice, including soldiers, police, legislators, and courts.
But we who are believers in Christ – who may or may not have responsibilities for the administration of justice – and few of us do –weALLhave the divine calling of life in Christ. And that is a life that is always inclined toward mercy, love, and forgiveness. We may not want our government to be in the business of forgiving, but that is OUR business. We are the ones who extend what the theologians call “God’s right hand” — the way our Father in heaven rules his creation through the Gospel – through the forgiveness of sins.
Yet we struggle with being gracious and generous – not to mention “uberschwenglich” in our forgiving because we WANT to do the work of justice. We want to exact punishment and even the score. Yet, when faced with the choice of justice or mercy, Joseph said, “Am I in the place of God?” We leave matters of judgment and justice up to God. And we look to Christ as the source and power of forgiveness. We are not up to the task on our own. But in Christ even the worst offenses can be opportunities for forgiveness.
All because of the cross. That’s why forgiveness permeates the Christian message and oozes out of those who are in Christ. It’s not because Christians are nice. Sometimes they’re not. It’s not even because Jesus is nice. It’s because Jesus suffered and died.
Today we will remember the events of 9/11. But we must also remember the events of 2000 years ago when God’s own Son came to a hostile, violent world opposed to God, and chose to call down not vengeance, but forgiveness. And by his cross he opened up a way for us – the way of the cross – a way marked not by judgment, but mercy, not by calculations, but trust, not by fear, but courage, not by violence, but healing, not by hate but love, and not by death but by new life. That’s what forgiveness can do. That’s what Jesus can do.
Forgiveness is available to us – it is given to us. And it does amazing and surprising things in us. Remember the firefighters and rescue workers on 9/11? Remember the images of these men and women running INTO the burning collapsing towers while everyone else was running out? Remember how many gave their lives to save and rescue while everyone else was running for their lives to safety? They had no guarantee that they would survive their work, and many of them did not, but they did not turn their backs on their work, but pressed ahead in faithfulness to their calling.
This is the image of cross-focused, Christ-centered, Spirit-generated, “uberschwenglich” forgiveness. It goes against the grain. It goes in when human instinct says “save yourself!” It pushes ahead when our nature warns us to protect our own liabilities. It trusts what God can do even in the face of the most serious offenses. It saves. It rescues. It gives life. It begins to permeate those who know how much THEY have been forgiven. And then it begins to shape, not just our theology or our worship — our creeds and prayers, it begins to shape us. And that’s when the way of the cross becomes a way of life.
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