CELC The Seventeenth Sunday After Pentecost

The Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost – September 11, 2005

Matthew 18:21-35

You do remember the really important people of your life, don’t you? We remember those who love us like mom and dad or sister or brother or even that special friend. I have people in the bible that are really important to me, who mentor me, who stand before me in the story they live and make me their friend. I cannot forget them.

Joseph and Peter are mentors for me. Both of them led “up and down” lives that seem so much like mine. Joseph started out on top, the beloved of his father. Then he was down the pit his brothers threw him in and so they could sell him into slavery. You could call it the pit of jealousy. Then there is the ruling position of being Pharaoh’s right hand man and also the days in prison when he is falsely accused. More could be said, but Joseph’s life is not a flat line, but an up and down line that shows its vitality and at the same time that Joseph is a real person like you and like me.

Peter has the same kind of life pattern. His is not a flat line. Like Joseph there are many ups and downs for Peter, including the denial of our Lord Jesus during the Passion. Peter swears he will follow him anywhere and then denies Jesus three times.

These two bible characters are not “bigger than life” as some like to say. Rather, they are mentors of us who are ordinary. For the average person life is not lived as a “flat line” experience. You and I who have watched far too many episodes of “ER” know that if the screen next to your bedside flat lines it means you are dead. So to experience life in a more “up and down” mode is to be alive.

There is more to living, though, than simply having “up and down” experiences. Peter and Joseph are mentors on what it takes to really live life. In the first lesson and the gospel lesson today we encounter Joseph and Peter before us as examples of people who live life to its fullest.

Look at these two saints of God’s making: they have a loving relationship with God. We know that is Joseph’s case. Remember his father has recently died. Dad had acted as a buffer between Joseph and the brothers that had did him so wrong. The brothers are now worried Joseph will take revenge on them. Joseph does what they do not expect and forgives and then also points out that God took the evil deeds of these brothers and intended them for good. You can see that Joseph has a close and loving relationship with God. How else can you forgive such nasty brothers and speak for God a clear word of grace, that evil has been turned to good?

The situation with Peter is a little different. However, you can see the same love. Jesus has been teaching about the steps to take to forgive another who has sinned against you. Now, listening intently and paying attention, Peter asks a question. You don’t ask questions of people you don’t care about, so Peter exhibits the special relationship he has with Jesus.

The question Peter asks is most interesting. Good fellow that he is, he asks a very human question: “…how often should I forgive? As many as seven times?” Seven seems like a lot, doesn’t it? Yet the answer of our Lord Jesus is “seven times seventy” or 490 times. Or, as is evident, Jesus is telling Peter and us, “forgive without keeping track.”

And it is only by the grace of God that we can forgive “seven times seventy.” Only by the complete forgiveness that is ours in the cross of Jesus Christ can we have the faith and strength to forgive. It is from the cross that the Word of forgiveness is ours. It is through the cross that we are transformed into disciples who can forgive others. It is a gift of the cross, the life, death and resurrection of Jesus that God’s forgiving us becomes our forgiving others.

Forgiving others can be a very tough matter. Ponder with me again how the church has set a three year cycle of lessons to be read. We call it the lectionary. The lessons for today, so clear about forgiving others because we have been forgiven, come on 9-11. It is a bit daunting to consider that. Maybe it is coincidence, maybe it is the hand of God at work through those who developed the list of lessons to be read on Sunday morning.

The Word of forgiveness today stands in paradox with the anniversary of the horrible attack on America that happened four years ago. How do we deal with this heinous and deliberate crime against us when the Word of God comes with forgiveness for us and the model that we, like Joseph, are to forgive even those who wish our death?

For me this is a great challenge. The clash of 9-11 and the Word of forgiveness is a clash that hammers hard in my heart. Clearly scripture models today our need to be forgivers as we have been forgiven. Yet the travesty of the attack of four years ago impedes my movement toward that.

Shall we forgive? How shall we forgive?

As you reflect on that remember three things: First that God has fully forgiven us all our sin. That is the Word of grace from the cross. Second, to forgive does not mean to tolerate anything. It does not mean we are to tolerate terrorism. Third, forgiving is not forgetting.

So, I ask once again, shall we forgive? How shall we forgive those who have attacked our nation and killed so many on this infamous day four years ago? Amen.

Pastor Robert F. Holley