Anyone who’s ever read the Bible must have noticed that numbers very often play an important part in the biblical narratives. As we read through the books of the Bible, we find that some numbers recur quite regularly in different books. So, for example, we find that there are 12 tribes of Israel and the Book of Revelation speaks about 144,000, which is 12 x 12,000, from the tribes of Israel worshipping God in heaven. During the great flood we read about in Genesis, it rained for 40 days and nights, Moses was on Mount Sinai receiving the Law for 40 days and nights, and Jesus was in the wilderness for the same length of time. 3 is another number that crops up regularly in the Bible and we’re probably most familiar with that number from the story of Jonah, who was in the belly of the great fish for that length of time and, of course, because it was on the 3rd day that Jesus was raised from the dead. And in this morning’s Gospel, we come across another of those recurring numbers, 7 when Peter asks if he ought to forgive 7 times and Jesus tells him not 7 times, but 70 times 7.
Very often, the numbers we see recurring in the Bible, are not simply numbers, they have some symbolic meaning too, and that’s no doubt why we find the number 7 and a multiple of it in this Gospel story.
We read in the Book of Job that God will save sinners 3 times and the prophet Amos speaks repeatedly about how God will deal with sinners, in a similar way, although it must be said that Amos is more cryptic in what he says. What Amos says is:
“For three transgressions of N, and for four, I will not revoke the punishment.”
What that’s thought to mean is that God will forgive, but only 3 times; there’s a limit to forgiveness. And so within Judaism, an understanding grew that it was sufficient to forgive someone 3 times, but it wasn’t necessary to forgive the same person more than that. Essentially, it was a ‘3 strikes and you’re out’ system of forgiveness.
So, no doubt, Peter thought he was being extremely generous in his willingness to forgive 7 times. And he probably chose 7 times because of what he read, and we read, in the Scriptures. In the books of Genesis and Leviticus we read about the 7-fold vengeance that God will deal out to sinners. So this 7-fold vengeance was probably seen as symbolic of God’s justice, of complete punishment for sins. So Peter’s 7-fold forgiveness was probably the mirror image of God’s vengeance. If 7-fold vengeance is complete punishment, so 7-fold forgiveness must be complete forgiveness. But Jesus says that that isn’t enough, in fact, it’s nowhere near enough.
The problem with putting numbers and limits on forgiveness, of course, is that it turns forgiveness into a task, something that has to be completed. It might turn forgiveness into a matter of keeping score of other people’s faults and then ticking off the number of times we’ve forgiven them until we reach the point when they’ve had their 3 chances, or 7 chances, or whatever limit we might put on it. Once someone’s reached that limit, we’ve done what’s expected of us, we don’t have to do anymore, and we don’t have to forgive them again.
But Jesus said we have to forgive others from our hearts, it has to be something that comes from deep within ourselves, in fact, from the very deepest part of ourselves. So forgiveness, the forgiveness that Jesus is speaking about, isn’t simply a task for us to complete, it’s not something we do because we have to as Christians, it’s something we do because it’s part of our very nature to forgive. We forgive because forgiveness is about loving our neighbour and there is no limit to true, Christian love.
What we read in today’s Gospel though, doesn’t seem to sit very comfortably alongside last Sunday’s Gospel reading. Then we heard Jesus speaking about how to deal with sinners in the Church who won’t listen and won’t change their ways. You’ll no doubt recall that, in that reading, Jesus did advocate what amounts to a ‘3 strikes and your out’ approach;
that if someone in the Church had sinned against another Church member, they should be given 3 chances to change their ways and then, if they won’t listen, that they should be treated as a Gentile or tax-collector which, in the context of 1st Century Judaism, meant that they should be treated as though they were no longer part of the community. For Christians, that means as though they were no longer part of the Church.
That might seem to be an unforgiving and unloving way to treat people. But is it really? Anyone who’s ever had or cared for children will know that part of loving them, is to discipline them at times. To set limits on what they’re allowed to do so that they don’t do things that would harm themselves and others. Letting someone do anything they like regardless of the consequences for others, especially when what they’re doing is wrong, is not loving them, and it’s not loving anybody else either, certainly not those who are being harmed by the actions of unrepentant sinners. So there has to be discipline in the Church, as in any other walk of life and, at times, that means people need to be spoken to about their actions, and action taken to resolve the problem if those people won’t listen and won’t change their ways. It has to be done for the good of others.
But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t forgive those people, and it certainly doesn’t mean we can’t love them. We don’t have to agree with someone, or like what they’re doing, or even particularly like them to love them in the way that Jesus tells us to love them. If we look at ourselves honestly, in the light of the Gospel, which is as close as we can get to looking at ourselves through God’s eyes, do we really think we’re particularly agreeable at times? Do we really think that the way we act at times is acceptable? Do we really think we’re very likeable at times? An yet God loves us. He loves us so much that he sent his Son into the world to tell us what we’re doing wrong and ask us to listen and change our ways so that we could be and remain members of his people.
Is that not really the way Jesus said we should treat those in the Church who don’t follow his teaching and example?
So what does it mean to love in that way and to forgive from the heart? There’s a well known saying that whatever we wouldn’t like to be done to us, we shouldn’t do to others and I’m sure we’ve all heard that saying or something similar. But if we’re going to love as Jesus taught us to love, that’s only half the story. Christian discipleship isn’t just about what we can’t do and shouldn’t do, it’s also very much about what we can do and should do. So no, we shouldn’t do to others what we wouldn’t like done to us but, we should do for others whatever we’d like done for us, and we should do those things for everyone, regardless of whether we agree with them or like them, and that includes people in the Church who’ve acted in ways that aren’t in keeping with Jesus’ teaching and example. And really, what is forgiveness other than treating someone who’s done wrong in the same way as we treat those who haven’t done wrong?
So, these two Gospel readings aren’t really contradictory. We must have discipline in the Christian life and in the Church. At times, that means we have to deal with people in the Church who act in un-Christian ways. That means we might have to treat those people as though they’re no longer part of the Church in order to deal with a problem and for the good of others in the Church, but that doesn’t mean we should stop loving those people, and it doesn’t mean that we can’t or shouldn’t forgive them. And we should always be ready to welcome them back into the Church when we can. That is the loving thing to do, it’s the forgiving thing to do. It’s the Christian thing to do because it’s what Jesus taught us to do and that he did himself. It’s the loving, forgiving way that God treats us and that, as his people, he asks us to treat people too.
Amen.
You will find the Propers for the 24th Sunday (Trinity 14) here.
Parish Church of St Mark Chadderton 