Let me die!

It was a gorgeous day. The sun was shining, and my joy was full. I remember walking down the stairs in our home telling God how much I loved Him and that I would never turn away from Him.

It was not long after my great declaration that my world crumbled.

Betrayal. Of the deepest kind.

Within a few months, I was begging God to take me home. I had so many questions: “Why God? What now?” My rational thinking was absent. All I could do was cry out to God.

I was determined that I could not and would not ever forgive. In my grief, I began searching the word “forgiveness” in my Bible. I hoped God would speak to me from His word justifying my unforgiveness. That is when I read Matthew 18.

Peter was having a discussion with Jesus about how often we should forgive. Peter suggested 7 times, expecting a pat on the back for his generosity. (Their normal expectation was 3 times.) Shockingly, “Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.” Jesus was not giving Peter a “forgiveness scorecard;” He was teaching that we never stop forgiving. Then Jesus illustrated this truth with a parable.

There were 3 characters: The King (representing God), the King’s servant, (representing you and me), and the servant's friends, (representing our offender).

The King’s servant owed the king an incomprehensible amount of money. That is a picture of you and me before we placed our faith in Jesus. We owed God a debt we could never pay - the price for our sin is spiritual death.

The King’s servant humbled himself before the king and asked for mercy. The King forgave the unpayable debt and set the servant free. Wow!

Likewise, when we come before God, humbling ourselves, confessing our sin, and receiving Jesus, God forgives us and wipes our slate clean. Like the servant in the parable, we do not deserve it; God gives it to us as a free gift.

Because God is holy, justice must be carried out on sin. Our punishment is spiritual death. Jesus came to pay our punishment as a substitute which allowed God to forgive us and set us free.

What’s the point of the parable? We are to forgive others like God has forgiven us.

But how? Stay tuned.

“We ask for forgiveness. And we forgive others who ask us. In that way we can experience healing, healing in our souls.” -Ed Dobson