"My chains are gone. I've been set free. My God, my Savior has ransomed me.
And like a flood his mercy rains,
Unending love, Amazing Grace"
I absolutely love Chris Tomlin's Amazing Grace (My Chains are Gone). Yesterday we sung this song in church and it moved me like it always does. It's hard not to feel a little bit choked up when you truly grasp the grace we have been given, though we don't deserve it.
Then, before bed, Dave and I continued our Bible reading through the book of Matthew. The Parable of the Unmerciful Servant in Matthew 18:21-35 caught my attention like it never had before. Has that ever happened to you? I've heard the story many times in my life, but for some reason didn't understand it as fully as I did last night. It was honestly a reminder that I really needed, an important one that I wanted to share.
One of the disciples asks Jesus how many times we must forgive others. He replies, "I tell you the truth, not seven times, but seventy times seven.." I could probably do the math to figure our how many times that is, but the point is to always be forgiving. That's not easy! Sometimes I have trouble with forgiving the first time let alone the 7X77! Goodness, if I forgave someone that many times, I would have to be so full of love and grace I wouldn't be counting at all! (Point taken)
But Jesus goes on to make a greater point through a parable:
In his story, a king decides to settle his accounts with his servants. One servant owed him quite a debt, and since he could not pay it back, he and his wife and children were to be sold into slavery to repay the king. But the servant fell to his knees and begged for another chance to pay back what he owed. The king showed mercy, and cancelled the whole deficit, letting the servant walk away a free man. How do you forget a forgiveness like that?!
However, that same servant then found another servant who owed him money, and since that man couldn't pay him back, he had him thrown into jail until the debt was repaid. The fellow servant begged for mercy, but though the kings servant had just received an amazing grace of his own, he refused to give the man another chance.
Hearing what had happened, the king was furious. He handed the man over to the jailers to be tortured until his debt could be repaid.
And Jesus said, "This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart".
I'm not sure why, but it had never fully hit me that God IS that king in the story every single day with us. Daily forgiving us with grace we will never, ever deserve. And what do we do? We find every reason to take offense and hold something against a fellow sinner. In the story, it's amazing to me how the servant just received an amazing gift of forgiveness, from the king no less, but he seeks out another servant, someone in his very same position, and can't show him the same mercy. That a king would look on a lowly servant with mercy is amazing, so why do we forget that miracle every day in our interactions with others?
Because of our sin, we owe a huge debt that we can never repay. When we go against God and don't forgive others, Jesus has said we will will be held accountable for our own debts. The servant in the story was sentenced to be tortured until his could repay what he owed. I drew my own connection that if we can never repay our debts, and if we were sentenced to the same torture, it would be eternal. I'd say that makes it vitally important that we forgive others as Christ has forgiven us.
These are strong words, a promise that I admit almost hurt to read because of how it convicts me. However, the story can also reinforce our joy that we DO have a King who can forgive us. A King that somehow loves each of us, and cancels our debts when we cry out for mercy and forgiveness. "My chains are gone, I've been set free!" The question is, how will we respond to such a gift? Will we continue to have unforgiving hearts, or will we release others from their debts as a testament to the love we have received through Christ.
