Lord, if my brother sins against me,
how often must I forgive him?
As many as seven times?
Peter thought he was being generous in suggesting seven times. Humanly speaking, seven times seems like a lot. We speak of second chances, but seldom of seventh chances. Even in a situation where the other person says he wants to change and do better we are likely to stop believing him after he repeats his behavior even a few times. Peter no doubt would have suggested that for the sake of self-protection he should be free to cut this hypothetical brother off after seven chances.
Fortunately, our limited conceptions of mercy and forgiveness are not those of God. Whatever wrongs our brothers have done and continue to do against us are less than those by which we have spurned the Lord our God. He himself continued to seek after us while we were yet enemies, even while we were still sinning against him. He prayed for us even as we mocked and spat upon him. He forgave us even as we nailed him to a cross. If God had any limits to his forgiveness we would have quickly exhausted them. But his mercy is endless and he never ceased to seek us no matter how far we strayed.
Moved with compassion the master of that servant
let him go and forgave him the loan.
The master forgave us a debt we could never repay. And to those of us who, like Therese of Lisieux, may never have committed a mortal sin (praised be to God for it!), should still recognize that it was only by God's prevenient grace that they avoided it. None of us are without need of the boundless mercy of God.
Had we not first experienced mercy on the scale of God we might be content with our normal human limitations on the mercy we are willing to show others. But the mercy of God is meant to change us. It is in fact only truly received if it does change us. The tight grasp of neediness and self-protection not only harms others, but it makes us into people we don't want to become.
He seized him and started to choke him, demanding,
‘Pay back what you owe.’
We become merciful only by first receiving God's own generous mercy. It requires a willingness to be open to showing love that is no longer based on merit, that need not be earned. This sort of love is what families embody when they are at their best. There may be times when we do need to take measures to protect ourselves from the abuse of others. Yet we even when we may need to be physically separated we are still called to hearts of love and forgiveness, just as Jesus first offered to us.
Mercy can be miraculous. When people experience being loved in a way that they did not earn and do not believe themselves to deserve it may interrupt long standing patterns of thinking. They may be open to being changed into agents of mercy themselves. It may seem impossible to cross to the far side of the Jordan to transformative forgiveness. The waters don't appear to be going anywhere. But if we do not go alone, but follow the presence of God into those waters, we can cross over dry shod.
Why is it, O sea, that you flee?
O Jordan, that you turn back?
You mountains, that you skip like rams?
You hills, like the lambs of the flock?
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