Unconditional Forgiveness:::24th Sunday in Ordinary Time

 Year A

Sirach 27:30-28:7

Psalm 103:1-2.3-4.9-10.11-12 (R. 8)

Romans 14:7-9

Matthew 18:21-35

Unconditional Forgiveness

 

Last week, we looked at how to help a brother who in his weakness has done something against us.  We were given four solutions, the first was to see him privately, the second was to go with two or three witnesses, the third was to send him to the Church and the Last was to treat him as a tax collector or Gentile, which means putting him into the hands of God.

So treating our brother us a tax collector or Gentile means given him to God who is Love himself. Thus to love our neighbor and treat him us a tax collector or Gentile is to put him in the hands of Love. Because, love of neighbor at a state that is beyond the Church is giving your neighbor to God who nothing is beyond or impossible. 

Then if we Christians are not to be better than our neighbors, but better for our neighbors, and if he does something wrong against us and is beyond the Church we must put him in the hands of God, who is Love himself, it means we should forgive him. 

With this, Peter asks today, how often shall my brother sin against me, and I  forgive him? As many as Seven times? And Jesus answers that Seventy times seven times. 

 

In Scripture we see a progression of unlimited revenge know as "curse of destruction," where God orders that the Israelites should destroy all the  properties of their enemies in war (cf. Joshua 6:21), to limited revenge, where we have Moses giving them the law of an eye for an eye and  a tooth for a  tooth (cf. Exodus21:24), to limited forgiveness, where the Scribes and Pharisees taught them to forgive a person three times, to an unlimited forgiveness taught by Jesus Christ. 

This is what we are been taught today. I the Parable Jesus gave today, I have been wandering why the servant who fell down and pleaded and his master forgave him his huge debt, did not forgive his fellow servant who also did  fell down to plead. Why did he not forgive his fellow servants? 

His attitude show one thing about him, namely he is not powerful. The one who forgive, must have an authority or power to do so, and the one who cannot forgive cannot because he does not have the power to do so. Thus the one who can forgive others is powerful or stronger than the one who cannot forgive. 

Why? In Scriptures, the only one who can forgive sin is God. So when Jesus Christ came and started forgiving people their sins, the Pharisees and Scribes argued with him and he said;

 

Matthew 9:6

But that you may know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins, (then said he to the man sick of palsy,) Arise, take up thy bed, and go into thy house. 

If we are Called Christians, if we are part of the Body of Christ, of which when Paul was persecuting Christians Jesus said to why are you persecuting me? Then by forgiving others their sins you prove that you are part of the body of the Son of man who has power on earth to forgive sins on earth.

Forgive your enemies unconditionally and show them how powerful you are, and you will eventually lead them to amend their ways.  

By Sylvester Amakye-Quayson