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Can We Forgive? - Part 3 - The Wicked Servant

by Jerry Ousley  
8/03/2012 / Christian Living

Jesus told a story about a man who really needed forgiveness. It's found in Matthew 18:23-35. In my own words the story went something like this: There was a king who was owed a lot of money by several of his servants. There came a day when the king decided that it was time all these debts be taken care of so he began to call each one of his debtors in and worked out terms to settle the matter. It seems that most of them paid their debts on the spot and nothing more was said about it.

One certain servant was brought in and it was found that, all together, this man owed the king nearly one million dollars. Talk about being deep in debt! Anyway, the king told this man that he was going to have to settle his account. There was no way that this servant could come up with that kind of money. The king decided that the man, his family, and everything that he owned should be sold to come up with as much of the debt as could possibly be scraped together. The servant didn't want himself or his family to be sold into slavery so he begged the king, "give me some time and I will pay you everything that I owe you." The king knew that the servant couldn't possibly earn the money in his lifetime to repay such a great debt. The king felt sorry for the man and decided to simply write it off and forgive him of all that he owed him.

Now for most of us this would be such an act of mercy that we'd be falling down at the king's feet in gratitude. Can you imagine what it would be like if our creditors had such compassion that they'd do a thing like this? I for one would be overjoyed; but not this man. Jesus didn't add this aspect to the story but it sounds to me like the man didn't want charity. He became angry and the first thing he did was to go out, find a guy that owed him ten bucks, and demanded immediate payment. His debtor couldn't come up with the ten bucks that day and, just as this servant had done, he fell down at his feet and begged for more time. But the wicked servant instead had him thrown into prison until he could pay off his ten dollar debt.

This was told to the king who recalled the servant and pointed out what he had done. Now, instead of being sold into slavery a much worse consequence was placed on this wicked servant. The king had him delivered to the torturers until this debt could be paid. You know what? I'd bet that this man never saw daylight again.

Jesus finished His story with these words: "So My heavenly Father will also do to you if each of you, from his heart, does not forgive his brother his trespasses." (Matthew 18:35). That's pretty tough. It sounds hard coming from our loving Lord and Savior. After all, aren't we saved by grace? Have we not been taught that there is nothing we have to do to be saved except to invite Jesus into our hearts and lives as our Lord?

Grace is enough. Jesus has forgiven each of us who have come to Him, a debt far greater than a million bucks. We deserve to be delivered into slavery, sold along with everything we have to pay off our huge debt of sin. Instead, when we come to Him, He forgives us, writes the debt off with His own blood and releases us from that great weight.
But we have to ask ourselves, have we gone out just like this wicked servant did, and demanded that our fellow believers who have wronged us, pay for their debt? Have we chosen to demand that they make right their measly ten dollar debts forgetting about our own huge forgiven debt? I'm not a judge. I'm not going to tell you that if you chose not to forgive that you aren't going to heaven. But I am going to ask you to think about the words Jesus said regarding our own forgiveness and instruction on how we should forgive others. Is the price of not forgiving worth it?

Jerry D. Ousley is the author of ?Soul Challenge?, ?Soul Journey?, ?Ordeal?, ?The Spirit Bread Daily Devotional and his first novel ?The Shoe Tree.? Visit our website at spiritbread.com to download these and more completely free of charge.

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