Pentecost 18                                              Matt. 18:21-35                                                    9/14/08
                                                          “490 and Then *POW*”

There is a play I read about this week that is  based on this text called, "Seventy times Seven Equals Four-Hundred-Ninety, But Then...POW!" In the play the husband has a chalkboard in their apartment where he is keeping count of the
number of times he has forgiven his wife.

Every time she would do something that would upset him, such as having scrambled eggs on Sunday, when she knows that Sunday is the day for eggs sunny-side-up, the husband would yell a little bit, then take off his glasses, walk
over the board, but on a white glove, pick up the piece of chalk,
place another mark on the board, and say, "I forgive you."

Then he puts down the chalk, takes off the white glove, puts on his glasses
and exuberantly walks back to where he was.

This play reminded me of the character Jackie Gleason played in a 1950 TV show called the “Honeymooners”.  In the show Gleason played Ralph Kramden, a NYC bus driver.  The plot revolved around Ralph, his wife Alice, Norton, his friend and Norton’s wife, Trixie. 

Ralph was a dreamer, a man offanciful ambitions, but poor self-esteem, lack of practical motivation and a hot temper.  Ralph easily took offense and let everyone know that he had a way of dealing with such offense, “One of these days, one of these days... POW! RIGHT IN THE KISSER! “

Ralph probably had never heard of Peter’s discussion with Jesus and Jesus’ instruction to forgive an offender 70 times 7.  If he’d been a more religious man, Ralph might have kept accounts and when a person’s offenses hit 70 X 7 or 490 times forgiven, then it would be, “490 and then *POW*”.

While I doubt that the man in the first story would get much of our support, I think we can all sympathize with Ralph.  Whether the offense is of major proportions like losses suffered on 9/11/08 or just some thoughtless and unintended slight or something in between, it can be really hard to forgive the offender.

This is understandable from a human perspective.  When someone seems to ignore us when we pass them in a store, leave us out of a social gathering, fail to come through when we need them, break a confidence, say something mean and hurtful, steal our good name by criticizing us in public or through gossip, cheat us of money we worked hard to earn or commit some heinous crime against someone we love, we feel hurt and angry.  If the person doesn’t admit their error/sin and ask our forgives the hurt can fester.

We, in turn, tend to make assumptions about the offender’s motivation and behavior.  We often personalize it.  We put our own interpretation on what happened and may carry on long conversations in our heads in which we tell the offender what we think.  This usually just adds to our pain and anger, and is especially unfortunate when the offender had no intention of hurting us and doesn’t even know an offense has been committed.

The worse the offense the harder it is likely to be for us to heed Jesus’ words, but no matter what, when we have suffered something at the hands of a fellow Christian, Jesus expects us to forgive.

But, here is the good news, forgiveness is not instant and immediate act that we may have grown up believing it to be.  Forgiveness is a process, a spiritual journey that may take years to complete.  It is a journey though that we must choose to embark on and continue.

Forgiveness begins with recognizing it is needed.  This means both admitting to ourselves that some act or lack of action has hurt us and that we are upset about it.  Often, especially in relationship that are important to us, we pass off slights and incidents. 

We may be like the wife who shrugs her shoulders and mutters, “Men!” each time she finds her husband’s dirty socks on the floor, but day after day, and year after year says nothing to the offender.  Then suddenly, on their twenty-fifth anniversary, blows up as she sees him about to drop his socks once again.

So, we need to learn to be honest with ourselves and admit that we are offended by dropped socks or other thoughtless acts.

We need to then move on to awareness of the mental chatter that follows an offense.  Do the voices argue that we must forgive...but we don’t want to?      Do they build on the offense with memories of past offenses or our own interpretations of what caused the offense?  Do they excuse, rationalize and brow-beat us into premature forgiveness?

Recognizing the voices and accepting their presence in our thought processes offers us the opportunity to consciously decide whether we will have this be one of those 490+ times we forgive the person. 

We may then be able to engage in healthy self-talk that truly accepts the other person’s humanity and excuses the acts.  This makes forgiveness a short process.

On the other hand, when the offense wounds us deeply, when our life experiences have left us more vulnerable to slights than others, when contrition on the part of the offender never comes, we may need to begin with a prayer to God for the ability to forgive...or even for the ability to want to want to develop the ability to forgive.  And this prayer will need to be repeated many times in some cases.

Along with this, we would benefit by reviewing Scriptures that remind us that we have been forgiven.  A passage such as, but I see in my members another law at war with the law of my mind, making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members.  Wretched man that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?  Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!
1. Romans 7:23-25 (NRSV)
can help us realize that the forgiveness God asks of us He has already extended to us many many times over.  We are all the “unforgiving servant” at times and need to face the sin of our unforgiveness - though by God’s grace we won’t be thrown into prison until we pay our debts to our Master.

Given time, effort on our part and most of all, the working of the Holy Spirit in our hearts, we will reap the benefits of taking the forgiveness journey.  These benefits are physical.  As we release that which we have suffered our blood pressure goes down, our muscles can relax, our stomach can stop producing acid, etc. 

The benefits are psychological.  Through the forgiveness process we learn to replace negative thoughts and emotions with positive, healthy ones.  With a more positive attitude we can grow and use our energies in life-giving ways.

Best of all, the most valuable benefits are spiritual.  Anger, hatred, resentment separate us from God, build walls between us and others (and not just the offender either), and lays us open to temptation to overt sins, like revenge.  Taking the forgiveness journey, on the other hand, opens us to having a closer walk with God, helps us become aware of the extraordinary gift of grace in our own lives and makes it possible for us to enjoy the blessing of being one of God’s beloved children.

Thus, forgiveness is not just another law imposed on us, a command of Jesus that makes our lives harder, a harsh discipline with eternal punishment if we fail.  Jesus’ command to forgive is meant to be a blessing of His love, an avenue for our growth and health, an invitation to a closer relationship with God and the opening to possible reconciliation with the offender and others.

I was originally going to open my sermon by holding up this notebook and claiming that it was my record of every offense anyone her had committed against me.  I was going to claim that I was keeping count on an individual basis and when I got to 490 for anyone it would be “POW”.

I think I have some better uses for the notebook though.  I think it would be better to use the notebook to record the many many blessings I receive from being in relationship with each of you, or I may use it as a journal to record my own journey of growing in forgiveness.  Either way, the POW will come to mean, “Peace” - “Oneness” - “Wholeness.  Amen