The Unforgiving Servant

Sam Ferguson, May 31, 2020. Key text | Matthew 18:21-35

SERMON OUTLINE & QUESTIONS

Opening thoughts—

What is a parable? An abstract truth illustrated and brought to life in a story (e.g., “Love your neighbor” in the story of the Good Samaritan).

Why parables? We can be “hard-headed,” but stories slip past our mental defenses and into our hearts.

Two things to keep in mind when reading parables in Scripture:

  1. Pay attention. If Jesus speaks in a parable, we know it contains an important lesson.

  2. Have a posture of openness. The truths contained in parables can be hard for us to hear.

    What parables do you know best? On the whole, do you find them puzzling, encouraging, memorable, cryptic? Is there a parable that stands out as being particularly challenging to your heart?

Sermon focus | Matthew 18:21-35 | The Parable of the Unforgiving Servant Prelude (vv. 21-22).

Peter’s question assumes there is a limit to how much we must forgive.

Jesus’ response (70x7) suggests forgiveness is limitless. Jesus knows our hearts will reject this teaching, so he uses a parable.

Scene One (vv. 21-27)

The servant owes an impossible sum of money to the king. (Many thousands of lifetime earnings.) At first, the king begins carrying out justice (i.e., bringing the servant to account).

v. 21: the king feels “pity.” He is moved by deep, heartfelt compassion and shows the servant mercy by forgiving the servant of his debts.

Scene Two (vv. 32-34)

Another servant owes the unforgiving servant 1/600,000th of what the unforgiving servant owed the king. (Remember, the king forgave all of it.)

The unforgiving servant does not show the debtor any pity or mercy.

Scene Three (v. 35)

Jesus makes a “jarring statement” in response to Peter’s question: “This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart.”

Jesus wants us to see ourselves in the story. We are more like the unforgiving servant than we like to admit.

Peter is asking a “rabbinic” or intellectual question. In response, Jesus teaches that forgiveness is not a matter of the will or the mind, but of the heart.

Have you, like Peter, ever sought to find a “limit” to forgiveness?

In your own life, can you recall an experience where you forgave someone by will or mind, but never from your heart? How did it go?

Key question: When your heart is pricked or hurt, what bleeds out?