September 11, 2005 - 17th Sunday after Pentecost - Mother Stephanie Parker

FIRST READING: Genesis 50: 15-21
PSALM: 103: 8-13
SECOND READING: Romans 14: 1-12
GOSPEL: Matthew 1*: 21-35

On September 11, 2001, death and destruction traumatized our country, possibly like never before. This country saw great trauma in the Civil War, but that was inflicted from within. The trauma we suffered on this day, four years ago, was a trauma that came unexpectedly and from without. I think this particular anniversary of 9/11 might be particularly tender to us today because of the devastation so recently wrought by Katrina and those images that we have seen coming across the airwaves and in still photos. I think these events connect in our hearts and minds, even though they are very different, because they both remind us of how fragile and vulnerable we are in this world in which we live. Feelings like fragility and vulnerability can make us very fearful of the world and the people around us, and, if we are not careful, as we seek to isolate ourselves from the pain that traumatic events can cause, we run the very great risk of isolating ourselves from everything that's wonderful in the world, as well.

As this anniversary approached, I know all of us probably saw the images of Katrina from recent days that became interlaced with those familiar images of 9/11 - images that I think are truly indelibly etched on all of our consciousnesses, and ones which we will not forget. So, when we remember that horrible day on each successive anniversary, as we do today, and we are reminded of the scars left on our hearts and minds, some scars that possibly are still very tender for many of us, I think the questions before us are these: One, how do we continue to move forward in hope?; and, two, what is a deep meaningful Christian response to those reprehensible attacks that we remember in Pennsylvania, in New York, and at the Pentagon?

Well, I think all of our Scriptures today point us very clearly in one direction - in all three of them. We see this incredible story of forgiveness of Joseph for his brothers, and how God can use the worst things we can do to one another to the greater good of all. We see it in Paul's pleading in his Letter to the Romans to love one another and not to seek to find judgment with one another, and then, in the Gospel, we hear Jesus, who is the fulfillment of all of these images of mercy and forgiveness, sum up the answer to both of those questions with one word: Forgiveness. Forgiveness is the one-word answer.

So today, of all days, we hear Peter ask Jesus, "How many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?" That sounds generous in the extreme, at least to me; and, if any of you have ever had to forgive anyone even more than one time, that second time feels like a pretty far road to travel. So, now we hear Jesus say, "No, Peter! Not seven times, but seventy-seven times" - or seventy times seven, which is to say, how many times? A bajillion! O.K. It is a sort of nonsensical number. It is what one writer calls - and I love it - "The arithmetic of forgiveness".

So, in this light, Jesus goes on, in responding to Peter's question, to tell this shocking parable about an unmerciful servant who received forgiveness for his own enormous debt, a debt which, of course, is again a nonsensical number, like a bajillion dollars (it's my favorite word of the day!), but also, in light of this enormous debt, instead of extending forgiveness for a tiny debt, which was equal to about a month's salary, something that possibly could be paid back, we see this servant imprisoning his debtor, after the deep amount of forgiveness he had just received.

Now, in the Kingdom of God that Jesus proclaims, He instructs to forgive, as I said, not seven times, not seventy-seven times, and not seventy times seven, but exponentially. We are to forgive beyond calculation or even beyond our own ability of comprehension. Here is where it gets dicey - Jesus also warns us that obtaining forgiveness is inextricably linked to what? To our ability to offer forgiveness. So, in what might sound very different from the kind of things we're used to hearing from Jesus, we hear the chilling news in today's parable that we can expect divine forgiveness in the measure with which we extend human forgiveness. He says it this way, referring to the fate of that unmerciful servant, "This is how my heavenly father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from the heart". These are also the words that are echoed in the Lord's Prayer that Jesus taught us. We pray, what? "Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us". Or, in some versions of it that are very closely linked to today's parable, "Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors".

In his book, a book that I highly recommend Wishful Thinking, a Seekers ABC, Frederick Buechner explains it this way:

"To forgive somebody is to say, one way or another, 'You have done something unspeakable, and, by all rights, I should call it quits between us. Both my pride and my principles demand that I do no less. However, although I make no guarantees that I will be able to forget what you've done, and though we may both carry the scars of this for life, I refuse to let it stand like poison between us.'"

He goes on to suggest that it is the matter of pride that most often trips us up. If the offended must put away the pride that calls for retribution and revenge, possibly rightfully due, then the offender must also swallow their own pride to admit that they have done this unspeakable thing to another person and, quite possibly, another person like in Joseph's story, that was a member of their own family, someone they were supposed to be able to trust. So, putting away this unbending kind of pride is what Jesus is calling us to do in the words of the Lords' Prayer, as I mentioned earlier.

Now, in that prayer that we pray every Sunday, as well as in the parable that we hear today, I do not believe - and this is important! - I do not believe that Jesus is telling us that God's forgiveness is conditional upon our forgiving others, because Jesus, more than anybody, knows full well that our un-forgiveness, which we constantly struggle with, is among those things about us for which we need to have God forgive us the most. What Jesus is trying to say, perhaps, is that the pride that keeps us from forgiving something that has been done to us is the same pride that is wrapped up with our inability to accept forgiveness from another when we have transgressed.

Remember last week's Gospel? - "What we bind on earth, we also bind in heaven". The un-forgiveness that we might bind in heaven will be our choice, not God's, because, here's the deal, and this is very important - Nothing, no thing, not even the power of God's limitless forgiveness, can penetrate a heart that is hardened by resentment or stubbornness, and this even includes those who can't forgive themselves, no matter what anybody else says.

That is also a place that traps us in resentment and stubbornness and keeps us from being able to do what? Receive God's love and mercy and forgiveness. And Jesus is desperately trying to teach us this important fact. Jesus knows that we are prone to lock ourselves up in chains of self-righteousness and indignation on either side of this forgiveness equation. Have you ever heard these words or said these words? - (and this is a hint - I am quoting me!): "I'm the one who's been hurt. He or she needs to come to me". Or: "If she thinks I'm going to beg for forgiveness, she's got another think coming. . . ." On and on, we spiel out when we are hurt these words from our hearts and from our minds.

Now, sometimes, people have been hurt very badly by another human being, like an abusive spouse or parent, or even by a group of human beings like this country suffered in those attacks on 9/11. In addition, sometimes there are people who have done despicable things, who come to realize their deep and pressing need to find forgiveness for themselves. These are the places of unbearable pain that Jesus never intends us to brush off casually by simply letting by-gones be by-gones. What Jesus does is call us to this deep understanding that forgiveness, in both the giving and in the receiving, is the only way to heal from such pain and receive that freedom that will bring new life and new hope - new life and new hope not only to each of us as individuals, as we move through this precarious world that we live in, but also as a nation, as we move further and further away from the pain of 9/11. With this promise of hope, we begin arriving in that place that is free of fear - a place that embraces the world around us in all of its complexity, both the complexity of who we are in and who we are to the world as a nation, as well as who we are as individual Christian people, just trying to find our own way in our own lives and in our own relationships.

How do we grab hold of this precious freedom and gain this sweet release? Today, Jesus hands us the key. He reminds us that no one, no one, is without the need to be forgiven for something and, sometimes, forgiven for something over and over and over again, and that God forgives us all, over and over and over again. Understanding our own need for forgiveness becomes the basis upon which we can learn to freely forgive others. We learn to forgive because we have been forgiven, which is the same way we learn to love, right? We learn to love when we, ourselves, are loved. So, we learn to forgive because we have been forgiven, and the more we are able to lavish God's exponential forgiveness on others, the more forgiveness we, ourselves, are capable of receiving in return.

Jesus says the number of offenses does not matter; we are still to forgive; nor should the seriousness of the offense we have suffered compromise the genuineness of our mercy. A straightforward radical assurance of forgiveness to someone who has wronged us, offered, as Jesus tells us, from the heart, is the only thing that can heal those complex, painful wrongs we have either suffered or committed.

Now, I reflect back to something I said earlier, and this is exceedingly important, especially for women. This is not to say that we are to put ourselves in danger from someone who continues to harm us emotionally or physically, but it is saying that, when we get ourselves to those places of safety, where this person can no longer hurt us, our next task is to begin that process of forgiveness. Even if our situation dictates that we can never be near those who have hurt us ever again, we can still release them from their debt to us and gain our own freedom from the pain we suffered in the process. This is an incredibly great gift, even if, at times, it feels like a horrible burden.

When we forgive others, we liberate them from their sins and their failures, and we unshackle them from the chains of anxiety, guilt, and shame. Have you ever felt that for something you have done to another human being? What is that phrase? - "These things that are grievous unto us" - we pray that. What a beautiful phrase! We point these people toward a future of hope instead of miring them in a past of regret, and we free them, just as we are free to begin afresh and anew.

In short, when we do this for each other, we give each other permission to carry on. Perhaps and maybe even more important, in the liberation we offer others, we free ourselves from those painful feelings of victimization, vengeance, and bitterness - feelings that, no matter how badly we have been wronged, will corrode our souls as surely as any wrong we, ourselves, have ever committed against another human being.

So, here we are on the anniversary of that devastating day, four years ago, when everything we thought we knew about feeling safe as a people and as a nation was, in a very brief moment, forever changed. So, how do we take this teaching of Jesus about forgiveness and hold it up, not only in how we treat one another as fellow Christians, but in how we continue to move forward as a nation, as we recover from the pain and devastation we suffered in those terrorist attacks of 9/11? I have already said it! I think the way forward is very clear, and Jesus is pointing us clearly on the way. Whether it is in our personal lives, or as a people who constitute a nation, forgiveness brings us freedom from the horrible need for revenge, as well as freedom from those lonely fortresses we build for ourselves with our own self-righteousness and indignation.

So, to that end, I am going to finish with this story. I confessed this in the early service - Andrew had this story first, but I stole it from him, because it was perfect for today.

A woman goes into a diner. She sits down and orders a big salad, and, when the salad comes, she decides she needs to go to the restroom to wash her hands and take care of business. So she gets up, leaves her salad, leaves her pocketbook, and goes into the restroom. When she is finished, she comes back and is surprised when she arrives back at the booth that there is this big, burly, dirty-looking man sitting at her table and eating her salad. And so, determined not to let a person such as this push her around or get the better of her, she just sits down right beside him, grabs up a fork, and, as he is taking a big bite of the salad, she pushes her fork in there and takes a big bite, too - staring him straight in the eyes, daring him to do something about it. So, he looks at her, and he digs his fork in; and they go back and forth at this until the salad is consumed, and the bowl is empty. So then, the fellow gets up from the booth, walks over to the counter, gets a couple of cups of coffee, brings them back to the table, gives her one, takes one for himself, and they sit in silence, as they drink their cups of coffee.

Now, when this is over, the man gets up and leaves the diner. So the woman, feeling pretty sure that she has put him in his place, gets up to leave, as well; and, as she stands up, she reaches for her bag and realizes that it is not there. Now, doubly indignant, she jumps up to raise the alarm and to make sure this guy gets what he deserves, and, upon arising, her eye catches the next booth over. On that table sits her untouched salad, and, in the chair beside it, is her pocketbook that she was convinced had just been stolen.

So, it is my contention that the question her story leaves before us is the same question that Jesus asks us to contemplate today. How many times have each of us received forgiveness, even when we didn't even know that we needed it? How many times?

So, today, and as our parable tells us, today of all days, for heaven's sake, let's go out into this world we live in and, in Jesus' Name, do likewise.

AMEN