On January 8, 1956, five American missionaries were killed by members of an Ecuadorian tribe called the Wodani. These five missionaries were trying to penetrate the tribe in this isolated culture, trying to befriend its members over many years to bring them to Christ. And then they had decided to make their trip there to Ecuador, and in just five days after their arrival, they met their death by the end of a Wodani spear. The story could have ended there, but because of forgiveness, it was only the beginning. In a decision that is unimaginable in our thinking, the wives and children of these murdered missionaries moved in to the Wodani village to help care for these people. The Wodanis were a violent people. Among them, killings were rampant. They certainly did not deserve any gracious treatment. These people lacked any concepts of trust or forgiveness, according to Steve Saint. In the Wodani language, there is no word for forgiveness. Today, Steve Saint is not merely defined as the son of a martyr, but as the man who befriended his father's killer. Forgiveness is the main story of Saint's life. He said, God sent his son down not when we were perfect, but when we were not. God did not do it because we were ready or because we asked for him, but because we needed him. For Steve Saint, it was this truth that motivated him to forgive. He was able to look past what the tribe deserved and able to extend grace and forgiveness to a people because they needed him. Our text today is Matthew chapter 18, verses 21 to 35, and it highlights forgiveness. This is the conclusion of Jesus's sermon on how to love one another in the church. And he leaves us with this very strong exhortation of the absolute necessity of the Christian to forgive. So let's look at this together. Matthew chapter 18, 21 to 35. This is right after Jesus just preached on the process of church discipline, how to deal with sin. And the final step of that was to treat the unrepentant sinner as a Gentile and a tax collector. Now right after that, Matthew 18 verse 21, then Peter came up and said to him, Lord, how often will my brother sin against me and I forgive him? As many as seven times? Jesus said to him, I do not say to you seven times, but 77 times. Therefore the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his servants. When he began to settle, one was brought to him who owed him 10,000 talents. And since he could not pay, his master ordered him to be sold with his wife and children and all that he had in payment to be made. So the servant fell on his knees imploring him, have patience with me and I will pay you everything. Verse 27, out of pity for him, the master of that servant released him and forgave him the debt. But when that same servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him 100 denarii and seizing him, he began to choke him saying, pay what you owe me. So his fellow servant fell down and pleaded with him and said, have patience with me, I will pay you. He refused, went and put him in prison until he should pay the debt. When his fellow servants saw what had taken place, they were greatly distressed, and they went and reported to their master all that had taken place. And his master summonsed him and said to him, You wicked servant, I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me and should not have you had mercy on your fellow servant as I had mercy on you. And in anger, his master delivered him to the jailers until he should pay all of his debt. So also my Heavenly Father will do to every one of you if you do not forgive your brother from your heart. The parable contrasts a merciful king with an unmerciful servant and reveals to us that forgiveness is so essential to our faith as Christians that if we do not forgive, if we do not extend forgiveness to others, we will find ourselves under God's judgment. And as such, it is a parable of warning in the church. It causes us to examine ourselves for that damning sin of unforgiveness. So just to bring you to context, Matthew chapter 18, Jesus has so far employed five of six accounts to teach us how to love one another. Starting back in verse, chapter 17, verses 24 to 26, we love those in the world, we love the unbeliever by limiting our freedoms. Then in verses 1 to 5 of chapter 18, we love fellow Christians with humble service. In verses 6 to 9, we love the weaker brethren through self-denial. Then in verses 10 to 14, we love wandering Christians with a relentless concern and outreach. And then in verses 15 to 20, we love sinning Christians by confronting that sin and, when necessary, disciplining that sin. What might strike us throughout this text, throughout this sermon of Jesus, is the seriousness with which sin is dealt with. Listen just to some of the wording in this text. Verse 6, whoever causes one of these little ones who believes in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and be drowned in the depth of the sea. Verses 7 and 8, woe to the one by whom temptations come. If your hand or your foot causes you to sin, cut it off, throw it away. It's better for you to enter life crippled or be lame with two hands or two feet than to be thrown into the eternal fire. Verse 12, if a man has a hundred sheep and one goes astray, does he not leave the 99 on the mountain and go in search for the one? Verse 17, if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector. See, no measure is left untaken in our effort to deal with sin, to put sin to death in ourselves and in our brothers and sisters in the church. This shows us the importance of our mission field right here in these pews, our mission field right before us, right within. That's right, you've heard that right. We have a mission field right here in the local church. And we've seen how chapter 18, when we join ourselves to a local body, a church, we become our brother's keeper. That's why we can't be in huge places where no one knows us. When we join ourselves to a local body, we're our brother's keeper. We strive together to make it to that final destination so that when one falls short, we can say, come on, get back up. There's not much to go. Let's run this race together. So mortification of sin is a group project where we help one another root out sin in our lives. But now as we come to the end of Jesus's sermon, he doesn't want to leave us with excommunication as the final word, but he wants to tell us about forgiveness. And he speaks in forgiveness in just as strong terms. Brethren, it's a reality in our life together as a church, as we live together as individuals in his church, we will inevitably sin against one another. It's going to happen. And part of our growth as a Christian involves bearing with one another's different sinful tendencies, and forgiving one another is paramount in this. This text, along with parallel teaching from Jesus and the Apostle Paul, reveals that extending forgiveness to others is a behavior that comes as a result of heart change that God does when we receive the forgiveness from Christ. It is then as a result of being forgiven by Him with an overwhelming sense of gratitude that the Christian's life then becomes defined by forgiving others. Now let's look at this text in Matthew 18 beginning with Peter's question in verse 21. Lord, how often will my brother sin against me and I forgive him? As many as seven times. Now there's some virtue in this question because according to Judaism, forgiveness was to be extended as a general rule three times. They had the three strikes, you're out rule. So Peter's being charitable here and suggesting seven times. The weakness though of Peter's question is that he is seeking to put a boundary on forgiveness. And Jesus releases all limits here by replying to Peter in verse 22, I do not say to you seven times, but 77 times. And by the way, 77 is the preferred translation to what we often hear is 70 times 7, I think in the King James and the NASB. They all go back to the Old Testament, Genesis 4.24, where it talks about God forgiving or holding the sin against Cain seven times and against Lamech 77 times. In the Hebrew it says 77, in the Greek Septuagint it's 70 times 7, so some translate one or the other. The point is that Jesus is not teaching about a limit. He's teaching, by multiplying this out, He is teaching that forgiveness is without limit. To illustrate the extent of this expectation of limitless forgiveness, he follows the instruction with this parable, a merciful king and an unmerciful servant. He illustrates the incredible generosity of this merciful king toward his utterly indebted subject. And then, though, the ensuing expectation that forgiven subject would then extend that forgiveness to others. So in verse 23, he tells us this king initiates a settlement with this servant. The servant owed him myrion talenton, 10,000 talents. That's about $6 billion in our money. But really, the Greek myrion talenton is saying zillion. He's describing a debt that's beyond any quantifiable number. So, Miriam Talenton is quite accurate, then, to describe the magnitude of our sin debt against God, is it not? And this is the first truth of the Gospel. The first truth of the Gospel is that we are in debt to God. That, like the servant in this parable, we have such a debt that it is impossible to pay it off. A zillion dollar debt. We realize that when we look at ourselves against the law of a perfect and holy God, in light of His holiness, we see the magnitude of our sin. It becomes clear to us. It is a debt that we could never hope to pay. We realize that if the King would give us what we deserve, then we would be like the servant in the parable. We would be sold into slavery because we could never pay it back. The king is doing here, by the way, in this parable, what any king would do, he's just trying to recoup some of his debt. He's owed so much, he says, well, take him and his family and sell them as slaves, and I'll just take whatever I can get. And this further illustrates the condition of us outside of Christ. Not only are we abject debtors because of sin, but we are slaves to sin as well. The law of God is constantly revealing that to us. It's constantly showing us our sin. It's constantly condemning us, keeping us trapped as slaves under condemnation, under punishment. But then to our surprise, this king shows himself to be quite merciful. And he hears the servant plea, the servant, verse 26. Servant fell on his knees saying, have patience with me and I'll pay you everything. That was not a promise that he could keep. There's no way he could pay him everything. The servant would have needed countless lives to repay this debt. It reminds me a bit of the parable of the prodigal son, after he's spending all that he has on his father's inheritance and decadent living, he comes to his senses and he's in this pigsty. He comes to his senses, he says, I'm going to return to my father and I'm going to be his servant. But before he can even tell his father that, the prodigal father stops his son and embraces him with prodigal mercy and forgiveness and receives him and he celebrates his return. In a similar manner here, this merciful king in verse 27, he knows the servant can't pay it back. He knows, there's no chance. But what does it say? He says, verse 27, out of pity for him, the master of the servant released him and forgave him the debt. Now, imagine the initial shock of that debtor servant. He asked, I just want to pay it back. Give me the opportunity to pay it back. What did he get? Complete release from this crippling debt. Now, I don't think we can imagine that in a natural way, owing someone $6 billion and them saying, just forget about it. But we see here illustrated so magnificently, so extraordinarily, is the mercy of the King, the matchless, amazing grace of God. In the mercy of the King, we see the grace of God. God is gracious. God is forgiving. And today, as you hear this, it does not matter today how good or how bad you have been. You could be the most moral person, or you could be the worst of sinners. We are all undeserving of mercy. We all owe God obedience, perfect obedience. We owe God glory. We owe God righteousness. And we accrue debt because we fail to do as we ought. We are guilty of cosmic treason against the king of the universe because he is infinitely holy. Any sin against him then warrants infinite penalty. The Scripture says that if you've broken one commandment, we're guilty of breaking the whole law. Sin is destructive. It alienates us from God. It corrupts us from the inside out. It enslaves us. And the final wage of sin is always death. There is no exception. God takes sin seriously. It is appointed unto man once to die, and then comes the judgment. And apart from Christ, We will bear the wrath that our sin deserves in the eternal judgment and fiery torment of hell. Now, if this is the last word on the matter, we are a people without hope. We're trapped under our guilt. We're ruined. If justice triumphs over mercy, then you're ruined. We are a doomed race. We're fated to live forever apart from God in hell. But God, but God who is rich in mercy because of the great love with which He loved us even when we were dead in our sins, dead in our transgressions. Like the king in the parable, God desires to forgive His people. He is compassionate and gracious. He's slow to anger, abounding in love. He doesn't treat us as our sins deserve. He doesn't repay us according to our iniquities. So that today those who confess their sins, those who repent and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, His person, His work, His death on the cross, that He is condemned in my place, those who are trusting in that have a hope of being forgiven and reconciled to God. The Scripture says to you today, if you say you're without sin, you're deceived. The truth is not in you. But if you confess your sins, God is faithful and just and will forgive your sins and cleanse you from all unrighteousness. So those who see their unworthiness, who plead with God to be merciful, who see their debt, will find an abundance of mercy, a grace that is greater than all of our sin. A grace that grants unconditional forgiveness, including the removal of sin's consequences and sin's power as far as the East is from the West. And we all need this, friends. You need this. Whether you realize it or not, you need this. There is nothing the world needs more than to know that they are forgiven. And in Jesus Christ on the cross, redemption was purchased, the forgiveness of our sins in accordance with the riches of his glorious grace. So today, if you're in Christ Jesus, if you're in Christ Jesus, there is now therefore no condemnation, no condemnation. But if you have not come to trust Christ, my call to you is the same as the gospel that has been preached for 2,000 years, the gospel that was preached by Peter at Pentecost. Repent, be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the forgiveness of your sins. And then the book of Acts gives us the assurance in 1043, everyone who believes in Jesus receives forgiveness of sins through his name. We all need that. And brethren, this is not something we just need once. This is something we need every day. Repentance is not a one-time act for us. Even though at that time of evangelical repentance we're reconciled to God, we need to keep short accounts with God on a daily basis. Whenever that old sinful nature kind of rises up, writing to the children of God, writing to believers. John writes in 1 John 2, my little children, I'm writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous. Because Jesus bore the wrath that we deserve, there is now this, as a result of the cross, there is this unquenchable stream of forgiveness that flows from the cross. And God forgives us as often as is needed. He will wash us. He will forgive us. One of the blessings that comes from Jesus' command here in Matthew chapter 18 is this understanding, as He's calling us to forgive, we know that God is infinitely greater than that. So the forgiveness of sins against us then becomes essential in our walk as we walk out God's forgiveness. He is infinitely forgiving to us, and now there is the expectation linked to God's forgiveness of us that we would walk in forgiveness of others. But alas, we don't, right? We don't always extend grace. We don't always extend the same grace that we've received to others. And this is the sad, if not surprising, outcome of this parable. Look at verse 28. The same servant went out, found one of his fellow servants, owed him 100 denarii. That, numerically, just numerically, is 600,000 times less. Now, it's still a substantial debt. If you do your math, it comes out, people say, anywhere between $1,000 and $10,000. Substantial. But nothing compared to what was owed. Now one might expect the king's zillion dollar forgiveness would produce zillion dollar patience for this servant. But what happens instead? Verse 28. He seizing him, he began to choke him saying, pay what you owe me. So his fellow servant fell down and pleaded with him, have patience with me and I will repay you. Does that sound familiar? Didn't I just say that to my king? Did I forget? You'd think the guy would have heard his own words and the words now being spoken to him. Have patience with me and I will repay you. But no, verse 30, he refused and he went and put him in prison until he should pay the debt. Now let's just put them up, compare the actions of the merciful king and the unmerciful servant. First of all, the merciful king is owed a massive, insurmountable debt that could never be paid off. The servant is owed a significantly smaller debt that could be paid off. The merciful king is moved with compassion by the servant's plea. The unmerciful servant becomes violent at the servant's plea. The king cancels the entire debt, allowing the servant to go completely free. The servant throws his fellow servant into prison. Now one might ask, how inhumane can someone be? Is it possible that this parable can reflect real life? The awful truth is that it does. This parable points to the way that Christians do this very thing every time we do not forgive those who sin against us. Brethren, we are capable of the same behavior as the unmerciful servant. One of the reasons I believe the servant acted this way was that his debt was so astronomical so unquantifiable that it almost didn't seem real to him. The smaller debt that was owed to him, he could count that. It was real money. What's a zillion dollar debt? It's unreal. It's so huge, it's unreal. So when we ask the question, how can a Christian who knows that he's been forgiven so much, how could he then be so hard-hearted to not forgive those who sin against him? I think it's because we don't always understand the debt. We don't always understand how large our sin debt is, how much our sins have accrued. But then, when someone sins against us, it's a palpable sin. I could feel it. I could see it. I was hurt by that. There's a feeling of that. We need to pray that we don't act like the servant in this parable. that we be delivered from the temptation to become bitter and resentful and delivered over to that evil, that heartless attitude of unforgiveness. And one way we do this is by keeping the scripture's assessment of our sinful nature before us. We need to be understanding and meditating texts like Romans chapter 3 and Ephesians chapter 2 and remind ourselves that there is none righteous. We need to be reminded of our unrighteousness, our worthlessness, our lying, our cursing, that we're bitter murderers, no fear of God before our eyes. We're dead in our transgressions and sins. We're slaves to sin. We're without hope in the world apart from Christ. See, a biblical view of our sinful nature will keep the hopelessness of our debt in focus. So that as we understand the magnitude of that debt that we have been forgiven, we are truly grateful people, and thereby readily forgiving others who sin against us. Now, one of the questions that always comes up when we talk about forgiveness is, what about repentance? Is forgiveness contingent upon repentance? Someone sins against me, do I have to wait for them to come and repent to forgive them? To answer this question, we need to understand that there are two aspects of forgiveness. There is immediate forgiveness that's not dependent upon the person coming and repenting. It has nothing to do with the relationship between the people. It's something that's for the heart of the individual who was sinned against. So if someone sins against you, what do you do? That's the first, immediate forgiveness. And the second aspect is the restorative forgiveness that requires repentance for reconciliation. And I want to go to a few texts of Scripture to illustrate these two types of forgiveness. First is right here. Peter asks in verse 21, Lord, how often will I forgive my brother? Seven times? And Jesus says, no, 77 times. No mention of the person asking for forgiveness here. Now, turn to Luke 4. Luke 4 is the Lord's Prayer. I'm sorry, Luke 11, verse 4. Luke 11, verse 4, the Lord's Prayer. Jesus is teaching how to pray. He says, forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive, present tense, everyone who is, present tense, indebted to us. No mention of repentance. Present tense is used. We are called to forgive everyone who is presently indebted to us. The person who we forgive is still presently indebted, and even in that condition, even in that state, we are to forgive them. Now turn to Mark 11. verse 25 Mark 11 verse 25 in this text Jesus again is teaching about prayer and in Mark 11 verse 25 he says whenever you stand praying forgive if you have if if you have anything against anyone so that your father who is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses Again, no mention of prerequisite of repentance. This is about forgiving someone if you have something against them. Not that they're not coming to you, okay? Forgive. No mention of repentance, not even implied. In fact, the words anything and anyone would suggest that there is no condition to this kind of repentance. Take note, though, of the link between the horizontal forgiveness of others and the vertical forgiveness from God of our sins. He says, forgive them so that your Father in heaven would forgive you. This link of our forgiving of others to God's forgiving of us comes up often. It's in the Lord's prayer, forgive us our debts as we forgive those who are indebted to us. Colossians 3.13 says, bearing with one another if we have complaint against one another, forgiving each other as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. So this immediate forgiveness, this first aspect of forgiveness, is not dependent on a person's repentance. It's for your sake as the forgiver, as the one who was sinned against, that you would not become bitter. Then there is the restorative forgiveness. This requires repentance of the other person. It requires they come and ask for forgiveness. One example is right in Matthew chapter 18 where with this church discipline process that he goes to, the restoration is contingent upon what? the repentance of the person right if they don't repent they're treated like a tax gather so the restoration is dependent upon repentance let's look at another go to luke seventeen verses three and four luke seventeen verses three and four pay attention to yourselves if your brother sins rebuke him and if he repents forgive him and if he sins against you seven times in a day and turns to you seven times saying, I repent, you must forgive him. Well, talk about rough. The disciples say, what is the response? Increase our faith, right? We need a lot of faith to forgive someone the same sin against us seven times in a day. But what's the difference between these two aspects of forgiveness? Well, the second kind of forgiveness that requires repentance is unto restoration or reconciliation. This is the kind of forgiveness where the slate is wiped clean. You're never bringing up that sin again. You're forgiving and forgetting. Such forgiveness requires that person to ask for it. But when they do, it can't be withheld. In a sense, the first kind of forgiveness, dealing with it in your heart, sets the stage for you to be ready for the second kind of forgiveness. If you've freely forgiven that person from your heart already, even apart from them asking, it becomes much easier to extend full forgiveness and reconciliation when the person does come and ask for it. If instead we're holding on to anger or bitterness against the person and have not forgiven them in our heart first, then it becomes very difficult when they do come to us to ask forgiveness. It's so important, brothers and sisters, to guard your heart in this area. It could be very difficult for us to do so. It's so important. Guard your heart against this sin of bitterness, growing bitterness. And you know, I'll tell you where you have to guard it most carefully. It's right in your own household. Right in your own household. It's the ones who are closest to you. Those are the people whose sin you see most clearly. You see their sin, and those are the people who have the greater likelihood to hurt you as well. So I ask you, where have you been hurt by someone? By whom? Maybe it's your parents, maybe they abandoned you. Maybe you were abused as a child by a family member. Maybe you were bullied or discriminated against on a job because racism or sexism Maybe you were the victim of infidelity or divorce. Maybe someone deceived you. Maybe you were hurt by a misuse of authority in a church. Or maybe you felt rejected by the people in a church. Maybe you sat under a false teacher. Perhaps you were treated unfairly on your job. You were discriminated against because of your faith. Maybe you were the object of gossip or insults or name-calling or humiliation. Whatever it is, brother, sister, no matter how wicked the evil done against you, forgiveness is not an option for us. What about justice? Justice will be done. Leave that to God. Your present spiritual health and your future destiny depend on you extending forgiveness. If we're not prepared to readily forgive, bitterness will quickly be built up, the devil will get a foothold, walls will be developed between you, not only in that person, but every other relationship it'll affect. That's why Ephesians says to us, do not let the sun go down on your wrath. Do not give the devil a foothold. That is to say, deal with the offense in the day it happens. Don't let things lie. Don't let them fester. Be prepared to forgive and to forget. Now in verse 31, back in Matthew 18, verse 31, we see that this behavior of the unmerciful servant. He's blind to it, but it's obvious to those around him, which is interesting in the context, right, of all of Matthew 18. It's all about how to love one another in the church, in the corporate context, right? So there are people here who are observing this, and in verse 31 he says, when his fellow servants saw what had taken place, they were greatly distressed. And they went and reported to their master all that had taken place. That's just a little interesting aside in the parable, you know? An interesting fact put in there. The servant's behavior is a stumbling block to those other servants. And in the context of Matthew 18, we see where it's all about our responsibility to root out sin, to love one another by rooting out sin. Here it is, these servants see this and they report it to the master. Parallel to the church identifying sinful behavior and dealing with it. See, it's very easy at times for us to privatize sin and unforgiveness for that matter. It's just about me and them. It's just between, we're dealing with it. It's just between us. No. All of our sins are corporate sins. They affect the whole body. And we're called as a church to deal with sin. Then in verses 32 to 34, we arrive at the master's reaction to the unforgiving servant. Let's read this again. Verse 32. Then his master summoned him and said to him, you wicked servant, I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. And should now you have had mercy on your fellow servant as I had mercy on you? And in his anger, his master delivered him to the jailers until he should pay all his debt. So here we have this parable, okay, laid out now in three parts. Starts out, with judgment of an insurmountable debt, then it moves to grace and mercy and free forgiveness, and it ends with judgment again. In this part of the parable we need to give our attention to because it is subject to confusion and misunderstanding, especially in its application. But what's going on here is that there are two encounters with the king. These two encounters with the king. First, he has the debt, he pleads with him. Secondly, he's judged because he didn't forgive his fellow servant. In these two encounters, we see the tragic sequence which happens when a Christian first accepts the mercy and grace of the king, but then somewhere in time, somewhere between that acceptance of salvation and their death, somewhere between the cross and the chair, as it's been said, the cross and the judgment seat, this free expiation of debt, which is allegedly accepted, doesn't work itself out in the life, so it's accepted at some point in time, doesn't work itself out in the life, end up a hard-hearted, unforgiving person subject to judgment. See, brethren, we relish this point. We love the merciful King who forgives the debt without reservation. We rejoice in that gospel truth that our salvation is all of grace, none of us. Our salvation is apart from any condition of good works, including our forgiveness. And this is unquestionably the heart of God that we rejoice in, the heart of the king in this parable, to take pity, to freely forgive. However, what many people miss is that true gospel forgiveness, while requiring no prior conditions, must work itself out. There are expected results to true gospel forgiveness. And from this parable we learn that there are certain behaviors that are expected of a true Christian. If there's one thing we can say for sure that our salvation ought to produce in us, it's mercy, it's charitable forgiveness of others. There ought to be no such thing as an unmerciful Christian. As you say there are, I've met quite a few in my life. But sadly what's happening in some of these cases is that People are unmerciful. Unmerciful people all their lives. Heartless people. Someone comes to them, preaches the gospel to them. They say, I don't want to go to hell. They have this external repentance. They clean up their language a little bit. They stop drinking. They go to church. They stop smoking, whatever it is. They start to adopt the Christian language. But now they start to use this newfound truth in an uncharitable way to be merciless in their attitude toward others. And that mercy doesn't work itself out in their lives. And this is the person that text calls out. You need to ask yourself, am I the unmerciful servant? Have I received mercy and forgiveness for my sin only to turn around and use that same gospel that supposedly delivered me now to continue to be heartless in my attitude toward others? The gospel clearly expects, brothers and sisters, get this, if you get one thing, the gospel clearly expects God's forgiveness to transform our relational lives. And if it has not had that effect on your life, there is judgment coming. Now those who say, oh, this is just a parable, you can't take the analogy too far, I would agree with you, except for verse 35. Verse 35, Jesus makes it implicitly clear this applies to real people. Look at verse 35. He's talking about the anger of this king, right, in verse 24. And in his anger, the master delivered him to the jailers until he should pay all the debt. And he says, so, verse 35, in the same manner now, in the same manner, in the anger of the king in the parable who just judged his servant, in the same manner, he said, also, my heavenly father will do to every one of you if you do not forgive your brother from your heart. Clear. This is aimed at the professing Christian. And it speaks in terms of God's wrath and God's judgment. In fact, if you're paying attention throughout Matthew, all of Jesus' warnings in Matthew have been aimed at Christians. Right? Lord, Lord, depart from me, I never knew you. Go one by one through the warnings in Matthew, you'll find they are directed toward the professing believer. But someone objects, you're teaching justification by works, you're a heretic, pastor. No, it's not at all. The parable is not asking for some toilsome duty of us. It is simply seeking for the forgiveness that was received to be given. It calls a person naturally, it's a natural product of the new nature, the new heart to freely forgive, not perfectly by any means, but readily, being ready to forgive. Forgiveness is the default mechanism of the new heart. Unforgiveness comes from one place, a stony, hard heart. So upon regeneration then, the heart is removed, it's replaced with a heart of flesh, and that heart, by definition, is merciful. And so the number one mark of a Christian is mercy. This is not teaching salvation by works, this is talking about the marks of a Christian. It's talking about the vertical and the horizontal aspect of forgiveness. They are so tightly linked in the scripture, one necessitates the other. If I have been forgiven by God, I will forgive others. True conversion is a supernatural work of the Spirit of God that will result in the ongoing sanctification and the bearing of the fruit of mercy. And listen, this is the key here. How are you reacting when you hear this? How do you react to the warnings of Scripture? There are one or two ways. You who are born again, how do you respond to the warnings of Scripture? Two possibilities. First, indifference. I prayed a prayer with Billy Graham 25 years ago on television. You're preaching condemnation now to me. I can't accept that. I'm a Christian. I accepted the Lord. Warnings don't apply to me. I'm eternally secure. That's one. The other reaction, this is a warning. He's warning Christians. You take it seriously and God will use the warning as a motivation to bring about repentance and trust of Christ. If the sin of unforgiveness is prevalent in your life since apparently accepting Christ, it would behoove you to take this as a serious warning. It may very well be the indicator that you are not a Christian and that you remain in your sin. If you have a cavalier disregard of the warnings about judgment, it's the mark of a false convert. A true believer learns from the Scripture. We learn how to live with this tension between the assurance we have in Christ and the warnings. And brethren, you know me. Those of you who are here for many years, you know I love grace. I will fight for grace. I will fight for the doctrines of grace. But in the book of Grace, Galatians, the Apostle Paul, the Apostle of Grace, warns, God is not mocked. What a man reaps, he sows. And when it comes to forgiveness, if there is no reaping, if there is no working out of forgiveness toward others in your life, there was no sowing of forgiveness in your heart. And if that's the case, the only thing that you can anticipate is judgment. no matter what you profess you accepted in the past. But what about eternal security? Amen! I will fight to the death for eternal security. But with no responsibility to future judgment? No. Some versions of Calvinism have a very hard time with this parable because it presents an idea of a once-forgiven person falling away, losing that forgiveness. what happened to Perseverance of the Saints. Again, I love Perseverance of the Saints. I embrace Perseverance of the Saints. But every Perseverance text in Scripture should, ought to be preached with conviction and vigor, but never at the expense of ignoring the warnings of Scripture and preaching just as faithfully and with equal vigor. Matthew Henry captures this balance in his commentary. He says this, imitations enough we have in scripture of the forfeiture of pardons for caution to the presumptuous. And yet, we have security enough of the continuance of pardons for comfort to those who are sincere, that the presumptuous may fear, that the sincere may hope. But, again, you object. God's gifts are irrevocable. If He's given the gift of forgiveness, will He take it back? Yes. God's gifts are irrevocable. But I ask, has God given a heart of stone? Has God given a bitter heart that cannot forgive? Is that what He has given? And Matthew's Gospel has challenged us. This is the ninth time where we've dealt with, in one text or another, the demand for the Christian to forgive. This is the ninth and last time. If you've heard this nine times, do not harden your heart, because if you do, you are storing up wrath for yourself in the day of judgment. And so also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you if you do not forgive your brother from your heart. Now it's important as we close, as you see that verse 35, look at that verse 35 again. So also my Heavenly Father will do to every one of you, plural you, if you do not forgive your brother from your heart, in the Greek your words are plural, This is a call, remember the whole context of Matthew 18, this is a call for us for corporate application. We have a responsibility to one another. If you see bitterness or anger or unforgiveness reigning in the heart of your brother or sister, you are responsible to see that that gets rooted out, to come alongside of them, to help them see it. and root it out. There is no room for the old lying statement that we've all heard or said, I will forgive, but I'll never forget. That attitude puts you in danger of hellfire. You try to escape with sentiments like, oh, I'll love him, but I don't have to like him. You're deceiving yourself. Jesus commands here a deep, heartfelt change in your relationship with one another. And there's no way around this. We need to deal with this sin in our midst with the same kind of loving, compassionate severity that we see Jesus outlining in Matthew chapter 18. There ought to be no attitude among us, oh, you know, everyone's a sinner anyway, so who am I to judge? No. Instead, do everything, brother and sister in, we do everything in our power to follow Jesus' instruction in Matthew 18. By first, starting out at the beginning of the chapter, reducing the occasions to sin by not being stumbling blocks to one another. Secondly, seeking out like the shepherd who leaves the 99 to seek the one. Seeking out, helping or straying brothers and sisters, that requires that you know them. When was the last time you were over someone's house? When was the last time you visited someone in the church? How are you going to know if they're straying if you don't see them, if you don't look them in the face? Seeking out, confronting one another, and when necessary, disciplining sin in our company, and then fourthly, forgiving each other, even as Christ forgives us. These are the key factors of our vitality as a church, brothers and sisters. As Jesus closes this sermon on how to love one another in the church, this is our mission. It may surprise you, but we need this as much as we need to go out into the world and engage the world. We need to be sure that those in our pews are going to make it to heaven. This is our mission field within. A church that has integrity reaches out to the lost and is concerned with the mission field within, the in-reach. This is how we are to love one another in the body of Christ, by caring for each other to be sure that all is forgiven indeed. And I close with this admonition from Hebrews chapter 4, verses 12 to 14. Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart leading you to fall away from the living God. But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called today, that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. We have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end. We pray, amen.