X Equals Infinity

²¹ Then Peter came to Him and said, “Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? Up to seven times?”

²² Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven. Matthew 18: 21-22 (NKJV)

This is from the parable of the “UNMERCIFUL” Servant.

Oddly, different translations of the Bible do that math in ways that gets varying answers.

New International Version says, “seventy-seven times.”

King James and the New King James Version say, “seventy times seven” (That’d be 490 times) So it goes with The Message, the American Standard Version, The Living Bible, and many, many more versions. The difference in the math is that Jesus could have been quoting from the Hebrew or the Greek translation referencing a statement by Lamech that we can find in Genesis 4:24.

Some folks do get hung up on the difference in the math, but the moral of the story is the same, as it relates to the Unmerciful Servant. Read below from The Message:

^23-25 “The kingdom of God is like a king who decided to square accounts with his servants. As he got under way, one servant was brought before him who had run up a debt of a hundred thousand dollars. He couldn’t pay up, so the king ordered the man, along with his wife, children, and goods, to be auctioned off at the slave market.

^26-27 “The poor wretch threw himself at the king’s feet and begged, ‘Give me a chance and I’ll pay it all back.’ Touched by his plea, the king let him off, erasing the debt.

²⁸ “The servant was no sooner out of the room when he came upon one of his fellow servants who owed him ten dollars. He seized him by the throat and demanded, ‘Pay up.” Now!’

^29-31 “The poor wretch threw himself down and begged, ‘Give me a chance and I’ll pay it all back.’ But he wouldn’t do it. He had him arrested and put in jail until the debt was paid. When the other servants saw this going on, they were outraged and brought a detailed report to the king.

^32-35 “The king summoned the man and said, ‘You evil servant! I forgave your entire debt when you begged me for mercy. Shouldn’t you be compelled to be merciful to your fellow servant who asked for mercy?’ The king was furious and put the screws to the man until he paid back his entire debt. And that’s exactly what my Father in heaven is going to do to each one of you who doesn’t forgive unconditionally.

I heard a preacher say it this way, “Once you’ve forgiven 70 times or 490 times … what’s one more time?” We are directed to “forgive as we have been forgiven.”  Yes?

OH, BUT IT IS SO DIFFICULT. (from a “peopleness” perspective)

We have all heard the phrase “forgive and forget” … and while we can say that phrase over and over, and we can try with all we have to forgive; the forgetting part is like a thorn in the flesh that festers now and then.

I once wrote a song titled, “It’s Easy to Remember When You’re Trying to Forget.” Here is the first line:
“The past can surely drag you down, when you’re trying to get up. You want to shake that dusty ground, but your feet seem to be stuck.” 

Do those words from my song ring true for you? They sure do for me.

Apostle Paul writes to the Romans in chapter 12:19, The Message,

“Don’t hit back; discover beauty in everyone. If you’ve got it in you, get along with everybody. Don’t insist on getting even; that’s not for you to do. “I’ll do the judging,” says God. “I’ll take care of it.”

Now I’ve used this verse and heard others use it to … with some degree of attitude like, “God’s gonna get him. I don’t have to.”  Which is not exactly the intent of the verse.

Over in Hebrews there’s a reference to this with a bit more bite.

Hebrews 10 The Message.

^26-31 If we give up and turn our backs on all we’ve learned, all we’ve been given, all the truth we now know, we repudiate Christ’s sacrifice and are left on our own to face the Judgment—and a mighty fierce judgment it will be! If the penalty for breaking the law of Moses is physical death, what do you think will happen if you turn on God’s Son, spit on the sacrifice that made you whole, and insult this most gracious Spirit? This is no light matter. God has warned us that he’ll hold us to account and make us pay. He was quite explicit: “Vengeance is mine, and I won’t overlook a thing” and “God will judge his people.” Nobody’s getting by with anything, believe me.

So, “as a believer” and “follower of Jesus,” one is expected to understand and practice the “algebra” of forgiveness. We are supposed to forgive to the “nth” degree.

Does the Bible say anything about the “forgetting” though?

While I have read and heard some “well meaning saints and scholars” say that the Bible only tells us to forgive, that it does not say anything about forgetting. But that’s not true.

In Psalm 103:12, David writes, “As far as the east is from the west,
So far has He removed our wrongdoings from us.”  And David should know, right?

In Isaiah 43:18-19, we are told, “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing!  Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland.”

In Job 17:9, “The righteous keep moving forward, and those with clean hands become stronger and stronger.” 

Paul writes to the Philippians in chapter 3:13-14,“Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.”

So yes, forgetting is nearly as important as forgiving. And yes, both are very difficult. I don’t think it is humanly possible without God’s help, and again, “that willingness to be willing.”  (the want to)

I never liked math. I especially hated algebra when I was in school.  I thought, “when will I ever need to know what X equals.”  The answer to that is “every day!”  When I was in college (at the age of forty-four and having a good deal of life experience behind me), I realized just how wonderfully satisfying “solving for X” can be. One day, when it all clicked, I believe I actually “saw God’s Hand” in the creative artwork of algebra!

I’m sure my high school algebra teacher would get a good kick out of that epiphany.

So when it comes to the math involved in forgiveness, in God’s way, X = ∞.