The Debt [part 2]

You would think that the pardoned man would have left the king's presence a different man...wouldn't you?

He had just be forgiven a debt [due to neglect and criminal dishonesty] that he could have never repaid...a debt that would have forever plagued, not only his life, but his families.

But now the weight was gone...the king had paid the debt...he was free...

...and what was the first thing he did, after he finished dancing and singing in the streets?

We are told that he went out and "found"...actually looked for...a fellow servant who owed him money...someone who owed him a debt.

Here is the test...did the servant really understand his kings love and grace and mercy?

Was he looking for his fellow servant to tell him that he too was pardoned...that full forgiveness was being given to him?

NO!

He grabbed his fellow servant and began to pound him, choke him...and demanded payment!

The fellow servant pleaded for mercy...pleaded for time to be able to pay back the debt [note, that the debt was an substantial amount, 100 denarii was worth around three and a half months wages...that is a considerable ouch...even though it was nothing in comparison to the 10,000 talents.

No mercy was shown.

Other servants of the kingdom saw this horrible ordeal and went and told the king...it was Israels equivalent to "America's Most Wanted"

The King was outraged and had the first servant brought back in to His presence...this time mercy is no where to be found.

The servant is again judged by his own merciless standard...and is giving a life sentence for his debt...

The moral of the lesson? When you truly receive God's pardon and God's mercy, you will begin to give pardon and mercy.

There are many people who enter covenant with God, profess to trust Jesus, are baptized, are members of the church...and they never really believe the covenant that they entered.

They don't really believe that God pardoned them graciously...freely...they are like the servant in the story...who in the back of his head thought that real pardon had to be earned...it had to be worked off by the one who owed it.

So these people live outward religious lives...they go through the Christian motions...but they are rigid people who are bitter, hold grudges...and show no mercy to those who really hurt them and sin against them.

On the day of Judgment, if these people do not repent of their unbelief and bitterness, they will not receive the pardon that God's covenant offers...because that pardon comes through faith...and they show by their lack of a changed life that faith is absent from their lives.