“Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you” (Ephesians 4:32).
The verse above reminds me of Jesus’ parable of the unmerciful servant.
The servant owed an impossible debt to his king. Because he could not pay it, the king ordered that the servant, his wife, and his children, and everything he had, be sold to repay at least part of the debt. The servant begged for mercy, and astonishingly, the king canceled the debt.
Then the servant went out and found a fellow servant who owed him a pittance of money and assaulted him, demanding his money back. When his fellow servant begged for patience so he could pay it back, the unmerciful servant refused and had the man thrown in prison until he could pay the debt.
When the king heard about the unmerciful servant’s actions, he was outraged and asked why the first servant hadn’t shown mercy to the other man as the king had shown him mercy. The king then handed the unmerciful servant over to the jailers to be tortured until he paid back all he owed.
Jesus ended his parable with a sobering warning: “This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart” (Matthew 18:35).
The parable is shocking. Reading through it, we might think to ourselves, “How could that unmerciful servant not show mercy to his fellow servant? He had just been forgiven so much!”
But then my sinful heart is convicted by that very question. Time and time again, I fail to show mercy to others. I hold on to the wrongs done to me. I fail to forgive from the heart.
Connecting Jesus’ parable to Paul’s gospel imperative to the Christians in Ephesus (above), I realize how miserably I fail to be kind and compassionate to the people in my life. I fail to forgive others as I have been forgiven in Christ Jesus: freely and fully.
God, forgive me and help me forgive others from the heart!
While Jesus’ parable and the words of Ephesians 4:32 are convicting, they also point to the incredible comfort of what God has done for us in Christ Jesus.
You and I have been forgiven and set free from our sins, including our failure to forgive as we have been forgiven. The impossible debt we could never pay has been wiped away—paid in full by our Savior Jesus with his innocent blood shed for us.
God’s forgiveness is life-changing! It puts everything into perspective, including our relationships with other people and how we interact with them—especially when they’ve wronged us.
The more we focus on our Savior Jesus and what he has done for us in his Word and sacraments, the more we are motivated and empowered to reflect his love to the people in our lives—to be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ Jesus God forgave us.
Conflict is bound to happen in life. A Heart at Peace: Biblical Strategies for Christians in Conflict offers you a biblical blueprint for resolving conflict and breaking down the hostility that can cause you so much tension and stress.
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Alex Brown is the marketing and content copywriter at Northwestern Publishing House and a 2023 graduate of Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary with a Master of Divinity degree. He enjoys reading, writing, and spending time in God’s creation with his family.
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