Forgive Us Our Debts

Order of Service

• Hymn — All Praise to God Who Reigns Above
• Call to Worship — Psalm 107:1-3, 8
• Hymn — All Praise to God Who Reigns Above
• Prayer of Invocation
• Confession of Faith — Heidelberg Catechism, Q&A on the Fifth Petition
• Scripture Reading — Luke 8:40-56
• Hymn — Arise, My Soul, Arise
• Pastoral Prayer
• Offering
• Prayer of Dedication
• Hymn — God, Be Merciful to Me
• Sermon
• Hymn — And Can It Be That I Should Gain
• Benediction

Sermon Title: Forgive Us Our Debts

Scripture: Matthew 18:21-35

I. The Debt of God's Glory Fulfilled

• A. Sin is defined in Romans 3:23 as falling short of the glory of God — the Hebrew word for sin means "to miss the mark."

  1. God graciously condescends through his law so that creatures might glorify him through obedience.
  2. The Westminster Confession notes that the creature could never enjoy God as reward apart from God's voluntary condescension by covenant.

• B. Adam broke the law and humanity fell short of God's glory, incurring a debt that must be paid.

• C. Christ at the cross hits the mark of God's glory through perfect, active obedience all the way to death.

  1. In John 12:23 Jesus says, "The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified."
  2. In John 17:1 he prays, "Glorify your Son, that the Son may glorify you."
  3. As in Galatians 6:14, believers glory not in their own righteousness but in the cross of Christ.

• D. We do not approach God with a payment plan but as those to whom God has come down and written on the certificate: Tetelestai — "It is finished."

II. The Debt of God's Justice Satisfied

• A. As sinners we owe God a double debt: the obedience owed to his law, and the penalty for breaking it — illustrated by the demand of Madoff's victims for both full restitution and full legal punishment.

• B. Christ's active obedience satisfies the first debt.

  1. Throughout his life Christ honored the Father through positive conformity to the law of God.
  2. He was circumcised on the eighth day, obligated under the law of Moses, and lived only to do the Father's will.

• C. Christ's passive obedience satisfies the second debt.

  1. Like Esther's moment in Esther 4, Christ came to the kingdom "for such a time as this" — not to be transported to heaven like Enoch or Elijah, but to bear the penalty of death.
  2. His active obedience is putting money in the bank; his passive obedience on the cross is cashing the check — the double payment for the double debt.
  3. As 1 Corinthians 15:45 declares, the last Adam became a life-giving spirit, reversing what the first Adam's disobedience brought.

• D. Tetelestai — "It is finished" — is a commercial term in the Greek perfect tense: an action completed in the past with ongoing and permanent effect; the debt to God's justice is paid in full, now and forever.

III. The Love of God for Neighbor Realized

• A. The parable of the unforgiving servant in Matthew 18:21-35 functions as a negative commentary on the fifth petition: the servant forgiven 10,000 talents (roughly 200,000 years' wages) refuses to forgive a fellow servant a minuscule 100 denarii.

• B. The key phrase is verse 35: forgiveness must come "from your heart" — not a mechanical or grudging utterance but a genuine transformation wrought by grace.

  1. True forgiveness flows from a heart softened by the Spirit at the foot of the cross, not from a payment-plan mentality.
  2. If love of neighbor is motivated by chipping away at personal debt, the neighbor becomes merely a means of self-justification and the second table of the law cannot be truly fulfilled.

• C. Tetelestai liberates us to love freely.

  1. Justified fully in Christ's blood, both eyes are freed to rest on the neighbor rather than on self.
  2. Christ on the cross perfectly displays love of neighbor — he did not hang there to pay his own debt but ours, fulfilling the second table of the law out of pure love.
  3. We weep with those who weep, keep short accounts, and forgive seventy times seven not to ascend the mountain of glory but because the Son of God has descended to us and declared, "You are forgiven."

• D. The call to the congregation: daily reckon your full justification in the blood of Christ, so that you are liberated from the law's condemnation and free to love for the sake of Christ's love — "Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors."