“Jesus said to him, “I tell you not seven times, but seventy times that. See, the Reign of Heaven is like a ruler who wanted to settle up with his servants. But when starting to settle up, one of his debtors who owed ten thousand talents was brought to him” (Matthew 18:22-24).
The scripture above comes after Peter asks Jesus about forgiveness. How many times should I forgive someone, he says, seven? If someone keeps on hurting me, stealing from me, betraying me, after seven times I can say enough, right?
Jesus, of course, tells a story. And it’s a wild one. There’s a ruler who decides to settle up all his debts. Starting at the top, he gets the guy who owes him the most. And he owes a lot, I mean an absolutely obscene amount of money. This isn’t thousands or even hundreds of thousands of dollars. This guy is in debt up to his and his whole family’s eyeballs.
I’ve read that the sum of ten thousand talents equals up to around three-to-six billion of today’s dollars. That probably works for what Jesus is trying to get across. This guy’s taken some bad bets, gotten involved in some bum deals, and there is no way he can ever hope to pay this money back. There’s not enough time left in his or even in his and his children’s lives to work off all that money.
In line with Peter’s question, Jesus’ story of debts is interpreted as an example of God’s abundant grace. The man whose debts are forgiven is all of us. God is the ruler who wipes that spiritual debt away. But, Jesus isn’t talking just about spiritual things.
Peter’s question, as mentioned, is about what is enough. Is it enough if I forgive someone seven times? Is that when I can say, no more? Is that when I can say there’s nothing left, the cupboard is bare? At what point does it run out?
In response, Jesus gives us an almost unbelievable example. This ruler has enough to take a billion-dollar write off. He can forgive this amount; because, his account balance shows he has such an abundance that he can afford to give away the excess.
The temptation here is to say that the ruler is God, but that’s not the story. The story is about a ruler, a boss, a CEO who’s as human as you and I. This is not the spiritual world but the very concrete and real one, the one Jesus talked about throughout his life. It’s a world, a reality that that runs contrary to the one we know: one where peacemakers and the poor and the hungry are blessed. It’s a reality where there is always enough.
Peter is like you and me, he’s struggling to see beyond the reality that appears to be all around him. He understands things as finite—they run out. We have to fill up our storehouses just as tight as we can; because, we don’t ever know when we might run out.
Jesus is saying, there’s enough. But, we have to act like it. We have to believe that scarcity is something humans create; because, we don’t think we have enough.
But we do. How much?
At least seventy-times more than we thought.