Take the First Step
Matthew 18:10-20[1]
As is too often the case with men, my most difficult
relationship was with my father, Harold Brehm, who passed away in May. For me,
it seemed that no matter how hard I tried to do my best, it was never good enough.
It’s a dilemma I’ve heard from other men and women regarding their
relationships with their parents. I haven’t kept it secret that I was never
close to my parents. That happens. My case was not simply one of normal
“tension” between parents and children. There’s a lot I could say about that,
but I choose not to out of respect for them. I will say this, the distance I
kept from my father was not without cause. If I told the whole story, I’m quite
sure some of you might be shocked. I’ve never spoken of this in a sermon. I
refrained from doing so while he was alive out of respect for him. But now that
he’s in the presence of Christ, where he’s whole and healed, I feel that I can
tell my story.
I realized many years ago that it was up to me to forgive
my father. I’m not ashamed to admit the process took decades. It began when I
was a young man. I realized that holding on to bitterness toward my father was
hurting me and my relationships. But it’s one thing to recognize the need for
forgiveness. It’s another thing to actually forgive. I continued to take steps
toward that goal over the years as I grew in my understanding of myself, and in
my understanding of my father. I’m deeply grateful that the process led to my
ability to fully forgive my father about five years ago or so. To be sure, he
never apologized or asked for forgiveness. And I never confronted him for what
he had done. I didn’t think it would do any good. Nevertheless, I am grateful to
God for giving me the ability to let him be who was, flaws and all, and to love
him despite what had happened.
It may be hard to see this, but I believe our Gospel lesson
is about forgiveness. I think the reason why it may be difficult to see this is
because the lesson outlines a procedure for “admonishing” or “rebuking” another
person may seem impractical to us. As the basis for the practice of
“excommunication” in its various forms, our lesson for today seems to be at
odds with what we know of Jesus. These verses have been used to justify
everything from excluding people from the Lord’s Supper to completely shunning
them. I would say when Christians cut off someone else in the name of Jesus, we’ve
missed something. Our lives are meant to be directed toward loving God and
loving others.
I think Matthew was aware of this problem. I think we see
this in the way Matthew has arranged Jesus’ teaching in this chapter. We have
to take Matthew chapter 18 as a whole. When we do, we find that Matthew himself
has “couched” this difficult passage about admonishing others in the context of
humility, compassion, and forgiveness. We who follow Jesus are called to become
“humble like a child” (Mt 18:4). We’re called to practice concern for the
“little ones” by taking care that we not cause anyone to “stumble” (Mt 18:6).
We’re reminded that God does not look down on any of his “sheep” who may have
“gone astray” (Mt 18:10-14). And we’re called to forgive one another not seven
times but “seventy-seven times” or as some translations render it, “seventy
times seven” (Mt 18:22). Whatever the situation was behind this procedure for
admonishing others, it was meant to be carried out with humility, compassion,
and forgiveness.
We can see a similar situation with the Apostle Paul, where
the question of eating meat was one that caused Gentile converts to “stumble.”
In response, Paul actually urged both sides to take the first step: if you’re
the one who is offended, he asks, “who are you to judge”? The idea is that
rather than holding a grudge or harboring bitterness, we’re to take the first
step toward resolving the problem. And if you’re the one who has offended
another, he urges us to “never put a stumbling block or hindrance” in the way
of another (Rom 14:13). Paul himself insisted that if he did anything to give
offense to anyone, he was going to take the first step by avoiding anything
that might harm others (1 Cor 8:13). The basic principle here was one of
humility, compassion, and forgiveness for others.
Jesus said something similar in the Sermon on the Mount. He
said that if we come to worship and remember that we have done something to
offend someone, we must first be reconciled before we can rightly worship God
(Mt 5:23-24). Think about it: how can we truly worship God while we’re
harboring bitterness or a grudge against someone? It just doesn’t work. Jesus
may have been following the lead of some of the Old Testament prophets here,
like Isaiah or Jeremiah. That we cannot truly worship God without making things
right with the people in our lives is a theme that they emphasized. And Jesus
also insisted that we take the first step toward making things right.
I think Matthew knew what he was doing when he based the
step-by-step process for setting things right on humility, compassion, and
forgiveness. I think he had some keen insight into who we are as human beings. Humility
enables us to look at ourselves and recognize that my attitude or my actions
may be the problem, not the other person. That’s not something that comes
easily. Compassion enables us to see things through the perspective of those
with whom we may be at odds. It also enables us to care about them as people,
and so to care about their wellbeing. Forgiveness enables us to drop any sense
that we may feel we have a right to judge or to blame the other person. And
when we take the first step to make things right prayerfully, we can hardly do
so without a change of heart from one of blame and bitterness to one of
humility, compassion and forgiveness.[2]
I’m not going to pretend that the process of healing broken
relationships is one that can be undertaken lightly or carried out easily. The
deeper the hurt, the more work it’s going to take from us. It took me decades
to forgive my father. There were times when I wasn’t sure I was ever going to
be able to get there. The key for me was that I continued to pray, and I
continued to try to see him through eyes of compassion. It wasn’t easy, and it
didn’t happen quickly, but I can honestly say that I’m grateful for all the
many “first steps” that God helped me to take over the years. For me, forgiving
my father was crucial to my ability to “live and breathe a spirit of
forgiveness”[3] toward
everyone, which I would say is at the heart of following Jesus.
[1] © 2023 Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Alan Brehm PhD on 9/10/2023 for
Hickman Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE.
[2] Ulrich Luz, A Commentary on Matthew 8-20, 458. He reasons that we can hardly
“pray” for the punishment of offenders, but rather for their salvation and
restoration to the community!
[3] W.
D. Davies and Dale C. Allison, Matthew 8-18.
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