Jacob Creighton: Hey, everybody. Welcome back to the Formed Podcast Episode five. We're excited to be here again. We're here. Got a Steelers hat on. Let's go still. I've got my cabs. Had McCarthy Greenfield native. That's right. It's coach. It's game time, baby. Game time. We're pumped about it in Greenfield. Yeah, we are. Greenfield is bumping. We are. We're bumping. We don't know where Greenfield is. Greenfield is a neighborhood in Pittsburgh of about, eight thousand people. Yep. And that's where Mike McCarthy was born and raised. And now he is the Coach whereas everybody in Greenfield calls him Mike Mikey Mikey Yeah, we're excited but we might be the only like little subsection of Pittsburgh that's like really every life idea But now Mike if you're listening welcome. Yeah, we're glad you're here Now this episode we're gonna be talking about being formed for redemptive relationships and where we're coming from where we're looking at it is Matthew 18 21 through 35 so if you got a Bible encourage you to open it to that story so you can kind of track where we're tracking yeah but this is the parable of the unmerciful servant Matthew 18 Matthew 18 one of my favorite parables is it yeah one of my I don't know that you like choking people that owe you money yeah no I think one of my favorites because it has impacted me because I like love the story yeah Question to start us. Okay, before we jump in. Yeah, what is a piece of advice that you once received? when you were younger that you wish you would have listened to or Or trying to listen to your trying to listen. I'm trying to embody The the reminder that I got from a lot of my teachers where they said with their probably handle my knee or on my shoulder while I'm talking in class where they said, Chris, you have two ears and one mouth for a reason. That I should listen twice as much as I talk. Okay, it is It is by God's mercy that I've become a pastor. Okay. Yeah, so For this episode, we're just gonna let you sit there. We're gonna mute your microphone. Yeah, I'm just gonna just listen Yeah, listen to the comments in the comment section where they're probably saying stop talking My mom my mom tells a funny story where she had to write like a thousand times This is where the apple doesn't fall far from the tree My mom would say, yeah, my teacher would catch me talking in class and I'd have to write. Even a fish wouldn't get called if it kept its mouth shut. It's a generational problem in my house. All right. Now have two daughters that probably are guilty too. What was something? Well, I don't have that problem. I've taken to heart every piece of advice I've ever given. I'm just kidding. Crazy please call. ⁓ No, that's a joke. That's a joke ⁓ This maybe doesn't count but you know, obviously I should have invested in Bitcoin a lot sooner you yeah, you know ⁓ Yeah, I in run all of them all of them being a lot better ⁓ Yeah, we're looking at Matthew 18 changing gears here changing gears Kind of summarize the story for us a little bit. So Matthew 18, 21 through 35, Peter asked this question, Jesus, being the impulsive person that he is. This is the Chris standard version when we do this. this is Chris standard. So don't take that. You need to go read it for yourself. he's like, Jesus, how many times I got to forgive my neighbor? Seven times enough. And he's kind of quoting the law there. And Jesus is like, Peter. And Jesus says this exorbitant number of either, depending on what your translation is, it's either 77 or seven times 70 or 70 times seven, whatever it is, it is, it's a lot. Like you got to do it. And Peter is not just looking to forgive an unlimited amount of times. He wants to figure out what the eighth time is so he can really drop the hammer. then Peter, and Jesus knows this. So he tells this story of a man who is again, Jesus being the great storyteller that is that he uses this like crazy analogy to basically say there's this man that owes the king a billion dollars and the king wants to settle the accounts with his people. This merciful king and the man is like he has a billion dollars. There's no way that in Bitcoin depends on the day. ⁓ I owes a billion dollars. He's like, ⁓ ⁓ Mighty King, be patient with me, have mercy on me. And the King has mercy on him and forgives him a billions or billion or however much, a lot of money. And then we see the man, but it says, but the man went out and found someone who owed him a hundred silver coins. We're talking about fractions of percents of the billion dollars that he was just forgiven. And he ends up Not like confronting the guy, not like saying, hey man, you kind of hooked me up. My family just got forgiven all this, but I kind of need some money. No, he rolls up to this servant and starts choking him and tells him, you got to pay up now or I'm throwing you in prison. And so the guy is using the same language, be patient with me, have mercy on me. And the unmerciful servant throws him in prison and it outrages the other people. And then You know, Jesus uses it to say we should forgive people or treat people out of our hearts, out of the forgiveness that we have received. It's kind how he closes ⁓ it out. it's a good one. Yeah, so obviously in Matthew 18, we can see that contrast between how he responds to the king forgiving him and then how he goes and treats his debtor. And so what about that? Why do you think Jesus highlights that contrast so strongly? Yeah, I think there's a lot of ways you can kind of slice this up. I think as we're talking about being formed for dent of relationships, I think you see this merciful, powerful, almighty King. Kings aren't known for mercy. They're known for demands. They're known for driving you to the point of basically failure so they can get what they need to be successful. It's not about the people being successful, it's about the king being elevated and successful. But here this king, this mighty person is merciful, is patient, is kind, is gentle, is forgiving. And then we see this non-powerful servant that has just been forgiven, not be merciful, not be forgiving, not be caring, not be gentle, not be kind, not even look at his fellow countryman as if he's a man. It's like he's choking him like he's an animal or something. And that's not even appropriate. So I think Jesus is just highlighting these like stark differences here of how the king handles himself when he has the opportunity to be merciful and when this man handles himself when he has a chance to be merciful. Yeah, that's good. Why do you think that is? Why do you think it's so easy for people who have received such great mercy from the king to then when they turn around and extend grace to countrymen, they fall on their face and can't do it. Why is that? Yeah, I think that that I think we lose sight of of what was done for us. And of course, you know, Jesus is trying to point to us here the forgiveness that we receive from the Father, our Almighty, Holy, all powerful, all knowing, eternal God who spoke something out of nothing as the Bible tells us that he did. Forgives us. a massive debt. An unpayable amount. Yeah, an unpayable amount in our sin and the fact that we cannot reflect God in our thoughts, actions, and being. And so, He's painting that picture and trying to make it clear that here, this is what He's doing for us. This is what He's doing for normal people who in some ways want to elevate ourselves to like a godly power. You know, I can't even pass a science test, you know, and I'm struggling, you know, and I want to elevate myself to this God aspect. And so I think he's trying to show us here, hey, something massive happened with the King forgiving. But this is what our typical behavior is. We have this massive problem where now you ask why, why do we do that? And I think it goes back and we have to acknowledge this. It's fascinating if you read the passage, which again, I encourage you to go do that, Matthew 18 verses 21 to 25, but between verses 27 and 28 is where that change happens. The man is forgiven. ⁓ And then he goes out and almost the next thing that he does is he goes and chokes a man for his payment of a hundred coins where he was just forgiven a billion. And I think there's this tension that we have to hold between where we receive forgiveness and then what our response is, especially towards other people. And we see kindness and patience and gentleness and mercy from God. We don't see that from the man. And so he's highlighting that I think to say like, hey, look in the mirror here. This could be you. Yeah. Yeah. What I love about it is clearly the parable is laying out an example with money. It's finances. It's like, it's a, we can understand that. But it's just face value. I think that Example and where it's a parable is that that that goes across the board for you anyway in which The the massive amount of debt that we've been forgiven from the father. Yeah, and how that plays out into any type of unforgiveness. Yeah With anyone who has some sort of debt whether that's financial or or whatever. I don't think it... I think that's where we have to be careful interpreting Scripture. This is a, I think, descriptive passage that Christ is using here. It's a parable. It's not a prescriptive where it's prescribing that, well, anyone that owes you money, you must forgive instantly. there's pieces and parts there and we got to be careful. But yeah, it's implying this debt that we kind of have with each other. Yeah. I say that to say you might be like reading the parable and be like, well, No, doesn't mean anything. Like, yeah, I'm off the hook for this. But, ⁓ you know, what about someone who has wronged you or someone who exactly it could be within your own family, within the church, outside of the church? You know, how do you how do you respond then in the situations? ⁓ Well, I mean, how do we respond? I think I mean, it just for me is I was like sitting in this. It was not even the big things for me. For me, it was when I was. ⁓ going to Starbucks this morning to meet my D group and the lady in front of me was taking too long to turn. And I was like, I was almost not becoming enraged per se, but there was a little piece in my heart that was like, can we make this left turn here, please? Let's go. And I it's like, it's so simple. like, I'm like wanting to honk my horn and like, do I am I going to roll the window down and curse out the window? Is that appropriate here? Like, no. Well, and I think culture says, well, Yeah, she's got to turn faster. Yeah. Yeah. You know, you're right, Chris. We are conformed by the world. You were right. And how many instances are like that where we're wronged and, know, the other person's wrong. Yeah, it's it's their debt to pay. That's the problem is I wasn't even wrong. I know. But I was impatient and not ever taking into consideration the patience that I was given. Like that man says the man, the unforgett, the unmerciful servant says, be patient with me. God has been patient with me. Yeah, and here I don't know this woman. Yeah And that's what the parable is pointing out. Yes that there's something in our hearts that immediately we react and say, yeah, they owe us Yeah, they owe us. Yeah, or it's their problem if they deserve they need to to function in my realm and my world Yeah Yeah, if someone listening to this recognizes that they've received forgiveness, but they haven't fully embodied it yet Which maybe is all of us yeah, this is all of us yes What are some what are some practical and spiritual ways that they can begin to allow that forgiveness? To form their relationships yeah so I mean I think we have to start with a experiential dive into what we have received as followers of Jesus. Like, I'm not talking, I think so often we go here as like, hey, we're going to take these almost like theological courses and we're going to be able to name all the pieces and parts of what we receive at salvation and justification and glorification and vivification. And we go through all these like big words and it's like, ⁓ I can say all these things. But do we like ever take a chance to sit and not put our sin record per se in front of us to shame us or give us guilt or scare us as we talked about in the last episode, but do we ever consider, I was a billionaire debtor. Like I was massively in debt. And I go before the throne of the King of the world, the universe that spoke all that we know into existence. And he said, you're forgiven. Yeah. Do you know how much you have been forgiven? Yeah. And I guess sit in that and these things start to well up in me when I do that, when I sit in that stillness we talked about a few episodes ago. man, I sit there and I I wrestle with that and then I hear the words, you are forgiven. Like, so I start there and then as I start to really like go deeper and deeper into the acknowledgement, the experiential, like, what does that mean when I'm forgiven? How does it wash over me? What is it? What fears does it remove? What shame does it remove? What guilt does it remove? What attitude does it change? What does patience tangibly feel like or kindness from a powerful God feel like? And you then kind of going back like we'll talk about in Galatians 5, 1 for freedom. started to experience freedom. Well, then what does it do? Well, then I turn around and I see what God has given me and I turn around and I look at my fellow humans. And I'm like, what can I hold against? What can I hold against them? I was forgiven billions. Can't hold against a slow left turn. Yeah, I can't hold against a it's hard for me to hold a wound against someone Yeah, I think the biggest challenge from this parable to maybe not the biggest challenge but a big challenge from this parable is You know, we see the stark contrast from like you were forgiven this much and then here's a Small little thing that you're not even willing to forgive. Yeah, but like there's a whole spectrum of things. ⁓ yeah. In between those. yeah, we might have been done wrong minorly. Yeah. We also might have been really done wrong. Yeah, absolutely. You know, absolutely. I... Forgiveness is still the same. Yeah, forgiveness is same. And I would say too, I just as like an asterisk here, this is not saying that you... Like put yourself back into maybe a toxic environment or an abusive relationship. That is not what we're saying here. I think we have to acknowledge that. But I do think, man, there's, I mean, there's times I've talked to a lot of people about maybe their family of origin. And there's a lot of times where as followers of Jesus, as we kind of sit and realize what we are forgiven of, we come to terms and we give forgiveness without blaming others. and we simply acknowledged that, there maybe was this misstep or there was this thing that happened and we're able to open our hands and say, you know what, I'm going to give forgiveness. I'm going to allow the Lord in this to protect me and extend His kindness and grace and mercy towards me because there's a chance that whatever that person is, whatever they did, they're not going to. And so then I'm experiencing the freedom that comes from that. Well, there's a chance with the hands open for a redemptive relationship, even your feelings towards that person. ⁓ But man, I think about so many minor wrongs. I I hear stories in my neighborhood of this person putting a fence up and basically now their grandkids hate each other. And it's like, what? mean, these are generational things. ⁓ sometimes come and can't even trace back the origin. Yeah. Yeah. And so some of it is that we never acknowledge the forgiveness that we have received. Therefore, we cannot fully extend forgiveness. can't restore this relationship. We can't redeem this relationship. But I mean, you think about what Christ did for us. I mean, He came to live a perfect life for a bunch of people that could not earn their way to Him. And man, he was kind, he was patient, and he was loving, and he was merciful, and he was righteous, and he was ⁓ gracious towards people, unmerited favor he poured out to the least of these. And even to the ones that hated him, the scribes and the Pharisees that essentially ended up hanging him on the cross per se, or going through the process to do that, he even extended mercy to them on multiple occasions. And it's just overwhelming to think, man, if we fully embody the forgiveness that we're given, then we turn around and we now, because we know how gracious God has been with us, I can be gracious to someone else. Because we know how generous God has been to us, I can be generous to someone else. I can be merciful because I've received mercy, I can give mercy. And man, that stuff starts to form our heart, it can't help but come out. I think there will be, think if some of our listeners were to just take a few moments to do this, pause it, do it. I have a feeling, because I've experienced this myself, I'm sure you have Jacob, ⁓ that it doesn't take long. It's like, so I'm just warning you, if there's someone you don't want to forgive, don't do this, okay? Don't actually consider the forgiveness that you've received from God. Yeah. But if there's someone or even just- It doesn't take long to like start to feel the rub there. Yeah. If someone moves your parking chair, you don't have to freeze their car. Yeah, so if you don't know what a parking chair is look it up if you're not from Pittsburgh people take that seriously Yeah, that's some serious ⁓ Yeah, there was Yeah a funny Post made about some shoveling that happened on my street. Yeah, somebody was bad Yeah, they were mad because people shoveled the street people on my street shoveled our street. Yeah, it's a hill Yeah, and the plows not come in. Yeah, but people on a nice sheet were mad. We're mad That ours got plowed. They should consider the forgiveness they've received. So it's okay. It's all right. So yeah, this is a humbling thing. This is something that I've had to sit in a lot, a lot, especially in patience, understanding the patience that I'm giving from God, not just knowing about the patience, thinking about the patience, but actually sitting and attempting to experience what it looks like for patients to wash over me from God. Because once it does that then it pours out onto my kids it pours out onto Rachel it pours out onto People at the church people in the neighborhood. Yeah So, yeah embodying forgiveness. Yeah Things about redemptive relationships good Yeah, he means relationships So that's that's all we got today, but thank you for joining us Like I said last week join us in like in the comments go ahead and leave a comment or a question. We'd love to answer it. Yeah, and Try to that. I'd love that be great. See some interaction start looping in some questions on this podcast. That'd be great So thanks for joining us. We'll see you next time on the formed podcast