Jesus makes a huge assumption. He assumes that we have been forgiven many times and a great amount. That’s why, in Matthew 18:23-35, a guy gets into huge trouble, I mean huge trouble, for holding a colleague accountable for a debt.

Let’s build the story.

Man A owes man B some money. A should pay B back.

B asks A for the money. That’s an appropriate thing to do.

B sends A to jail for not paying. That’s sounds pretty bad, but legally, at that time, it was acceptable.

B chokes A before sending him to jail, and doesn’t listen to requests for more time. That’s getting pretty rough, but we don’t know the story. Maybe A had been rude. Maybe A had been awful. Maybe B needed the money because he was in debt himself.

B had just been to see the king about a debt that was 100 times as big as A owed. See, that’s what was happening. B was terrified about his debt.

After asking for mercy, the king had forgiven the debt B owed. What? B had been forgiven, like everything? B had been able to keep his family, his house, his everything? B should have lost everything and the king, for no particular reason, and in spite of what the law would have allowed, let him go? B was insane! I mean, really insane? Man, if I would have been there, I would have punched him myself.

Wow. When you first started talking about this, I thought B had every right to hold A accountable. But now that I see what had happened…unbelievable. Absolutely unbelievable.

So why do get so defensive of our rights? Why do we get so offended by offenses?

Is it because we don’t agree with the assumption Jesus made? Jesus, the king?