Matthew 18:24,28 NKJV
And when he (the king) had begun to settle accounts, one was brought to him who owed him ten thousand talents. [28] "But that servant went out and found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii; and he laid hands on him and took him by the throat, saying, 'Pay me what you owe!'
There's a vast difference between 10,000 talents (the amount the guy owed the king) and 100 denarii (the debt that the guy was owed).
"A talent was a measure of weight usually for silver or gold. The bible talent was equal to about 29 kilograms or 63 pounds. A kilogram of gold at today's value is about $62,300 + or - so 29 kilograms or 63 pounds of gold would be about $1,800,000+." So, multiply that by 10,000 and you get an idea of how much the guy in the story was in debt to the king.
A whoppingly, humongous, unpayable debt, don't you think?
The king, in Jesus' story, absolutely knew the guy could never ever pay the debt in a million years. So, he forgave him out of sheer undeserved compassion.
That's where each one of us is before God.
All we can do is plead for mercy and grace.
Through Jesus we are forgiven that great debt of pride and rebellion amassed during our lives when we admit it and ask for His mercy.
Now, that greatly forgiven man should have bounded out into life full of the liberty that being let off that debt had given him.
Yet, what did he do? He didn't just bump into the man who owed him a small amount - oh no! He went looking for him.
To get an idea about the debt he was owed we need to know the value of the denarii...
"As a unit of currency, a talent was worth about 6,000 denarii. A denarius was the usual payment for a day's labour. At one denarius per day, a single talent was therefore worth 20 years of labour (assuming a 6-day work week, because nobody would work on the weekly Sabbath)."
So he was owed about 100 day's pay. It was a fair amount, but nothing in comparison with what he had been forgiven!
What is my response to Jesus' massive forgiveness of my sins?
Do I go looking for people who "owe me" something? Do I spiritually grab them by the throat, in my heart, and throw them into "solitary confinement" until they pay me?
Is that a Holy Ghost "ouch" in my life?
Shouldn't the guy in the story have just let the man alone and gotten on with his own freedom from debt?
So should I - Jesus has forgiven me so much.
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