Freely, freely, you have received
by Maria Rudolph
Click here to download your printable verse to carry with you today.
Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you? (Matthew 18:33)
Read Matthew 18:21–35
A great crowd was gathered around Jesus on a hillside when he taught them many things in what we now know as the Sermon on the Mount. He said, ‘This then, is how you should pray: Our Father in Heaven … forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors …’
A debt is definitely something that has to do with money, just like in the Parable of the Unmerciful Servant. I wonder what heading your Bible has on that story. I think it should be called the Parable of the Merciful Master. Jesus knows our heartstrings attach well to material things, and we struggle a bit with spiritual matters. So, he uses the very tangible picture of actual money, a real-life debt, to illustrate just how outrageously gracious God’s grace and forgiveness actually are. The amount owed to the master in the story is so much money that you could go out and buy your whole town or city dinner and drinks at a fancy restaurant, at your personal cost, and then throw in a few free cars for some of them as well.
It’s crazy that the master just wiped all that debt! In comparison, the servant is owed approximately enough money to take your family out for a meal at the local deli. How petty of him to react in such an extreme way toward the man who cannot repay him on the spot.
But really, how petty am I? How petty are you? In the face of the forgiveness and grace we have received from God through Jesus, the answer is: probably very! We hang on to grudges. When we feel wronged by others, the inclination is not to be forgiving but to get even!
In the midst of a society that had slaves and put less value on women and hardly any value on children, Jesus outrageously taught that all of God’s people stand on the same level and need to love one another from the heart (1 Peter 1:22c). So, let’s go ahead and put it into practice: Let us consider everyone as a person made in the image of God. Let us consider every Christian as a sister or a brother in Christ. Let us forgive freely, from the heart.
God forgave my sin in Jesus’ name, and in Jesus’ name, I’ve been born again. He said: ‘Freely, freely, you have received, freely, freely give. Go in my name and because you believe, others will know that I live’ (‘Freely, Freely’, Carol Owens, 1972) Amen.
Maria will be ordained as a pastor of the LCANZ on Palm Sunday on 13 April at 2pm at Concordia College Chapel in Highgate SA. She would love to see many Daily Devotion readers there! She has been assigned to serve St John’s Lutheran Church in Perth WA. She also supports the ministry of her pastor husband, Michael. They will be the first pastor couple of our church, but she hopes not the last. They are parents to three children, who are kept busy in their primary and secondary schools. Maria also serves the church on the Commission on Theology and Inter-Church Relations.
- Click here to read previous devotions.
- We are also posting them on LCA Facebook, making it easy for you to share them with family and friends.
- Sign up to receive Daily Devotion in your inbox every morning. If you’re already doing that, please encourage others to sign up. Click here for the link.
