A reflection on Matthew 18:21-35 for Sunday of the 24th Week in Ordinary Time Year A.
Peter asks Jesus, “Lord, if my brother sins against me, how often must I forgive? As many as seven times?” I have always had a soft spot for Peter, maybe because he so often says the thing the rest of us are thinking.
Seven times sounds generous, doesn’t it? If somebody hurts me once and I forgive them, that feels holy. Twice? All right, Lord. Three times? I am really growing in virtue now. But by the seventh time, I am probably keeping track, and there is the problem.
Jesus tells Peter not seven times, but seventy-seven times. In other words: stop counting.
Well, that is a fine answer when we are sitting peacefully in church. It gets harder when the same old hurt comes knocking again.
Forgiveness would be much easier if we could do it once, check the box, and move on. But real life does not always work that way. Sometimes we forgive somebody sincerely, pray for them, receive Communion, and feel a genuine sense of peace.
Then Tuesday comes, and something reminds us of what happened.
A name comes up in conversation. We see an old photograph. A family member makes a comment, or somebody repeats the same behavior. Suddenly, there it is again—that old ache, that old anger, that speech we have already delivered to them twelve times in our imagination.
And we think, “Lord, I already forgave this.”
Maybe we did. Maybe now we need to forgive it again.
That does not mean the first forgiveness was fake. It means healing often happens in layers. Some wounds are shallow enough to disappear quickly, while others seem to have roots. We surrender them to God, and then months later discover another little piece of resentment tucked away somewhere in the heart.
I do not think Jesus is surprised by that. He knows us. He knows how memory works. He knows that betrayal can leave a mark, and He knows that family wounds can be especially complicated because the people closest to us often have the greatest ability to hurt us.
And notice what Jesus does not say. He does not say, “Pretend it never happened.” He does not say, “Trust everybody again immediately.” He does not say, “Stay in relationships that are harmful.”
He says forgive.
Forgiveness is not the same as reconciliation. Reconciliation requires repentance, truth, and the willingness of both people to rebuild what has been damaged. Forgiveness can sometimes happen when reconciliation cannot.
Forgiveness means I surrender my right to vengeance. It means I stop asking God to make the other person hurt the way I hurt. It means I entrust justice to Him, and if I am being truthful, sometimes I have to hand the same person back to God more than once.
“Here, Lord. They are Yours.”
Then later, “Lord, apparently I picked them back up again.”
There is something wonderfully humbling about that. The servant in today’s Gospel receives an astonishing mercy from his master. His enormous debt is forgiven, but instead of letting that mercy change him, he immediately goes out and demands payment from someone who owes him much less.
That is the uncomfortable part of this Gospel. I want God’s mercy to be endless when it comes to me. I want Him to be patient with my weakness. I want Him to forgive the same sins I confess again and again, and I want Him to understand that I am trying, even when I stumble.
And He does. Psalm 103 tells us that the Lord is “kind and merciful, slow to anger, and rich in compassion.” That is the mercy we live on, and Jesus asks us to let some of it pass through us.
Not because the person who hurt us necessarily deserves another chance. Because we have been given another chance, and another, and another.
There are days when forgiveness feels almost impossible. On those days, perhaps the prayer does not need to be, “Lord, I forgive them completely and feel wonderful about it.” Maybe it is simply, “Jesus, I want to want to forgive.”
That is a prayer He can work with.
We can bring the resentment to Eucharistic adoration. We can place the person into one decade of the Rosary. We can whisper their name during the Divine Mercy Chaplet even if our teeth are slightly clenched while we do it. Grace often begins with willingness.
And then we keep going—seventy-seven times. Not because we are weak, not because what happened did not matter, and not because Christians are supposed to become doormats with rosaries. We forgive because we belong to a God who has forgiven us more times than we could ever count.
So if that old resentment comes back on Tuesday morning, do not panic. Hand it back to Jesus again, and if necessary, again tomorrow. Sometimes forgiveness is not a single heroic moment. Sometimes it is simply refusing, one ordinary day at a time, to let the wound have the final word.
Jesus gets that word.
And His word is mercy.
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