[This article was written by Robert A. Sochor.]

In Matthew 18:23-35, Jesus taught the parable of the unmerciful servant. For every generation it is relevant and helps us understand the need for forgiveness: forgiveness granted to the king’s servant as well as the forgiveness and mercy that were denied to the servant’s debtor. The king of verse 23 who ruled over all in the parable was displeased (wroth, verse 34) with his servant and actually ended his forbearance by requiring payment. The concluding lesson of the parable is found in verse 35 — that we as forgiven sinners should forgive those who trespass against us.

I have not done the parable justice by summarizing it so briefly. But there is one point of the parable that stands out, and that is the servant’s debt to the king. In verse 24 the servant had run up a debt of 10,000 talents. There are varying explanations of how much debt this actually was. One margin note stated that one talent was about 15 years’ wage for a common laborer. Multiplying this out would show this debt was quite unpayable. Other estimates I have heard run into the millions, even the billions, of dollars. I have always wondered, how did he run up such a debt? How did he ever expect to repay it? And what was he thinking?

But then I remember this is just a parable. A parable is a story to illustrate a greater spiritual truth. The man in the parable really does not exist. He is only in the story to represent someone else. And that someone is us. We are the ones who ran up a completely unpayable debt. We are the ones not thinking of how we would ever pay back the debt that we had run up. If we consider the man in the parable foolish, then we would have to say that also about ourselves. There is not one of us who could point to this man and say, “I’d never do that.” We have all sinned (Romans 3:23; Galatians 3:22). We have incurred that overwhelming debt we could never repay. And the debt we owe because of our sin is staggering. Romans 6:23 says the “wages” (the just compensation) for our sins is death. In the Old Testament, Ezekiel states the consequences more bluntly: “The soul that sins, it shall die” (Ezekiel 18:20). Sin carries a terrible consequence.

In the parable the foolish debt-ridden servant was fortunate to be in debt to this particular king for he was merciful. There is nothing about the servant which should recommend forgiving the debt. He was not particularly good; in fact, there is nothing good said about this servant in all of the parable. He had done nothing to merit this forgiveness.

After being forgiven, there was no change in the servant. Such forgiveness “reasonably” should have produced (or have been followed by) a change in character and conduct in his life. It did not. In the case of ourselves, when forgiven we should have a change of character and conduct. The New Testament calls this “newness of life” (Romans 6:4) or being “transformed” (Romans 12:2). The God who granted such great forgiveness has every reasonable expectation that this change would be present in those He has forgiven.

There is a practicality to this and probably all parables. If we miss it, it is to our shame.