[00:00] In the Old Testament, Cain was displeasing God and was banished from the general people there

[00:38] and was hated apparently. And he said to God, "Everywhere I go, somebody is going to kill me." And God said, "I will protect you. And if you are harmed, the one who should try to do harm with you, against you will undergo a sevenfold punishment, punishment, vengeance." And one of the descendants of Cain, Lamech, said, "Cain would be avenged sevenfold, but

[01:17] I will be avenged seventyfold if anybody should try to harm me." I've already killed somebody who wanted me. He was bragging to his wives. That's Lamech, a descendant of Cain who killed his brother Abel. So vengeance and violence was growing in his line, his family. And so Peter's here asking Jesus, thinking that he's saying a great thing, "Should I forgive my neighbor seven

[01:47] times if he offends me?" Jesus says, "Seventy-seven times you will," meaning an unlimited amount of times you will forgive your neighbor. So a complete turnaround with the Christian era, the Christian life, we are to forgive, to have that spirit of forgiveness. And we think with this parable here of the man who, wanting his great loaner, who loaned him a huge amount,

[02:28] a thousand talents, something like that, is the other translation, won't forgive his neighbor who owes him just a fraction of that amount, throttles him and throws him in jail until he pays his last debt. And obviously that's a symbol of us with God and our neighbor. We want to be forgiven by God and we ask and confess and hope to get to heaven despite our many failings. And

[03:07] yet we think it's different when it comes to our neighbor. We can get away with holding resentments and grudges and lack of forgiveness to our brothers and sisters, but we expect God to forgive everything that we've done wrong. And so we think it's different. We think it's different. God can forgive because He's so big or whatever, but our neighbors just don't deserve to be

[03:41] forgiven, we think. The love of God is so infinite, so great, and He wants to forgive us. He wants to give us peace and let us live in joy and happiness serving Him and doing good. He wants us to be free of our mistakes of the past and He wants us to be in peace. So He is ready to forgive, wants to forgive, but waits for our repentance. How do we look at our neighbor? Do we want to forgive them?

[04:16] Do we want to look upon our neighbor with mercy? Do we want to, like God? If we don't, then it's our lack of love, our lack of charity, and our lack of being like God. And so we have to pray for that spirit of godliness to have a great love, enormous love in our heart that is bestowed upon

[04:50] our neighbor. And we are ready to forgive and see and understand their situation. We have to forgive an unlimited amount of time. It doesn't mean we condone or allow certain things to be uncorrected, but we must forgive from our heart and pray. Pray for their conversion and pray for their good. Pray for or look upon them always with a desire for their good. And if you can't

[05:22] do that, then pray for the grace to be able to, because otherwise, are our own sins going to be forgiven? So we pray for that spirit of forgiveness so that on our Judgment Day, we too can be, we can be forgiven by every, for everything by God. So let us, we pray for that spirit of mercy. Give me that heart of mercy, full of love for our neighbor.