32 Then the king called in the man he had forgiven and said, ‘You evil servant! I forgave you that tremendous debt because you pleaded with me. 33 Shouldn’t you have mercy on your fellow servant, just as I had mercy on you?’
-Matthew 18:32-33, NLT
A big struggle with us, faithful spouse, surrounds the topic of forgiveness. Part of the struggle–though–is a result of spiritual abuse. People misuse texts in attempt to manipulate us into “forgiving” our cheater.
Most people have no idea of the amount of injustices and losses that a faithful spouse endures. It is ugly, and most people cannot handle such ugly truths. Such is not the topic of polite conversation.
My point is the debt is a great one that cheaters owe faithful spouses.
To compel faithful spouse to “forgive” this debt, Christian busybodies will point to stories like the parable found in Matthew 18:21-35. They will suggest the punishment is stark for those who refuse to forgive like the unforgiving servant in that story.
Their reading of that parable is shallow and missing of some important contextual points. It is no wonder their application brings about harm rather than healing–i.e. not exactly godly fruit.
For those unfamiliar, Jesus tells a parable to illustrate the importance of offering mercy to one another (see Matthew 18:21-35).
It is a story about a man with a tremendous debt to the king. He pleads with the king, and the king forgives his great debt instead of selling him and his family into slavery. Then this servant demands another servant with a much smaller debt repay him and does not show mercy when that servant pleads for such. The king hears about the first servant’s lack of mercy and then drops the judgment hammer upon him. Then Jesus closes this story by warning us that this is what happens to those who refuse to forgive from our hearts.
Many Christians will read this story as telling us that we MUST forgive or will suffer God’s judgment.
I think applying this to cheating situations is ludicrous for several reasons:
1) The debts are never in question. They are a given feature of the story.
Many of us have cheaters who will never acknowledge the wrong of what they did. They have justified what they did in their own minds.
The last thing they are willing to do is face an accounting of what they did and its impact on us. That would be like going through the books as the king did in the parable. Many cheaters are not interested in such an accounting. They live in full denial of owing us anything. In fact, some are so deluded that they think we owe them!
2) Our cheaters neither recognize the debt nor do they plead for mercy.
In both instances, the servants plead for mercy. They humble themselves and acknowledge that they need mercy. I think this is the true–deeper–meaning of the parable.
God looks on the heart.
What I see Jesus saying in this parable is to not harden our hearts towards another. When that person is in a place of vulnerability towards us, we need to use our power to extend mercy–not to abuse our power to extract all that we can.
In other words, God is telling us to be people of mercy. If we are not people of mercy, we will find ourselves on the outside of heaven–hence, the warning of torment–as we are not exhibiting Kingdom values.
Cheaters–generally speaking–are not interested in our mercy, though. The last thing most are capable of is humility.
So, this parable is not very applicable to such situations. It is a misapplication and spiritually abusive to treat it as such, in my opinion.
I believe it is fair game to turn the tables on people weaponizing this parable and ask them:
“So, what did my cheater say was the debt they owed me? Were they able to explain the complete bill–so to speak–of what they did?”
“Did my cheater acknowledge they need my forgiveness and are pleading for it? Are they willing to acknowledge that they are at my mercy regarding this debt?”
If they are unable to answer these questions in a satisfactorily way, then you have your answer about how applicable this parable is for you–i.e. it isn’t!
Many cheaters will scoff at the idea of having to plead for forgiveness. They only have contempt for us. That is NOT the position of the servants in this story.
They pleaded for mercy. Arrogant cheaters rarely do.
Finally, I will speak for myself on this. I would have loved to extend such mercy to my cheater when my marriage was imploding. The problem was my cheater refused to see her debt to me and lived from a place of contempt towards me.
Biblical forgiveness requires repentance first (see Luke 17:4). No repentance, then God is not requiring us to forgive.
After all, God is looking for us to exhibit soft hearts ready to extend mercy to those who recognize the need.
Thank you so much, Divorce Minister, for this explanation. It’s so often weaponized against faithful spouses that they are in danger or hell fire if they don’t forgive, adding to the already heavy burden because they chose to divorce their cheater! It is extremely traumatic. It was one of the things I really grappled with in the aftermath of the cheating.