Peter was often the outspoken disciple and in Matt 18:21 he asks Jesus a question, “Lord how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?” In other words when is enough, enough?
Jesus answer must have shocked them, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy -seven times(or seventy times seven)”.
The Lord again tells them a parable of the unmerciful servant, which seems to be unique to Matthew’s gospel.
Therefore the Kingdom of Heaven is like(this is the way of the Kingdom) a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. In this parable there is only a king and servants, no other roles are present. A servant had a very large debt which he couldn’t pay and the master ordered that all he had be sold. The servant pleaded for mercy and the master had pity and cancelled the debt.
He in turn went out and threatened a fellow servant who owed a much lesser amount with prison and showed him no mercy. The other servants told the master of his harsh treatment of his fellow servant. The master called him back and berated him for the way he treated the servant owing the much smaller debt.
The moral of the story is that we have been forgiven a much greater debt than we can ever hope to repay. We in turn must forgive, even to the seventy seven times. We do not want to be standing before the courts of heaven someday accused of unforgiveness when we have been forgiven so much.
This parable is really about our heart attitude, forgiveness or judgement. There is only one judge, all the rest of us are servants.
Extend forgiveness to those around us today and in turn receive the blessings of heaven on our own lives.