“How often must I forgive?” Jesus’ answer is “not seven times but seventy-seven times.” This means there is no limit to the number of times we must forgive. He tells a parable about forgiveness, about first of all receiving forgiveness and then in turn forgiving someone else. A king “moved with compassion” forgives his servant his entire astronomical debt when this servant asks for patience and mercy. The tragedy in this story is that this servant fails to show this same compassion to a fellow servant when this fellow servant also asks for patience and mercy. The king condemns this first servant: ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you your entire debt because you begged me to. Should you not have had pity on your fellow servant, as I had pity on you?’”
Jesus teaches that forgiveness is not something that we earn but a gift that we receive from God. We accept His gift by forgiving ourselves and forgiving others. It is the overwhelming experience of God’s love, mercy, and compassion that empowers and enables me to forgive someone else. When I focus on my enormous debt that God has forgiven it makes it easier but not easy to forgive the other. Forgiveness begins when I accept the gift of God’s forgiveness. God has forgiven you, now you must forgive yourself. It is not up to you to decide if you deserve forgiveness. This is God’s decision and God has decided to forgive you. So, accept this gift of forgiveness!