Daniel 3:25, 34-43 / Matthew 18:21-35
If love is a many-splendoured thing, then sin is a many-splintered thing.
Where love brings about a bouquet of beauty, truth, peace and joy, sin brings about a chaos of lies, destruction, hate and anger.
In the gospel, Peter approached Jesus with what he thought was a simple question about the number of times he ought to forgive.
The reply that Jesus gave, together with the parable, was beyond what Peter expected.
Firstly, Jesus told Peter that he ought to forgive seventy-seven times. That is not just a numerical sum but also to indicate that forgiveness is infinite when we understand that love is infinite.
Yet the parable that Jesus told gave a disturbing, if not shocking, image of how the splendour of love can be so carelessly splintered by sin.
It sounds so ridiculous that the servant who was forgiven by his master over a huge debt, can be so ruthless to a fellow servant who owed him so much less.
As much as the theme of the parable is about forgiveness, it is also about how easily we can slip from love to sin.
Indeed the man who thinks he is safe must be careful not to fall (1 Cor 10:12)
Yes we need to be calm and vigilant because the enemy, the devil, is prowling around to tear up the splendour of God's love and forgiveness in us into splinters of hate and anger.
Let us fight that enemy with love and forgiveness, and may God help us.