We Have Done Our Duty
1 He said to the disciples, “It is impossible that no occasions of stumbling should come, but woe to him through whom they come! 2 It would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck, and he were thrown into the sea, rather than that he should cause one of these little ones to stumble. 3 Be careful. If your brother sins against you, rebuke him. If he repents, forgive him. 4 If he sins against you seven times in the day, and seven times returns, saying, ‘I repent,’ you shall forgive him.” 5 The apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith.” 6 The Lord said, “If you had faith like a grain of mustard seed, you would tell this sycamore tree, ‘Be uprooted and be planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you. 7 But who is there among you, having a servant plowing or keeping sheep, that will say when he comes in from the field, ‘Come immediately and sit down at the table’? 8 Wouldn’t he rather tell him, ‘Prepare my supper, clothe yourself properly, and serve me while I eat and drink. Afterward you shall eat and drink’? 9 Does he thank that servant because he did the things that were commanded? I think not. 10 Even so you also, when you have done all the things that are commanded you, say, ‘We are unworthy servants. We have done our duty.’”
Forgive seven times a day, they ask for more faith, and are told they are servants who have done what was expected.
He said to the disciples, “It is impossible that no occasions of stumbling should come, but woe to him through whom they come!
The millstone saying is treated in Matthew's account Matthew 18:6–9. Both halves stand here as there: such things are inevitable, and their inevitability excuses nobody.
Be careful. If your brother sins against you, rebuke him. If he repents, forgive him.
The instruction has two parts and the first is usually skipped. Rebuke — say it to him. What is forbidden is the silent grievance, and the procedure for it is set out at length in the other account Matthew 18:15–17.
If he sins against you seven times in the day, and seven times returns, saying, ‘I repent,’ you shall forgive him.”
Seven times in one day is a man whose repentance is plainly not holding, and the arithmetic is designed to be unreasonable. What is required is not belief in his sincerity; it is the forgiving.
The apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith.”
The request comes straight out of that instruction, and it is the only time in the Gospels they ask for such a thing. It reads like men who have just heard something they cannot do and are asking for a larger supply of whatever it takes.
The Lord said, “If you had faith like a grain of mustard seed, you would tell this sycamore tree, ‘Be uprooted and be planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.
The answer refuses the premise. Faith is not a quantity to be topped up; the smallest imaginable amount would already do something absurd. Their problem is not the size of it.
And the picture chosen is odd on purpose. Not a mountain moved but a tree replanted in salt water, where nothing grows — a demonstration that serves no use whatever. The point is the deep-rooted thing yielding, not the achievement.
But who is there among you, having a servant plowing or keeping sheep, that will say when he comes in from the field, ‘Come immediately and sit down at the table’?
The parable that follows is this Gospel's alone, and it lands hard. A servant in from a day's plowing does not get served; he prepares supper first and eats afterward. "Does he thank that servant because he did the things that were commanded? I think not" Luke 17:9.
Even so you also, when you have done all the things that are commanded you, say, ‘We are unworthy servants. We have done our duty.’”
The answer to increase our faith turns out to be a warning against the accounting mentality that produced the request. Duty done does not create a credit; there is no surplus to draw on and no ledger being kept in the servant's favor.
And the word is unworthy rather than useless — the servants are not being disparaged. What is being removed is the idea that anything they do puts God in their debt. Which is also, on reflection, the only footing from which a man could forgive somebody seven times in a day without keeping count.
It is worth setting beside the promise four chapters earlier, that the master will one day gird himself and serve them at his own table Luke 12:37. Nothing is owed. What comes anyway is a gift.
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