He Said She Loved Much, and He Said It in Front of the Man Hosting Him

He does not think God is angry with him. That would be simpler.

He thinks God is fine with him in the way a large institution is fine with you. Nothing outstanding. Nothing pending. He is in the system and the file is closed, and there is no reason anybody would look at it again.

And he has arrived at that by a route that makes sense. He did a great deal, over about a decade, and some of it he still cannot say out loud. He came back from it. He is not in it now. And when he came back, what he found was that everything worked: he was received, nobody threw him out, he can sit in a room and take communion and no alarm goes off.

What did not happen is the other thing. Whatever it is that other people seem to have. He watches men his age talk about being loved by God and he believes them and he does not have that, and he has worked out why, and the reason is arithmetic. You cannot spend a decade doing what he did and then be somebody's delight. You can be forgiven. That is different, and he will take it, and he is not complaining.

There is a dinner party in Luke 7 that runs the arithmetic the other direction.

What the host said to himself

Here is the setup, in the King James Version:

And, behold, a woman in the city, which was a sinner, when she knew that Jesus sat at meat in the Pharisee's house, brought an alabaster box of ointment, And stood at his feet behind him weeping, and began to wash his feet with tears, and did wipe them with the hairs of her head, and kissed his feet, and anointed them with the ointment. (Luke 7:37-38)

Stood at his feet behind him. Behind Him. She does not come around to the front.

And then the host, who has said nothing out loud:

Now when the Pharisee which had bidden him saw it, he spake within himself, saying, This man, if he were a prophet, would have known who and what manner of woman this is that toucheth him: for she is a sinner. (Luke 7:39)

He spake within himself. Nobody heard it. It is the private arithmetic, and Luke records it because the private arithmetic is what the whole scene is about.

And Jesus answers it. Not the woman. The man's unspoken sum.

You are answered in the thing you have never said out loud and you were never hidden while you carried it. Luke 7:39 puts the host's private calculation into Scripture and has Jesus reply to it directly, and it is the Holy Spirit rather than a change in your record who makes a two thousand year old answer land on a private sum.

The parable, and the arithmetic in it

The answer is a short story with numbers in it.

There was a certain creditor which had two debtors: the one owed five hundred pence, and the other fifty. And when they had nothing to pay, he frankly forgave them both. Tell me therefore, which of them will love him most? (Luke 7:41-42)

When they had nothing to pay. Both of them. That is not incidental. The story does not have a solvent debtor in it, and the difference between the two men is size, not capacity.

He frankly forgave them both. Frankly, in the old English, means freely. No terms.

And the question: which of them will love him most?

The host answers correctly, and slightly unwillingly, and the answer is the one with the larger debt.

Which turns the arithmetic inside out. In the accounting a man does about himself, a bigger history means a smaller portion of everything afterward. In the parable, a bigger history means more love, and the reason is not that the debt was good. The reason is that a bigger cancellation is a bigger event.

You have a larger cancellation and you were never moved to a lower category by the size of it. Luke 7:42 asks which debtor will love most and the answer given in the text is the one who owed more, and it is His Spirit who makes that arithmetic something a man believes about himself rather than only about a story.

The sentence about her, said to somebody else

Then He applies it, and the wording repays reading slowly.

Wherefore I say unto thee, Her sins, which are many, are forgiven; for she loved much: but to whom little is forgiven, the same loveth little. (Luke 7:47)

Her sins, which are many. He does not minimize it. He says it out loud, in the room, with her standing there, and He is not being cruel because He has just told a story that makes the size the reason rather than the obstacle.

But to whom little is forgiven, the same loveth little.

That second half is aimed at the host, who is not a wicked man. He is a man who does not think he needs much, and therefore has not received much, and therefore does not love much. The danger in the room is not the woman.

And notice what she never does. She never speaks. She does not explain herself, does not make a case, does not promise anything. She is behind Him, crying, and the entire defense is mounted by somebody else on her behalf while she says nothing.

You are spoken for by somebody who knows the whole of it and you were never required to make your own case. Luke 7:47 has Jesus defend a woman who says nothing in her own defense, and it is the Holy Spirit who makes being defended a thing a man can accept rather than deflect.

And if the weight of this has gone past shame into somewhere darker, if it has reached not wanting to be here, that is not a thing to hold alone. A doctor, a counselor, somebody you trust who will pick up the phone. In the United States the 988 crisis line answers day and night. Nobody is asked to carry that by himself.

The last thing He says, and who He says it to

Everything so far has been said to the host. And then, at the end, He turns.

And he said unto her, Thy faith hath saved thee; go in peace. (Luke 7:50)

He said unto her. Directly. Not about her anymore.

Go in peace. That is a dismissal in the old sense, the thing you say to somebody who is free to leave and does not owe you anything on the way out.

The order matters. The room heard the defense first. Then she heard the sentence. Which means the public part was not for her benefit primarily, and what she got at the end was short and personal and did not mention her history at all.

And Paul, who had his own arithmetic to deal with, does the same thing in a letter and does not soften it:

This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief. (1 Timothy 1:15)

Of whom I am chief. Present tense, written by an apostle years into his ministry, refusing to move himself down the list.

He does not treat the size of it as an embarrassment to be managed. He puts it in a letter as the credential of the message.

You have a personal sentence at the end of the public one and you were never left as a case being discussed. Luke 7:50 has Him turn and speak directly to her after the room has heard everything, and it is His Spirit who makes a direct address something a man can hear as his own.