The Golden Rule Modified

        "Do to others what you would have them do to you."  This is the Golden Rule given by our Lord in Luke 6. 

        Today's Gospel reading from Matthew 18 tells us how the Lord wants us to forgive others always (seventy times seven times).  Then Jesus told the story about a king who punished one official because he, after the king had forgiven him, did not in turn forgive his own fellow servant for the same kind of misdoing.  At the end the Lord warned that "My heavenly Father will treat you in exactly the same way unless each of you forgives his brother from his heart."  From Luke 6, 37-38 and the Lord's Prayer, we hear the same message.  Hence, we may safely replace the word "them" in the Golden Rule with "God." 

        We have now: "Do to others what you would have God do to you."