Tag: Forgiveness

Categories
Uncategorized

Forgiveness Pays a Bonus

Manny1 is the kind of prisoner for whom I ache most: socially awkward, defenseless, and essentially a loner, not necessarily because he wants to be, but because society has relegated him to its farthest margins—an outcast of the outcast. When he approached me at a weekly Kairos gathering at the prison one evening, I was happy to engage, but it was when he began to talk about forgiveness that he captured my rapt attention. Manny recalled a season when two inmates oppressed him—he didn’t say how and I didn’t ask. Life was miserable in this way, but he sensed God telling him, “You must forgive them.” So, Manny obeyed. “When I forgave them,” he recalled, “it was like this several-hundred-pound weight just lifted from my chest. I no longer hold anything against them.” His few friends in lockup were incredulous: “Why did you forgive them?” “God told me to,” replied this forgotten man who humbly believed and did as he was told. How like God, to choose the incarcerated as testimony to inner freedom.

We’ve all witnessed grudges nursed for far lesser offenses. Have you ever heard someone say, “God might forgive them, but I won’t”? Have we ever said it—or something like it—ourselves, whether silently or aloud? God says it’s not OK. To His audience on the hillside, Jesus taught, “If you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.”2 Give grace, receive grace. Then to the Ephesians—and vital for believers everywhere and of all times—Paul writes, “Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.”3 Receive grace, give grace.

Forgiveness is a response of obedience taken in faith, regardless of feeling. And here’s the thing: Forgiveness always pays a bonus. For when from the heart we truly release others from their moral debt to us, our ensuing burden—the guilt and weight of our unforgiveness—is lifted as well. And whether we forgive seven times or seventy-seven,4 each time we are surprised by the peace and joy of releasing “a burden too heavy to bear.”5

So may this from Paul be the inclination of our hearts redeemed: “Make allowance for each other’s faults, and forgive anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others.”6

Manny did, and he’s still talking about it.

Father, forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.7 In Christ we live and in Him we pray. Amen.

1 This name is changed for privacy purposes.
2 Matthew 6:14-15 NIV
3 Ephesians 4:31-32 ESV
4 Matthew 18:21-22 NIV
5 Psalm 38:4 NLT
6 Colossians 3:13 NLT
7 Matthew 6:12 KJV

Categories
Uncategorized

The Heart of the Matter

“When they came to the place called the Skull, they crucified him there. . . Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” — Luke 23:33-34 NIV

Did you ever notice?

Amid the extreme chaos of the most pivotal day in human history — the Son of God betrayed, mocked, misrepresented, beaten, surrendered in appeasement, and now suffering an excruciating death — Jesus interceded to His Father on behalf of His tormentors: “Father, forgive them.” But did you ever notice that they never asked? His enemies never asked Jesus for forgiveness, yet He pleaded it on their behalf anyway. How opposite our natural tendency to release a grudge only at the fickle price of a suitable apology.

We could say, “Well, Jesus is God; mere mortals are not built that way.” True, we are not; our self-will demands we live life on our terms and not God’s. But let us witness another execution, the stoning of Stephen. His capital crime? Declaring Jesus to be standing at the right hand of God. Listen to Luke’s historic account of this believer’s last words. “As they stoned him, Stephen prayed, ‘Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.’ He fell to his knees, shouting, ‘Lord, don’t charge them with this sin!’ And with that, he died.”1 Had his self-appointed executioners asked for forgiveness? No. But Stephen forgave them anyway and he petitioned Jesus to do the same. Instead of appealing for justice, he cried out for mercy.

How do we reach such a point where harbored animosity ebbs and the tide of charity floods its place? Consider Luke’s description of Stephen — “a man full of God’s grace and power.”2 Therein lies the spiritual means for the naturally impossible: As we realize the depth of our sin and the divine price at which it is expunged, we grow in our embrace of God’s grace. This grace overflows its human reservoirs, pouring over in its many forms to others. When the scorned woman anointed Jesus’ feet and wiped them with her tears, for instance, Jesus said to her antagonists, “She was forgiven many, many sins, and so she is very, very grateful.”3 The grace of forgiveness liberates us this way.

Spend some time today considering and appreciating God’s undeserved, yet limitless favor toward you. In humility before Him, think also of those who need to experience your forgiveness, even if they haven’t asked for it. Then, in God’s grace and power, release them for good.

“Be kind to one another, compassionate, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you.” — Ephesians 4:32 NASB

Father, Your goodness and faithfulness toward me, a sinner, is humbling. Indwell me through Your Spirit of grace and power, that I would be a vessel of grace and forgiveness to others. In Christ I pray. Amen.

1 Acts 7:59-60 NLT, emphasis added
2 Acts 6:8 ESV, emphasis added
3 Luke 7:47 The Message

Categories
Uncategorized

The Silent Killer Within

Resentment kills a fool, and envy slays the simple. —Job 5:2

Saturday evening on a Kairos Prison Ministry weekend is a powerful time. That morning, all attendees—residents and volunteers—receive a slip of paper and are encouraged to write down the names of those we need to forgive. No one except the individual will ever see these names; this is a private encounter between self and God. As we gather in the chapel at day’s end, we drop our forgiveness lists into water and watch them instantly vanish, for the paper on which we write the names is dissolvable. The moment is externally symbolic and internally liberating, and the relief that follows forgiveness is palpable. Freedom feels good.

Does this mean old feelings of hurt and anger never fester and surface again? Not at all. As one who has had to forgive some knuckleheads over and over again, I can attest that old feelings return. In fact, though “resentment” has come to connote holding a grudge in anger or pain, the literal origin of the word is to “feel again.” How descriptive! And how diagnostic! Isn’t this what we do—feel the same anger, disappointment, or pain again and again, refusing to let it go? A friend recently learned that someone had been holding him in resentment for close to ten years, and my friend didn’t even know it until someone else told him! So who did resentment hurt for so long?

When our son was a boy, Peggy would occasionally teach him, “Emotions are good, but you cannot let them master you; we must learn to manage them.” This is a decision, as Paul likewise exhorts us, “Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another . . .”1 But how can I relinquish my pain and release my grudge? Paul continues, “. . . as God in Christ forgave you.”2 Therein lies the key: we have sinned against God exponentially more than any one individual has ever offended us. Our sin against God is immeasurable, but others’ wrongs against us are finite. Then as God in Christ forgives us much, so we as people forgiven in Christ are free to forgive others for comparatively little. And in doing so, we overcome that silent “killer of fools”—resentment.3

And when you stand praying, if you hold anything against anyone, forgive them, so that your Father in heaven may forgive you your sins.4 —Jesus, to His disciples

Father, thank You for forgiving me my trespasses. May I flourish in Your forgiveness to the point of overflowing it to those who have trespassed against me. In Christ I pray. Amen.

1 Ephesians 4:31-32 ESV
2 Ephesians 4:32 ESV
3 Job 5:2 ESV
4 Mark 11:25 NIV