Let’s review. First, we’ve seen that Jesus demonstrated that forgiving those who have wronged us is possible. In the toughest situation you can imagine, he practiced what he preached. Second, Jesus cautioned us that those who possess an unforgiving spirit have grounds for questioning whether they have really experienced forgiveness.
For the rest of this series on forgiving others I am going to exercise poetic or, perhaps, pulpitic license in describing that person who is the object of our forgiveness. Rather than using the term “enemy,” a term you might object to or wasting words by saying “that person who hurt you,” I’m going to coin a word, “wounder.” I think that will make things a lot easier.
Matthew 18:21-22
You’ve heard this story a number of times. I’ve retold it on several occasions over the years. So, I’ll just remind you that the mathematics in this question is important. Peter was trying to outdo the Pharisees. They said we should forgive an enemy three times. He intended to show himself a better man. At the same time, Peter hadn’t backed himself into a corner; he placed a cap on forgiveness. He failed to see Jesus was trying to teach unlimited forgiveness.
That’s the meaning of Jesus’ response: “Seven? Hardly. Try seventy times seven.” (MSG)
We don’t know if Peter had a particular “brother” in mind when he asked the question. Andrew is the only brother of Peter’s mentioned in the New Testament but “brother” can be used for those we would call “cousins.” He may have even been using the term metaphorically to refer to a spiritual brother. Whatever, Peter was asking about the cruelest kind of hurt and the toughest kind of forgiveness. And he asked that question as he was surrounded by eleven spiritual “brothers.” The hardest person to forgive is the wounder who is one we should be able to trust.
Some nineteen hundred years before Peter asked his question another man, surrounded by eleven brothers, faced the question of forgiveness.
Joseph, the son of Jacob, of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob-fame, had been sold into slavery. His brothers were the sales team in that deal.
Oh, it turned out okay but for a long time it didn’t look like it would. Besides, why should time and success erase the need for payback?
If any man could be excused for maintaining an unforgiving spirit, it would have been Joseph.
We might have expected Joseph to long for the day he could face his brothers to exact a severe revenge against those who had caused him such grief. Instead, when the confrontation came at last, he forgave them. In so doing he became a source of inspiration to all of us who struggle to forgive those who have wronged us.
What can Joseph teach us about forgiving the hurts inflicted by those closest to us?
To begin with Joseph didn’t mince words about what his brothers had done.
In Genesis 50:20 Joseph went before his brothers and made a dramatic statement about their actions: “You meant evil against me, but God meant it for good….”
That’s an amazing statement about God’s power to bring good from evil, but we shouldn’t miss Joseph’s honest assessment of what his brothers had done. Miroslav Volf insists that when we forgive someone we must confront them with their wrong.
The word translated as “evil” or “harm” is used almost 300 times in the Old Testament and refers to the worst kind of behavior. In Genesis alone it is used for the violent wickedness which prompted God to send the flood and it is used to describe a disaster.
Joseph didn’t kid himself. He understood what had prompted his brothers’ actions, understood they intended their actions to have disastrous results. If he had died working in an Egyptian field, become a crocodile snack, or been beaten to death by a foreman, it would have been all the same to his brothers.
We have no right to brush off the hurt another has done to us. It’s not good for us and it’s not good for them.
I think we can even make the case that we aren’t ready to forgive until we are ready to honestly acknowledge the depth of our pain. If we brush off what the wounder has done to us, we run the risk of suppressing our true feelings under the mask of high-mindedness, only to have those feelings we’ve denied burst forth one day in a torrent of rage.
This means, of course, that we have to be suffering from a genuine wound. The wounder has done something wrong, unjust, cruel, and hurtful, not just something we didn’t like. If you’re a fifth-generation Buckeye and your daughter announces she is going to take advantage of a great program available at a school in Ann Arbor, you might be frustrated but she hasn’t committed an offense on the par with selling you to passing slave-traders. She has merely exercised her freedom.[1]
Here’s something else here. Unless we are honest about the depth of our hurt, our wounder may feel free to act again. What Joseph’s brothers did was wrong. I’ve heard some Bible teachers try to justify their actions by pointing to the poor parenting exhibited by Jacob. I don’t care, what they did was wrong. If every jealous older brother or sister sold their younger siblings into slavery, most of us would have had one or two fewer mouths to feed. Jacob’s actions were unwise, his older son’s actions were just wrong.
It may be time your wounder sees there comes a point in the lives of most healthy people when they realize that blaming others is immature and fruitless.
The wounder who is genuinely interested in changing won’t learn that if we brush off their wounds as nothing.
That doesn’t mean we become whiners, it means we are honest and clear in describing how we were wounded and the repercussions of what was done to us. Doing this may require you to carefully plan the way you will describe the wrong done to you.
I suppose this is a good time to mention the matter of forgiving and forgetting. Sometimes we say that we must forgive and forget. After all, that’s what God does with our sins. But is it?
Of course, we Christians do sometimes speak of God forgetting our sins. One verse we use to prove this is Jeremiah 31:34 where the KJV has God saying, “I will remember their sins no more.” Yet, we speak of God forgetting without really thinking about what it must mean for an omniscient Being to do that. Barring some kind of accident or illness, you and I don’t really forget things. Think of those lists of names and dates you learned in world history class back in high school. You got them down well enough to get you through the final but by the end of summer you couldn’t remember them. They’re still tucked away somewhere in your brain but your mental files are in disarray. Then, one evening you’re watching Jeopardy and suddenly you know the answer to a tough history question. You remembered what you had forgotten.
So, when we speak of God “forgetting” our sins, it’s really a metaphor, a figure of speech to stress how completely he has dealt with the charges against us. The Young’s Literal Translation, made in the 19th century, captures the meaning Jeremiah had in mind: “For I pardon their iniquity, And of their sin I make mention no more.”
Sometimes, forgetting a wounder’s actions may put us in danger or jeopardy. This is especially true if we forget the distinction between forgiveness and reconciliation.
Sometimes we confuse forgiveness with reconciliation. Though reconciliation may be our goal when we forgive another, the two processes are not the same. To begin with, forgiveness depends upon the action of one person—you. Reconciliation demands the involvement of at least two persons: the wounded and the wounder. Then, too, while forgiveness is always appropriate, reconciliation may not be. The wounder may be of such a character to feign sorrow and regret, all the while hoping to get you within range to harm you again. Many an abused and forgiving wife has learned that to her regret. Forgiveness deals with what a person has done, not what they are.
Forgiveness is an appropriate response to what a person has done. Sometimes caution and wariness is the appropriate response to what a person is.
Paul even leaves us an example of this matter of recalling how wise Christians should be on guard against those whose character is too dangerous to ignore. In 2 Timothy 4:14-15 Paul writes, “Alexander the coppersmith did me much harm. The Lord will repay him according to his works. You must also beware of him, for he has greatly resisted our words.” Paul, no doubt, forgave Alexander, leaving any vengeance to the Lord; this, even though Alexander may have been the informer who caused him to be arrested. But he still warned Timothy about this potentially dangerous individual.
At the same time, remember our forgiving another may not nullify the penalties imposed by the community to which we belong. Remember how those classic courtroom dramas begin? You know, like Perry Mason, “in the matter of the State of California versus Ima Framed.” As individuals we may exercise forgiveness but in some situations the state feels that the interests of the wider community are so compelling that the matter can’t be left in my hands. For example, suppose a drunken driver smashes into my parked car. No one is hurt. The driver seems genuinely sorry. Why not forgive and leave it at that? Even though I may not pursue the matter any further, the state—in the interest of the larger community—files DWI charges. At the same time, the bank holding the note on my car wants that car to be in good shape, so they want the damage repaired. I might say I’ll bear the expense of the repairs but I have an obligation to my family to use the monies we have wisely. While I may refuse to nurture bitterness and ill-will toward the driver, I may have to seek redress because that fulfills an obligation to the greater good. In fact, Christian love—which always seeks the best for another—may argue the most loving thing is to take a course of action forcing this driver into rehab or therapy.
Even in the Christian community, forgiving and forgetting may not be the best response to the actions of a fellow believer. Imagine Chris. Chris is a fellow believer who belongs to your church. An active member, Chris serves as the church treasurer. Chris was also laid off fourteen months ago and some bill-collectors are beginning to call. Chris gives into temptation and uses church funds to pay some of those bills, thinking that surely a job will come along and the funds could be replaced.
Inevitably, the embezzlement is discovered and the church must decide what to do. The church decides to forgive Chris. The congregation will absorb the loss, hoping that Chris will eventually be able to reimburse the church. But the church leaders also decide that Chris can no longer be the treasurer, not as retribution but in an effort to shield Chris from further temptation.
I suspect that’s what God does for us. Remember the sequence of the Lord’s Prayer. We pray that our sins be forgiven. Then we ask that we not be led into temptation. Because God knows us as individuals, I’m sure he knows our particular weaknesses. In this case, he “remembers” our sins, not to shame us or chide us, but to protect us—from ourselves.
As we move on, remember: the choice to forgive is a choice to pursue a lifestyle beyond the ordinary.
Revenge is the expected response to a hurt, forgiveness is the unexpected response.
Joseph’s brothers obviously expected him to seek retribution for their actions. Even after he had graciously helped them relocate in Egypt, they thought he was only waiting for his father to die so he could freely seek revenge.
Joseph had a surprise for them. His forgiveness was sincere!
Jesus envisioned a radical new way. He called for his followers to make forgiveness a hallmark of their lives.
Jesus honestly recognized that forgiveness sometimes has to be repeated. The rest of the world may place limits on forgiveness, but Christ’s followers are to completely abandon the notion of limited forgiveness.
No Christian could rub his hands together and mutter, “Oh, Boy, I’ve forgiven him seven times, if he messes up one more time, I can squash him like a roach.”
Squashing comes more naturally than forgiving. Because of this we must open ourselves to God’s work in our lives.
Years ago I read a sermon in which the preacher suggested that in calling people to forgive, Jesus was appealing to the natural human tendency to be forgiving. I wondered where he had lived and what kind of people he had known. They certainly weren’t the kind of people who suggested “revenge is a dish best served cold” or bumper stickers saying, “I don’t get mad, I get even.”
The sad truth is many wounders move on with no visible penalty for their actions. It’s hard to suffer their wounds while they walk away without a bandage in sight. Yet, if we keep our resentment alive, our hurt only continues. Jesus calls us to forgive seventy times seven times, perhaps because he knows that at any time we could be caught up in the trap the serial wounder lays for us. Any time we fail to forgive could be the time the seeds will be sown that will grow up to become the life-destroying plant of resentment and bitterness.
Yet, giving up retaliation just doesn’t seem natural. That’s why we need the power of the supernatural to help us.
When we forgive those who wounded us, we tap into the power God has already provided for us. When we open ourselves to let God work in and though us, that work will give birth to our forgiving those who have wronged us. There are non-believers who set a good example for us in their treatment of their enemies. We can’t deny that. Still, unless you possess some kind of extraordinary character, you will need the power of the Spirit. I know I do. The New Testament translator J. B. Phillips said, “Every time we say, ‘I believe in the Holy Spirit,’ we mean that we believe that there is a living God able and willing to enter human personality and change it.”
As Lewis Smedes says, “Forgiveness is the hardest work love does.” We have the assurance that God’s Spirit will fill us with the love sufficient to do the work.
God calls us to be forgiving; God enables us to be forgiving. God promises us wisdom. We need that wisdom to know how to approach the wounder, wisdom to know the kind of relationship we can have with the wounder, wisdom to know how to leave the wound behind.
Conclusion.
Let me close with a story some of you may have heard or read.
In the Summer of 1980 sixteen-year-old Debbie Morris (then Cuevas) of Madisonville, Louisiana, and her boyfriend, Mark Brewster, were kidnapped by Robert Willie and Joe Vaccaro. The couple was taken to Alabama where Brewster was beaten and left for dead. Debbie was returned to Louisiana where her captors repeatedly raped her for thirty hours. Then, for some reason, they let her go. It was a strange decision considering the fact they had murdered another young woman, Faith Hathaway, in the same woods only a few days before.
You may have never heard of Robert Willie and Joe Vaccaro but their personas were blended to become the one composite character depicted in the 1995 film Dead Man Walking. Sister Helen Prejean who was Robert Willie’s spiritual advisor while he awaited execution for Hathaway’s murder wrote the book on which the film was based.
Debbie was only a nominal Christian at the time of the attack and for several years afterwards her life was in a tailspin of alcoholism. Then she renewed her commitment to Christ and began to try to live like him. Inevitably she confronted the issue of forgiveness.
Finally, on the night Willie was executed, she was able to say, for the first time, that she forgave him. Still, she struggled with the full implications of that decision. Her words tell it better.
Well, if I say I forgive Robert Willie but don't want to see him in heaven, that's contradictory. If I forgive him the way God expects me to forgive him, I'll want God to win his soul over.
I couldn't have said that when I was 18 or 22. I just wasn't ready. I had to be able to stop looking at it as a victory for Robert Willie and start looking at it as a victory for God. I needed to accept a difficult truth: God loved Robert Willie as much as he loves me.
It's hard to understand God's grace. Even though the Bible says it has nothing to do with what we deserve, we still tend to think that way.
Jesus' parable about the vineyard workers [in which those who began work late in the day were given as much as those who began work early] finally put this in perspective for me. I'd heard it many times before. But a few years ago, I applied it to Robert Willie and realized it didn't matter how late in the game he came to Jesus, as long as he came. And if he did, God wanted him every bit as much as he wants me, because he loved him every bit as much.
This has been the final step in my forgiveness. The night he was executed was one step. Then, when I had [my son] Conner, I realized Robert Willie, too, was a baby once. Over the years, these things softened my heart little by little so that I was finally able to forgive him for what he did. God knew I wouldn't be able to do that right away, so he took me through the process step by step.
For some of you that road to forgiving your wounder may be just as winding. In the end you’ll discover a new understanding of God’s grace.
[1] This illustration is a humorous reference to the long rivalry between the “Buckeyes” of the Ohio State University and the “Wolverines” of the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. Some OSU fans are so devoted they will not mention “Michigan” out loud, instead referring to “that state up north.”
