April 20, 2006
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Forgive or Forget?
Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.
That line is known to just about anyone with any Christian church
experience. And we see the dramatic examples: Jesus on the cross, “Father,
forgive them for they know not what they do.” Corrie Ten Boom’s story
of forgiving her Nazi prison guard. What does forgiveness look like in
real life?Last night at our couples’ small group we were saddened by the
realization that many of us don’t forgive. Doesn’t that have eternal
consequences? But in a mobile and transient society, it’s easy to
avoid your debtor instead. And maybe over time you forget about the
wrongs. And in a transient society you can lose
friends as quickly as you lose enemies. Let me quantify this. On a
scale of 1-10, let’s say that 1 is hating someone, 10 is loving them,
and 5 is feeling neutral. If Jack hurts me, he’s at a 3. But one of
my friends, Jill, is an 8. Then times change, social circles change,
and I no longer see Jack or Jill for a few years. I’ve forgotten about
Jack’s hurt, and Jill and I have grown distant. Both of them are now
5′s. Was there a need to forgive Jack?Marriage is different because it’s permanent — you’re stuck with the
person for life, and you can’t get away. So you’d better forgive and
learn to let go of hurts. Even then, though, there’s a question of
which hurts to let go through active forgiveness and passive
forgetfulness. Active forgiveness is, “You hurt me, but I forgive you
and no longer hold it against you.” Passive forgetfulness is, “I was
hurt, but it’s no big deal and I shouldn’t be so sensitive.” I think
most of us err on the side of too much passivity, but we can’t really
forget the hurt, so we gunnysack, building up baggage and thinking more and more
critically about them. In that case, it’s better to put in the energy
and bring it into the open, and work at active
forgiveness. But isn’t it even better to develop a stronger soul that is
not as easily hurt by the actions of others, so there’s less need to
forgive in the first place? (Do I sound like a Buddhist
here? Forgive me.)So this Easter has got me thinking about the resurrection story again.
I think it’s kind of odd that Jesus is never recorded as saying, “I
forgive you.” In fact when Jesus comes back to Peter who fled at the
crucifixion, He doesn’t say, “You hurt me. I forgive you.” Instead He
just says, “Feed my sheep.” Is His forgiveness automatic and internalized? Maybe He’s beyond personal hurt, and maybe
we should strive to do the same.
Comments (8)
“Marriage is different because it’s permanent — you’re stuck with the person for life, and you can’t get away.”
That’s how I kinda feel about the Church, too– do you think there are differences? Varying degree b/c of proximity?
Good thoughts, Ed- challenging!
Though I’m not married, I wholeheartedly agree with your points.
I think forgiveness has a couple purposes, the main one being for the person who was wronged. Communicating it to the offender is another issue, but the wronged person probably needs it the most, right? Over time, it definitely fades for the offender more rapidly than for the person who was wronged, I think, and it becomes more important for the person who was wronged.
I think Jesus forgave (after all, being God, didn’t He just repeat the Lord’s prayer over and over? =)
i believe failure to forgive is also a sin, but that people are biased toward finding more sin in others than actually occurs, and tend to overlook sins in themselves. People generally impute worse motives to other people’s actions than are objectively “true”, and impute better/nobler motives to their own actions than objectively “true” (which might be perceived as sin by others).
my solution is to realize that most people believe they are good people, and don’t knowingly/intentionally do things that are hurtful/sinful, unless you’ve wounded them first (in which case they are plausibly acting in self-defense). give people the benefit of the doubt, in other words, and always be wary of acting in ways that might be perceived as sinful by others. the appearance of sin, even if not actually sin, is sometimes enough to bring judgment by others.
a long while ago, i thought a lot about this while i was struggling to forgive someone… what i concluded is that forgiveness isn’t complete unless you can remember the incident without resentment (or if you’re the one asking for/accepting forgiveness, remembering without your conscience feeling burdened by it). so i’m not sure if “passive forgetfulness” always counts.
i think being able to forgive is a reflection or side effect of being able to love wholly. i’m not sure that requires developing a thicker skin — if you love someone completely, with all their faults, it’s hard (and doesn’t make sense) to hold their actions against them, but on the other hand, that love also probably makes it very easy for them to hurt you.
good post, makes me think.
one point, on the cross didn’t jesus say “father forgive them for they know not what they are doing” or something like that?
Liv: church is different because you can move onto another church in another city with a whole new set of people. Unlike marriage. But I guess where forgivess is the same is that if you’re hurt by a church, you have to let go of the pain in your heart, as it’s only hurting yourself.
Shoe: my point is that we don’t have concrete examples of Jesus personally forgiving his friends, while most of our modern-day forgiveness situations involve our friends. Weird, huh?
Munich: I also try to live by the motto, “Never attribute to malice that which can be explained by incompetence.”
B: I think loving someone enables them to hurt you more because it provides access to your deep-seated issues. But if those issues get resolved, then less hurt, even from them.
Poobah: Didn’t I write that in the first paragraph (slightly different wording)?
Good topic… hard subject… I find that for me it is a process. I may think I’ve forgiven someone for some particular incident because I said I would and really want to… but then it will resurface when some other issue comes up. Then I realize that I haven’t completely forgiven them for the initial issue and that it sometimes takes multiple efforts to lay it before God and ask for help in forgiving completely.
So now when you forgive someone… do you find it helpful if they do something to “make it up to you”? Should just saying “sorry” be enough?
In addition to Poobah’s quote,
Jesus also said, “Friend, your sins are forgiven.” (Luke 5:20)
Matthew 18:15-end also seems particularly relevant: “…forgive your brother from your heart.” (v.35)