If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him, and if he sins against you seven times in the day, and turns to you seven times, saying, ‘I repent,’ you must forgive him.” (Luke 17:3,4 ESV)
Forgiveness
I had one job. I had been instructed to remove all of the books from a friend’s library and place them in a particular room. But with good intentions, I thought I knew more than my friend. Surely, he had not meant every single book, but only the books that were in the way of a particular project. Surely, he had not meant to move all the books in that particular room, when there was a closer room available. Surely, he had not meant for me to move books that I did not think really belonged in his library.
So, I moved some of the books to a different new room, and made a pile of books for him to approve disposal.
I smiled proudly when he entered the apartment… and then he laughed at me. His explanation of what he had asked me to do made sense, once I understood it… once I stopped trying to be smarter than him… once I stopped trying to fix his intentions.
This is one of the most powerful, yet ignored, statements of Christ.
The job of every Christian is to forgive each other. We add conditions, though, like me and the library, that are not found in Christ’s words.
Such as: “I only need to forgive her when she proves how sorry she is.”
Such as: “I only need to forgive her when she stops behaving badly.”
Such as: “I only need to forgive her when he has learned his lesson.”
Such as: “I only need to forgive her if he forms new good habits.”
You might expect me to write at this point, that a peculiar thing about being a Christian is that we can be forgiven. And indeed, that is a peculiar thing in the world.
But these verses instead show us that not only are we forgiven, but we GET to forgive.
No burdens of grudges need to be born. No anger that cannot be quenched till someone else does something needs to burn. No hurt because of the actions, words, or thoughts of another need to be felt anymore.
We get to forgive! Even if the world calls it naïve. Even if our neighbor calls us foolish. Even if our fears push against us. Even if we do not really want to forgive…
We are peculiar, we get to forgive.