by Dane Massey
(Dane Massey is the former Pastor of Mulvane Christian Church. He is now in ministry in Houston, Texas.)
Last week we talked about forgiveness. Today let’s look at what forgiveness is not.
Forgiveness is not letting the other person off the hook. It is taking them off our hook and putting them on God’s hook.
Many times our failure to forgive lies in this fact: We don’t want them to get away with what they did. Paul however exhorts us to place them in God’s hands.
“Do not take revenge, my dear friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written: ‘It is mine to avenge; I will repay,” says the Lord.
On the contrary: “If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head” (Romans 12:29-20).
Forgiveness frees me to be whatever God wants me to be in the life of the one who has sinned against me.
We must face our own hearts because here lurks the “Jonah syndrome.” Jonah did not fear the Ninevites when he ran from God, he feared the mercy of God. He hated the Ninevites for what they had done.
He had grown up in the north country where they had pillaged, murdered and raped. They were known for their brutality, leaving the corpses of men, women and children piled along the roads of northern Israel. Jonah wanted them punished, destroyed!
Putting them on “God’s hook” opened the great possibility that God would be merciful to them. Which is exactly what happened and why we find Jonah pouting at the end of the book. If we are honest, our struggle with forgiveness many times, lies here. We want them to be spanked, and if God won’t do it we will!
Forgiveness is not Forgetfulness
“And they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the Lord: for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more” (Jeremiah 31:34).
“For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more” (Hebrews 8:12).
Forgetfulness is a sign of old age, to not remember is a choice. Forgiveness is a choice to not remember. The Hebrew word in Jeremiah means to reminisce, to burn incense to, to meditate on.
Unforgiveness is to replay over and over their sin against me, what they owe me, what I wish I’d have said and done, picturing their punishment, etc.
When we are honest we have to admit we rather enjoy this exercise. We like to meditate on what they did. To get our revenge by telling them exactly what we think as we rehearse the event in our minds.
Not only that, but many of our life choices are justified by what they did. So to forgive is not only canceling their debt but facing the truth that we did what we really wanted to do. We can no longer blame them.
Forgiveness, “remembering no more,” is a choice where I no longer deal with them, respond to them, according to their offense but I choose to wrap grace around the offense. It’s living out the cross where God wrapped grace around the greatest offense ever committed.
Forgiveness is not understanding
I’ve worked with people who were deeply hurt and their desire to understand or even to explain away what happened was much more to ease their own pain than a desire to forgive.
I remember a wife, devastated by the confession of her husband’s unfaithfulness, sharing how she had failed as a wife. I’m sure she hadn’t been perfect but she just couldn’t face the pain that her husband had chosen to be unfaithful.
He, and she, didn’t need understanding nor an explanation, they needed forgiveness to enter the arena. One of the first steps to forgiveness is facing the pain of what really happened.
Forgiveness is not reconciliation
God provided and offers forgiveness to every individual but reconciliation is for those who come to repentance. God doesn’t need to be reconciled to mankind, mankind needs to be reconciled to God.
“To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation” (II Cor. 5:19).
Forgiveness puts us in a position to reconcile if those involved respond. The abused spouse is not under obligation to reconcile the relationship to establish the fact that they have forgiven. Unforgiveness however, maintains a wall that hinders and resist reconciliation.
Forgiveness is not restoration
When thinking on forgiveness, vengeance, reconciliation, and restoration it helps to put forgiveness into a setting I can wrap my mind around. If I had a business where an employee was working at the cash register, and they stole the money what should I do? Forgiveness puts me in a position to deal with them as God would have me to.
Maybe they need the discipline of legal action, maybe they need some other help. If I feel God would not have me prosecute, I may still be led to not reconcile but to terminate their employment. If I feel that the Lord would have me reconcile, due to repentance on their part, it might be best to not restore them to their role at the cash register.
It is key to see how forgiveness keeps the relationship on a level where I can be discerning and continue to be who God would have me be in their life.
Hopefully this gives some insight into the challenge of forgiveness. I was once again reminded of my friend from the Cuba prison:
“Forgiveness is more than something a believer does. It is who he is. It is a lifestyle.”
Paul establishes this lifestyle in Ephesians 4:32:
“And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you.”
Note that he didn’t say just forgive. Instead he pictures the community of believers (one another) as a community where the atmosphere is one of forgiveness. Life is difficult!, a lifestyle of forgiveness is required!
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