I
have learned a few things from the 13 years that I have lived outside
of my home country, including a special tradition that most British
people treasure: The Queen's Christmas day speech! Every year I say
to Mark Tatlow, “Are you going to listen to the Queen's speech?”
and every year he replies, “Well, of course”, as if to say, why
in the world would you ask me that...is it not completely obvious
that this is what people do on Christmas day?! So while I must admit
that I missed her speech as it was broadcast live, I did take time to
listen it to in the days following Christmas. It was remarkable in
its content and I must take this opportunity to quote some of the
very significant things she included in her speech this past
Christmas. She said, “Relationships
that years ago were once so strained, have through sorrow and
forgiveness, blossomed into friendship.” She went onto add,
“Although we are capable of great acts of kindness, history has
taught us that we sometimes need saving from ourselves, from our
recklessness or our greed. God sent into the world, a unique person,
neither a philosopher or a general, but a Saviour
with the power to forgive. Forgiveness lies at the heart of the
Christian faith. It can heal broken families, it can restore
friendships and it can reconcile divided communities. It is in
forgiveness that we feel the power of God's love.” She closed by
urging us to “Find room in our lives for the message of the angels
and the love of God through Christ our Lord.” I was completely
stunned by how beautifully she shared the core of the Christian
faith, capturing so eloquently how forgiveness lies at the heart of
the Christian faith.
On
a different note, Doug gave me a gift card to Espresso House as
Christmas gift this year. I have it here with me, ready to use. But
a gift card is only plastic unless it is redeemed. I must walk into
the shop, order something and allow them to take the card and
subtract my purchase with it. It is then and only then that I enjoy
the fruit of this gift. It is of no worth as it sits in my wallet.
Perhaps
this is a good image for us as we begin the new year. God's gift of
forgiveness is like a gift card that's more valuable than anything we
can imagine. He paid for it with his Son's life. God is holding that
priceless gift card out to us, waiting for us to take it. If we don't
accept it and use it, however, then it's of no value to us. The good
news of great joy that we celebrated on Christmas day is filled with
hope and the promise of forgiveness and redemption. After all, it is
the birth our Lord and Savior that we celebrated. Did you get that,
Savior...the one who can save us from ourselves, our greed, our
meanness, our smallness. That gift is ours to enjoy. We must only
accept it and allow Christ to redeem the dark places in our lives
where we crave his light. The verses from Ephesians 5 remind us that
we were once full of darkness, but now we are full of the light from
the Lord. We are encouraged to live as people of light, which means
that we embrace the forgiveness and redemption that it is offered to
us through God's love. As challenging as it may be at times to
embrace the forgiveness offered to us as a free gift through our
Savior, perhaps the more challenging aspect of this gift is the
reality that living in the light of Christ not only means living as a
forgivEN person but also living as a forgivING person.
Forgiveness
is a good theme for a new year for what good does it do us to enter
this new year with past grievances being held over or wondering
whether or not we ourselves can ever be forgiven for our own
transgressions? Perhaps you've heard this saying, harboring anger or
a lack of forgiveness against another person is like drinking poison
and expecting the other person to die. We think the venom that we
hold against another person is hurting them when all the while what
it is doing is eating us up from the inside out.
A
teacher once told each of her students to bring a clear plastic bag
and a sack of potatoes to school. They were instructed to call to
mind every person they had a grudge against. For every person they
refused to forgive, they chose a potato, wrote on it the name and
date, and put it in the plastic bag. They were told to carry this
bag with them everywhere, putting it beside their bed at night, on
the car seat when driving, on their lap when riding, next to their
desk during classes. Some bags became quite heavy. Lugging this
around, paying attention to it all the time, and remembering not to
leave it in embarrassing places was a hassle. Over time the potatoes
became moldy, smelly, and began to sprout "eyes." The
metaphor becomes obvious, right? Think how great it would be to stop
carrying around a bag of stinking, rotten, hurts. Often we think of
forgiveness as a gift to the other person, but it clearly is a gift
to ourselves.
I
know what many of you are thinking however. You are thinking, well,
it's easy enough to say this, but you don't know what I've been
through. I have hurts so deep, betrayals so profound that there is
no way I could ever think about forgiving those offenses. Except
that I do know how you feel. I do know the pain of unresolved hurt
and wounds that don't easily heal. I do know that nurturing anger
and resentment feels pretty good for awhile, protective, secure. But
the problem with it is that it also makes you hard, angry, unable to
trust, eventually even unable to love and be fully loved. That's why
we have to remember the profound love of God in Christ and embrace
that first. The only way we are able to forgive the deep hurts that
have wounded us so significantly is to more deeply experience the
unconditional grace that knowing Christ offers us. In Christ, we can
find the safety and security that we need in order to forgive another
person. God knows that if we can come to a place in our lives where
we are able to forgive others, then we will also be much freer to
love others with the love of God but also to experience in a much
richer manner the love He has for us.
But
God also knows and understands the painful road that some of us have
walked and wants to enter into the journey to forgiveness with us.
Perhaps you want to forgive someone for an injury that they have
caused and yet the hurt is too deep, the pain is fresh and the wound
perhaps even still open. You want to forgive but you have no idea
how to do so and so carrying the burden has simply become a way of
life that you feel is impossible to change. But the good news is
this: It is not impossible to change. Jesus is acutely aware the
pain that you have suffered and has great compassion for the scars in
our lives that won't fully heal. Jesus wants nothing more than for
us to be freed from past hurts that hinder us from knowing him better
and loving others more fully. So as we seek to take steps in this
new year towards a life that is closer to God and one another, let's
remember a few key things about living a life of forgiveness rather
than one that carries grudges.
First
and foremost, it is important to note that our ability to forgive
takes time. It does not happen overnight and sometimes it cannot
occur in the moment that it is asked for. God understands this.
What is important for each of us however is to nurture a desire to
forgive even in the midst of the seasons of our lives when
forgiveness is elusive. This requires that we focus on God's grace
instead of nurturing our feelings of anger, hurt and resentment. As
we focus on God's grace, we begin to cultivate a spirit of
forgiveness in our hearts as opposed to allowing a bitter root to
take hold in our hearts. Bring your struggle before the Lord. Ask
him for the courage to eventually forgive the one who has hurt you so
deeply. Remember, we were full of darkness, but now we are full of
light. Allow the light of Christ's grace and love to flood your life
and eventually you will see how that spills over into your
relationships.
Secondly,
remember that forgiving someone does not mean that you are saying
that what they did was all right. What they did is not all right.
It was wrong and it will always be wrong. Extending forgiveness does
not turn the hurtful act into a righteous one. But by extending
forgiveness to the one that hurt you, you are acknowledging the
painful history that you share but also saying that you are no longer
harboring the depth of pain or bitterness that was brought upon you
by their actions. But this may also mean that new boundaries and
rules for engaging the person who injured you may need to be put in
place. Because forgiving another does not mean that there aren't
still very real consequences to some of the pain caused by others.
Forgiveness does not remove those consequences but by forgiving, you
are extending the grace that has been extended to you by Christ to
the one who hurt you. Again, this takes time but if you can get on
the road that moves you closer and closer to this moment, you will
reap the benefits of letting go of the hurt that dwells so deeply in
your spirit. You will know when you are beginning to forgive someone
when you can begin to genuinely wish them well even when there may
still be lingering pain as a result of their actions towards you.
A
third reality when it comes to forgiveness is that sometimes when you
forgive a past hurt, the relationship can be restored, other times it
cannot. Forgiveness can take place even if the relationship cannot
be healed. At times, such as in cases of abuse, it becomes obvious
that a continued relationship would actually be more hurtful to the
one who suffered the abuse. Sometimes we are unable to forgive
because we feel that our forgiveness means we have to subject
ourselves to more pain and abuse. That is never God's intention for
us. God intends that we live as whole, safe, loved people so while
that may mean some relationships need to be severed, it does not mean
that we have to carry the guilt, the hurt, the burdens or the grudges
with us. Forgiveness does not always lead to a healed relationship.
Some people are not capable of love, and it might be wise to let them
go along with your anger. Wish them well, and let them go their way.
If
we can begin to see that our ability to forgive is actually part of
the way that God shows his mercy to us perhaps it makes it a bit
easier to move towards forgiveness. Our ability to forgive is
merciful because being an unforgiving person only hurts ourselves.
Not forgiving another does not make the pain go away, in fact it
causes it go deeper for through our grudges we carry reminders of the
hurt with us at all times. One writer acknowledges that “it is
unnatural to forgive from a human perspective. And it can only
happen by living in the stream of God's forgiveness. And as hard as
it may be to forgive, remember that it is actually harder to not
forgive and live a life that is marked with bitterness, resentment,
and vengeance which ultimately leads to an emotional, spiritual and
even sometimes physical death.”
So
in the end, forgiving someone does not mean that you are saying that
it's OK what they did to you. It is not OK. It is saying, because
God has poured out his grace in my life, and because God has forgiven
me, through the power of his light shining in my life, I am now
willing and able to extend the same to you. It's hard. It takes
time, sometimes a long time. But if we are able to forgive another,
we will experience the richness of God's grace in our own life in a
much more profound manner and we will know the joy that comes from
dying to our anger and living in the light and love of Jesus Christ.
What
a great way to begin the new year...living more fully in the stream
of God's grace. I can't really think of a better New Year's
resolution than to be both forgiven and forgiving for I do believe
that the Queen was right when she said that forgiveness lies at the
heart of the Christian faith. Forgiveness can heal broken families,
it can restore friendships and it can reconcile divided communities.
For it is in forgiveness that we feel the power of God's love.
And
so my sincere prayer for each of us at this new year begins is that
we may know in deeper and more profound ways the depths of God's
unconditional love and forgiveness and that we may be able to extend
that love and forgiveness to another. We are people of light. May
God's light shine brightly through us. Amen.
Posts
It's a little weird when an entire part of your history is gone. Still, the memories of our time in that house and neighborhood are warm and inviting. Our neighbors remain close friends whose kids are all grown up now but we treasure those years of living next door to one another. 
The entire area has changed tremendously with retail outlets everywhere. But it has been 13.5 years since we lived there so I guess the old adage that life goes on truly fits.
