The Prayer of St. Francis has always been very special to me. In a series of entries over the next couple of weeks I plan to break down each line and what it means to me.
"Where there is inury, pardon"
And you thought that dealing with hatred was bad. Suffering through hatred is not half as bad as learning to forgive. There is nothing in life that we hold onto harder than a grudge...money does come in a close second. The worst part of all is that I can't remember half as many of the injuries that I have caused as grudges that I hold.
Forgiving another person goes against every built-in mechanism that we humans have. We are survivors. We look out for "number 1." We protect what is ours. We are proud of what we do. So, when someone attacks us, our natural instinct is to do one of two things:
- Fight back
- Go all armadillo and protect ourselves
Either way, the grudge is only minutes away. If you fight back, you may feel good about what you did for a second, but then the original hurt of the attack is compounded by the hurt felt because of the confrontation. This kind of hurt usually manifests itself as animosity. If you curl up like a roly poly bug, it's only a matter of time before you have to come out of your shell and face the world. This kind of hurt usually builds up until you snap.
The memory of being hurt last much longer than the memory of hurting another. It's natural for our mind to sweep that up in the dustpan with the periodic table and long division...things once important but now forgotten. You say something to someone and you might not see them again for years.
For the one that is hurt, things are much different. I still remember a specific day in high school that hurts me to my core. We were getting changed for a Friday football game during my junior year and I had been one of the people in charge of teaching the routine to the band during the week. We were called the Brain Trust.
After putting on my oh-so-dapper uniform, I stopped to remind a fellow band member about a specific routine with which they had a problem grasping. Halfway through my sentence I was interupted by the guy as he spat at me, "Shut up, you fat fuck." If I'm being honest with myself, that still hurts.
I was an armadillo. I hurried away into the hallway like I had something else to do. It took everything that I had to keep from losing it. I was a fragile young man. I was self-conscious and self-loathing. I was, indeed, fat. I was also loud, obnoxious, and a know-it-all. (I wouldn't learn until adulthood that I suffered from chemical depresison and A.D.D.)
I didn't forgive that classmate for years. I never told him that I forgave him and he didn't ask, but the minute I said it to myself, I felt so much better. He had never apologized and still never has. He is a facebook friend of mine, so I guess that he may read this. If he does, I want him to know that he is forgiven.
The 20th century author and theologian Lewis Smedes said it best:
To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you.
Forgiveness, as it relates to this prayer, is very easy for some and even harder than forgiving another person for others. "Lord, make me more like you. Where I have been hurt, let me forgive without regret." That's how Jesus forgives. If we are to become an instrument of His peace, what is required of us is actively forgiving ourselves and others with wreckless abandon.
God's forgiveness through Jesus is free and absolute. Mark 2:1-12 is one of my favorite stories of the outright boldness of Christ's forgiving nature.
Mark 2
A Paraplegic
1-5 After a few days, Jesus returned to Capernaum, and word got around that he was back home. A crowd gathered, jamming the entrance so no one could get in or out. He was teaching the Word. They brought a paraplegic to him, carried by four men. When they weren't able to get in because of the crowd, they removed part of the roof and lowered the paraplegic on his stretcher. Impressed by their bold belief, Jesus said to the paraplegic, "Son, I forgive your sins."
6-7Some religion scholars sitting there started whispering among themselves, "He can't talk that way! That's blasphemy! God and only God can forgive sins."
8-12Jesus knew right away what they were thinking, and said, "Why are you so skeptical? Which is simpler: to say to the paraplegic, 'I forgive your sins,' or say, 'Get up, take your stretcher, and start walking'? Well, just so it's clear that I'm the Son of Man and authorized to do either, or both . . ." (he looked now at the paraplegic), "Get up. Pick up your stretcher and go home." And the man did it—got up, grabbed his stretcher, and walked out, with everyone there watching him. They rubbed their eyes, incredulous—and then praised God, saying, "We've never seen anything like this!" (
Mark 2:1-12,
The Message)
In order to truly feel God's forgiveness, you have to acknowledge your sin. That's the hard part. Nothing is as hard as saying to God, "Jesus...I'm really sorry...but I like to watch porn on Al Gore's information superhighway." I jest, but what about these:
- "Jesus, I'm truly sorry that I stole that cash from my coworker."
- "Lord, please forgive me for not telling my mother that I loved her before she died."
- God, I wish that I never would have started doing coke...but I did. Please forgive me for all of the hurt that I caused so many people."
It's sometimes hard to figure out when you truly mean it. I knew that I finally wanted God's forgiveness when I had the strength to face the people that I had hurt and ask for forgiveness. I knew that God had already forgiven me; now I just wanted to start a relationship anew.
I hope that my wife doesn't mind me telling this story. 14 years ago, just after we started dating, she wrote a letter to a friend of hers saying that she didn't feel like they could be friends anymore. She told her that she was moving on with her life and that this friend was no longer going to be part of it.
She hadn't thought about it for years. Earlier this year, she was on facebook and saw the person's profile. She friended her and waited to be accepted. What she had no way of knowing is that this former friend was hurt very profoundly by what my wife had written. Her response to Amy was, "Is this a joke?"
After a couple of messages back and forth, they agreed that they should meet. We all met at the zoo and I was not wanting to be there. I was, after all, one of the big reasons that Amy had written that letter in the first place.
When they saw each other, and hugged for a long, long time, it was evident that a powerful forgiving had happened. They both teared up and we spent the entire day catching up. We have since gone on two weekend vacations with them.
The friend had been hurt and had held onto that for more than ten years. By accepting Amy's apology, a huge cloud was lifted.
Some things just seem to horrible to forgive. Maybe you were abused, exploited or even raped. Turn to Jesus. He's not only good at forgiving your sins; he's pretty good at helping you forgive others, too.
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