FORGIVENESS

I was listening to my brother and sister-in-law’s podcast All Secure. The guest they had on, Bryce Mahoney, spoke at length on being able to forgive oneself, as well as others. This really hit home for me, because I have been the recipient of some major league forgiveness, and I still struggle with the concept.

I read a very short Essay on Forgiveness, by C.S. Lewis. As usual, he wrote with clarity and brevity. He points out the difference between forgiveness of sins, and being excused for what we’ve done.
“I find that when I think I am asking God to forgive me I am often in reality (unless I
watch myself very carefully) asking Him to do something quite different. I am asking
him not to forgive me but to excuse me. But there is all the difference in the world
between forgiving and excusing. Forgiveness says, “Yes, you have done this thing, but
I accept your apology; I will never hold it against you and everything between us two
will be exactly as it was before.” If one was not really to blame then there is nothing
to forgive.”

Later on in that paragraph he wrote, “…what we call “asking God’s forgiveness” very often really consists in asking God to accept our excuses.” I thought on that for quite a bit. It rang true, like the clear, sweet sound of crystal. We are really good at making excuses for ourselves. So much so that we can convince ourselves that we have asked God to accept our excuses, and that equals forgiveness.

C.S. Lewis says there are two remedies.
“One is to remember that God knows all the real excuses very much better than we
do. If there are real “extenuating circumstances” there is no fear that He will overlook
them. Often He must know many excuses that we have never even thought of, and
therefore humble souls will, after death, have the delightful surprise of discovering
that on certain occasions they sinned much less than they thought. All the real
excusing He will do. What we have got to take to Him is the inexcusable bit, the sin.
We are only wasting our time talking about all the parts which can (we think) be
excused.”
Knowing that God is omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent, there is nothing He doesn’t know. We can deceive ourselves, but we can’t deceive Him. So as Lewis wrote, we have to focus on the the inexcusable part. The actual sin.

Lewis writes that the second remedy is to fully believe in the forgiveness of sins. We make excuses because we don’t fully believe that. We do that with our friends, we do that with our spouses, we do that with ourselves. We need to set aside our excuses and see the sin in all of its aspects. We need to face the all the pain we’ve caused, without excuse. Our actions are like ripples in a pond. they extend out from ourselves and affect others. The further out they get, the more intertwined they become, making things appear more complicated than they really are. Go back to the action that caused the ripple. Acknowledge the horror, the pain, the dirty, mean nasty things that happened due to our choice.

When we do that, you would think that we would decide that we cannot forgive ourselves. But if we fully believe in the forgiveness of sins, then we have to forgive ourselves. If we don’t we do not fully believe in the forgiveness of sins. We then believe in an imperfect God. This is a logical fallacy that we adopt because of our insecurity. If you have a child, then you understand this.

As a parent, you love your child, no matter what they do. They will do stupid, hurtful, and sometimes insanely evil things. Yet you will still love them. You don’t like their actions, you may be hurt by their actions, but you still love them. God is the perfect embodiment of love. There fore there is nothing you could do to damage that love.

If you acknowledge what you have done, in all of its aspects, all of its horror, malice and dirtiness, and believe that God is Perfect Love, then you can ask for forgiveness and receive it. Once you have asked for it, then you need to work to prevent a re-occurrence. You may fail, as human beings are wont to do, but through that process of acknowledgment, asking for forgiveness, and working to do better, we grow.

I will mention my own experience in this. Twenty plus years ago, I made the decision to be unfaithful to my wife. I definitely made excuses. Robin and I had gone through a miscarriage and had both grown apart, she was distant, the woman I was involved with was rumored to be a serial adulteress, and on and on. The bottom line was that I had committed a mortal sin. I had forsaken a vow I had made in front of a large group of people, one I made to God, her and myself. My infidelity hurt her, it hurt my daughters, one who was a newborn infant, my family, her family, it hurt my school community, and my faith community. This ripples had spread much farther than I could ever have thought.

My self-realization was actually activated by a close friend, Mike Schill, who has since passed. He asked me, “What are you doing?” That simple question began my forgiveness process. That question was the start of a conversation in which he guided me to look at all that I was doing. The next month or so was appalling. Talking to family members and friends, I saw the pain I had caused. The lies and other behaviors were not as good as I thought (They never are!). People knew what I was doing. I was well-known in the church and school. They knew when my wife and I separated. They knew why I was at a new address. They knew why I was distracted, moody, and angry all the time.

My path back was to let Robin know I realized what I had done, and that I was sorry. I then began the long, laborious path of trying to save our marriage. If that vow meant anything, then I had to make the decisions in which I would validate that vow. It was not easy, by any means. Like people in Alcoholics Anonymous, I had to go to everyone I hurt to apologize, and make amends where I could.

My wife had to borrow money from her parents for the first time in her life. She had both girls and the house, but she had gone from two paychecks to one. I paid her father Bob back for that loan, and apologized for hurting his daughter and granddaughters. At our wedding, Bob told me as he handed her to me that he would snap my neck if I ever hurt her. That was definitely in the back of my mind as I apologized.

I was the recipient of Amazing Grace. Robin, despite all I had put her, Jessica and Carole through, forgave me, and decided our vows were important enough to make it true. She accepted me back and we have worked for twenty-plus years to not just repair our relationship, but make it grow and thrive. C.S. Lewis wrote, “This(forgiveness) doesn’t mean that you must necessarily believe his next promise. It does mean that you must make every effort to kill every taste of resentment in your own heart – every wish to humiliate or hurt him or to pay him out.” Robin has never done this, ever.

I have struggled doing the same for myself, but it is something I try to do every day. If she can forgive me, if God can forgive me, then I have to be able to forgive myself. If I don’t, I am spitting on God’s Love, on Robin’s love. In the Lord’s Prayer we say, “Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.” If God means what He says, then this is pretty straight forward.

The mystery of God’s love is one I think about every day. I want to believe in a God whose Love is so great that He can forgive a serial killer, if that serial killer acknowledges his sins and asks for forgiveness. That Perfect Love is for everyone, even me, even if I don’t think I deserve it.

Thanks you Robin, for, in this instance, being the perfect example of God’s Love on earth. Thank You, Lord, for your Perfect Love, and I pray every day for the Grace to continue to be worthy of Your Love.