Forgiveness

Listen: “All Apologies” by Nirvana

Forgiveness sounds like a great idea. Most people believe the world would be a better place with more forgiveness. Most people love to receive forgiveness from God or others for any harm they have caused. But, forgiveness gets exponentially more complicated when it comes to actually forgiving someone else (or even ourselves) for hurting us deeply.

One complication is that we love to be right. There is a saying: “The world is divided into people who think they are right.” End of quote. Sometimes we can feel hurt simply because someone disagrees with our views on politics, religion, or fashion. For some people, being right is more important than love, and they can quickly slip into blaming other people who are wrong (everybody but themselves) for their own problems and the problems in the world.

But there is a deeper complication with forgiveness. How do we forgive ourselves when we hate ourselves? How do we forgive someone who has wounded, betrayed, or abused us? Forgiveness is not always easy. Forgiveness does not always feel safe. If we forgive our abuser, does that open us up to further abuse? If we forgive our betrayer, does that make them right and us wrong? What about justice? Shouldn’t they suffer for what they have done?

Over the course of my life, I would consider myself as someone who was always “quick to forgive.” Quick to forgive others for sure. Sometimes I would “beat myself up” emotionally before I forgave myself. Certainly, I was harder on myself than others, but I valued forgiveness and lived without resentments. In addition, I can’t count the number of sermons I delivered on forgiveness.

That all changed a few years ago when I went through an emotional hell on earth. My heart was filled with anger, humiliation, and shame. Forgiveness seemed impossible.

Forgiveness of self. I was filled with anger, first and foremost, towards myself. I had failed to live up to my own standards. I had a personal meltdown due to a mixture of insomnia, ministry burnout, addiction, and an unhappy marriage. My personal failures were broadcast publicly around the world, and I wanted to disappear or die. I hated myself.

Fortunately, I had some close friends and family who loved me through it. I had preached God’s forgiveness my whole life, but in my darkest moments I felt abandoned by God. I started sharing my deepest, darkest failures with my therapist, close friends, and new friends I found in recovery groups. Shame had engulfed me; but, as I shared with my sponsor, my therapist, and my friends, they loved me despite my failures.

They modeled God’s love for me. They modeled forgiveness for me. Sharing my shame with loving people helped me regain confidence in forgiveness and compassion for my own self. A couple of bad years didn’t have to define the rest of my life. Forgiveness, I found, is best experienced in a loving community of forgiving people.

Forgiveness of others. Anger and resentment can feel like protective armor. It can protect us (we think) from future hurt, future abuse, or future powerlessness. Anger certainly needs to be heard, understood, and processed with safe people (like a therapist, sponsor, or close friend); but anger and resentment is not the cure for a wounded heart.

In the recovery world, resentment is a danger to sobriety and spiritual health. “Resentment is the ‘number one’ offender. It destroys more alcoholics than anything else. From it stem all forms of spiritual disease, for we have been not only mentally and physically ill, we have been spiritually sick. When the spiritual malady is overcome, we straighten out mentally and physically” (Alcoholics Anonymous, p. 64).

An old adage: “Resentment is like swallowing rat poison and hoping the rat will die.” Forgiveness frees our heart from the damaging affects of resentment and bitterness. In some ways, forgiveness is simply letting go of what the other person owes us. It doesn’t mean the other person is right. It doesn’t mean you become a doormat and let someone abuse you again. Forgiveness can be accompanied by healthy boundaries and tough love.

Forgiveness of God, the Universe, and Reality. This may sound odd to some people, but I think it is important. Shit happens. At times it feels like God or the Universe has conspired against us. Forgiveness of almost everything seems to be in order if we are going to press into love, beauty, creativity, and social justice—forgiveness of God, the Universe, Circumstances, Accidents, Injuries, Genocides, Tornadoes, Diseases, and Pandemics. Not to live in passivity and inaction, but to move forward in life with the grace of acceptance without the burden of resentment. It’s a way of making peace with Reality—What Is—dealing with life on life’s terms.

Richard Rohr reflects: “Our first forgiveness is not toward a particular sin or offense. Our first forgiveness, it seems to me, is toward reality itself: to forgive it for being so broken, a mixture of good and bad. First that paradox has to be overcome inside of us. Then, when we allow God to hold together the opposites within us, it becomes possible to do it over there in our neighbor and even our enemy” (“Including Everything,” can.org, August 31, 2017).

Forgiveness is a process. It’s a commitment to a lifestyle of forgiveness. Forgiveness is central to wholeness, health, and spiritual wellbeing. It is essential for healing nations, families, and individuals. As Jesus taught us to pray: “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us” (Matthew 6:12).

Shalom

©realfredherron, 2023