The Fine Wine Of Forgiveness, Part 1
The more serious the wrong, the harder it is to forgive; so don't rush it
The first in a short series of articles on the subject of forgiveness
Once I knew there was a love divine
Then came a time I thought it knew me not
Who can forgive forgiveness where forgiveness is not
Only the lamb as white as snow
We Christians love a forgiveness story. The (often tearful) testimony of a person able to forgive someone who has done a major, hard-to-quantify, wrong to them is undeniably moving and inspiring. For Christians such a story affirms a central part of our faith; it gives flesh and blood to something we commit ourselves to every time we say the Lord's Prayer. It prods our conscience, gives us a modicum of hope that we don't have to get stuck in a cycle of resentment and anger, and goes a little way to making the world a better place.
Forgiveness is also something like a fine wine. When it's done right, it's complex, surprising, and makes any situation a bit better. But there are two equal and opposite dangers.
One is the danger of opening the bottle - or filling it - too soon. Trying to finish the process before it's actually complete out of an eager desire to taste the fruits, please those who'll be tasting it, or just to get the job done and move on to something else. We want the healing story, the tearful testimony. Here the talk of forgiveness at the heart of our faith has nagged us into action before we're ready and it’s rushed through, ticked off the list.
Forgiveness is hard, and like almost everything that's difficult it by definition can't be rushed. A popular misconception is that forgiveness implies overlooking wrong - which is an understandable but nonetheless serious misunderstanding. It's hard precisely because of the depth of the wrong done; it's hard because it involves accepting, articulating, and enumerating that a wrong has been done. It involves the work of wading through the filth and the mess before you get to the refreshing cleanliness of the other side.
Naming, and articulating this wrong and its impact can't be rushed and has to be done properly if the remaking that comes on the other side of forgiveness is to have any hope of lasting. A country trying to rebuild after war, a relationship seeking restoration after trust has been broken, and a community trying to reshape after trauma all have to know what they're forgiving in order to do the forgiving. God, outside of time and also dramatically limiting Himself within it through Jesus, knows, enumerates, feels, experiences, and touches the schism and scars of sin before He enables a mechanism for forgiveness available for all. He's resolutely unhurried, gloriously and thankfully moving to His own unheard rhythm.
Where the big issues are concerned, forgiveness is hard. If it isn't, it isn't forgiveness. The pain hasn't been named, the hurt not enumerated, the responsibility not understood. To do so sells the victim short, builds the forgiven future on shaky foundations and sets everyone involved up for failure.
The next article will look at a second, equal but different danger in regard to forgiveness.