Forgive

Jesus is going to hit on the forgiveness theme a whole bunch over these next couple of weeks, which is kind of annoying when I want to just be grumpy for a while.

We spent some time on Sunday brainstorming definitions for forgiveness. The congregation came up with:

• Understanding
• Handing it over to God
• Love 
• Acceptance
• To move on
• A Gift to yourself
• An emptying of holding onto the wrong
• Wanting the person to be free from suffering and wanting the best for them
• Comfort
• Freedom
• Strength to acknowledge your own faults and recognizing how your actions affects others
• Moving on with no grudges
• Letting go
• Hard to ask for and to give. Praise God we are forgiven
• Laying down your anger and freeing yourself
• Letting go of a grievance and not having that issue being the first or only thing you think of when you see or interact with them

There were more, but I got tired of typing. I've enjoyed having a chat question instead of sharing the peace during worship. That's one positive thing about Zoom.

I'm still thinking about what forgiveness means, especially right now when everyone seems so angry.

I would define forgiveness as not allowing a person or event to tyrannize your story and identity.

Forgiveness is the freedom from being defined by others and what they do to you. 

My prime identity is as a beloved child of God; everything else I may choose to bind to myself or let it go. Stewing in anger and bitterness steals so much life from us and gives so much power to those who hurt us; forgiveness restores power to ourselves and frees us to be defined by God's grace not another's wounding. 

There's more than that, but in the midst of so much anger I want to sit with that thought for a bit and share a prayer from the ELW Prayer Book for the Armed Services:

Lord God, when we are assaulted by the troubles of life, and the deep waters of anger threaten to overwhelm us, do not let us sink. In your great compassion, hear us and help us. Deliver us from anger's power over us. Lead us out of bitter silence and hurtful words so that we may speak the truth in love. Heal every heart set on vengeance, and show us the way to honesty and reconciliation; through the one who has shown us both impassioned zeal and forgiving love, Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord.

Amen.