How Overestimating Forgiveness Led Me To Underestimate The Gospel
For years I understood the word forgiveness as synonymous with the word reconciliation.
This understanding emphasized peace over justice, often negating the importance of healthy boundaries while simultaneously platforming a “peace at all costs” mentality.
But, to quote the late Tim Keller, “There [is]…no conflict between loving forgiveness and the pursuit of justice.”
In misunderstanding forgiveness, I linked acts like graciousness, compassion, and mercy into the very words that defined the term.
To me, forgiveness was an end in itself, one that resulted in reconciliation and undermined justice. But in overestimating forgiveness, I underestimated the gospel.
This may sound counterintuitive, as forgiveness is a thread that has both tied history together and allowed it to break apart.
Nations rise and fall around grudges, hate, and the ability or inability to forgive. It’s the basis of Christianity.
But there’s much less to forgiveness, and therefore much more, than I realized.
In evangelical circles, with a major focus placed on our sinfulness (we are) and on God’s grace (he is gracious), it’s simple to affirm forgiveness as conjoining the two and manifesting reconciliation as a natural result.
Forgiveness is taught in a variety of ways, from the classic forgive and forget, to saying forgiveness means not bringing up the offense to yourself, not bringing up the offense to the other person, and not bringing up the offense to anyone else.
At first glance, these could pass as a different version of the phrases “move on,” “get over it,” or “don’t gossip.” However, in practice, this seems to border on a much blunter definition: forget it, don’t discuss it, and keep it secret.
Which sounds eerily similar to what an abuser might say. “This is our little secret. Don’t tell anyone.” Or perhaps, “We’re just going to forget this happened and move on.”
Regardless of intentions, in understanding forgiveness in this way, I began to nonconsciously (to borrow a term from psychiatrist and author Curt Thompson) underestimate the gospel I said I believed.
If to forgive is to forget (and if one forgets what another has done, they must move forward in relationship as if the past simply does not exist), forgiveness must lead to reconciliation.
While forgiveness is a prerequisite for reconciliation, the two are not synonymous.
In missing this fact, I missed God’s heart for justice, the depths of Jesus’ suffering, and belittled his love.
To help, a definition. Merriam-Webster defines forgiveness as a verb: to cease to feel resentment against (an offender). When reading this definition, you might feel an immense drop in your shoulders.
I can cease to feel resentment, that’s all? I don’t have to bring the other person back into my life, trust them, confide in them, or desire relationship with them, to forgive? Forgiveness is simply forgoing resentment, not another term for reconciling?
Once again, a definition. Merriam-Webster defines the term reconcile as: to restore friendship or harmony, and, to cause to submit to or accept something unpleasant.
Can these two terms truly be untangled, rather than used interchangeably? Or is this conjoined definition of forgiveness a wise way to steward a life, and a true way to experience Jesus?
To answer these questions, it’s necessary to start with a biblical definition of forgiveness.
Forgiveness in the Bible
The first time the word forgive appears in the Bible is in the last chapter of Genesis and used in a lie for the advantage of the ones speaking on forgiveness.
Genesis 50 shows Joseph’s brothers coming to him, lying about their father’s dying words by telling Joseph their father said, “This is what you are to say to Joseph: I ask you to forgive your brothers the sins and the wrongs they committed in treating you so badly.’”
It appears Joseph sees through their lies, but nevertheless, his response is deeply emotional. “‘Don’t be afraid. I will provide for you and your children.’ And he reassured them and spoke kindly to them.”
Joseph, the ruler of Egypt, embodied the Merriam-Webster definition of forgiveness—he had ceased to feel resentment against his brothers, the ones who had sold him into slavery.
But secondarily, he portrayed Merriam-Webster’s definition of reconciliation and restored harmony by “accepting something unpleasant.”
To say Joseph accepted his brothers’ treatment as unpleasant is an understatement, as they literally sold Joseph into slavery.
The second reference to the word forgive is in Exodus and includes Pharaoh imploring Moses to ask God to grant him forgiveness as well as to take away the consequence of his sin.
We see in Pharaoh’s request (Exodus 10:17) that forgiveness and consequences are not always mutually exclusive:
“Now forgive my sin once more and pray to the Lord your God to take this deadly plague away from me.” (emphasis added)
The last book in the Old Testament presents an interesting angle of forgiveness. Micah 7:18 says,
“Who is a God like you, who pardons sin and forgives the transgression of the remnant of his inheritance? You do not stay angry forever but delight to show mercy.”
Notice the breakdown. The transgression is separate from the people who committed the transgression. There are three separate acts going on:
· A pardoning for sin
· A forgiving of the people’s actions
· A delight in showing mercy
Moving to the New Testament, forgiveness takes a serious turn. Just six chapters in, we are told to pray,
“‘And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.’ . . . If you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.”
Forgiveness is crucial, serious, and not be taken lightly. Jackie Hill Perry, in her book Holier Than Thou, says, “We had to be forgiven so that we can know God.” Without forgiveness, there can be no reconciliation. No relationship.
She goes on to say, “We know almost instinctively that the guilty must be punished until the guilty one is us.”
It’s easy to feel similar, especially if I refuse to consider life from the guilty one’s perspective, feel empathy, or engage in curiosity.
Here’s the thing about forgiveness though. Justice and forgiveness can coincide, just as forgiveness and reconciliation are not a single act. We see this evidenced on the cross.
Enter, justice.
Unraveling Forgiveness
When Jesus hung from bleeding wrists, back pressed against the rough wood of the cross, feet nailed in place, he was doing what Sunday school teachers often teach children: bearing the weight of justice so we can experience the freedom of forgiveness.
God chose to forgive in the same moment he chose justice, which was a great injustice on Jesus.
In choosing to forgive via the cross, God both enabled a path to relationship with those who would accept the reality of their offense against him while simultaneously enabling his justice to be satisfied by the only one who could embody it and still ultimately live—Jesus.
As a friend once told me, “Actions that require forgiveness always have consequences.”
Tim Keller, in his book Forgive: Why Should I and How Can I, said,
“It is this apparent tension between God’s holiness and his love—between the necessity that sin be punished and the desire for sinners to be delivered—that becomes the basis for the forgiveness that God appoints, achieves, and offers to us. It is one that equally honors justice and mercy.”
There is so much more to the gospel than forgiveness.
Jesus’ act on the cross was not just forgiveness, and the positive repercussions of his act on the cross are not exclusively forgiveness.
To restrict the greatest sacrifice of all time to a word described as “cease to feel resentment” undermines the lengths God chose to go in his love for us, as well as undermines his heart for justice.
The gospel proves it is possible to hold dichotomies together.
Keller also said, “Forgiveness means the cost of the wrong moves from the perpetrator to you, and you bear it. Forgiveness, then, is a form of voluntary suffering.”
Jesus suffered so that God could serve out justice for sin without it ever touching us. That was mercy.
But, forgiveness alone does not demand that he provide the opportunity for relationship. That was grace.
Why he chose to extend mercy and grace is because he loved us. So here we have love, sacrifice, mercy, and grace, all stacked on forgiveness.
Forgiveness is often the start, the stepping stone, that can lead to a host of other positive acts, but it does not always include them.
The Consequences of Forgiveness
There are stories of individuals who chose to forgive those responsible for horrific injustice. Louis Zamperani, Corrie Ten Boom, Viktor Frankl, and Elisabeth Elliot come to mind.
Elisabeth Elliot went so far as to pursue relationship with those who murdered her husband. For her, forgiveness was the first step that set her on a jungle path to extending mercy and even compassion.
Empathy was likely a contributing factor to her choice, which Alfred Adler (founder of the school of individual psychology) defined as,
“Seeing with the eyes of another, listening with the ears of another, and feeling with the heart of another.”
To empathize with an offender takes immense humility, an often necessary element of forgiveness, and in some respects, a laying down of insecurity. Daryl Van Tongeren, in his book, Humble, says,
“We hustle to collect evidence of our worthiness rather than believing that we are inherently enough. In the process, we act defensively to maintain a positive view of ourselves, which in turn wreaks havoc on our relationships.”
When we understand we are inherently enough, simply because of the suffering and love of Jesus on the cross, it takes away the tension of proving this is the case.
It’s easy to pursue justice against another out of a desire to prove our worthiness of being treated a specific way, when in reality, worthiness is already ours.
However, in many cases, regardless of how we view ourselves, justice is necessary and can even highlight the cost of forgiveness given.
Rachael Denhollander’s statement during the Larry Nassar trial is a prime example of forgiveness and justice taking place simultaneously:
“I pray you experience the soul crushing weight of guilt so you may someday experience true repentance and true forgiveness from God, which you need far more than forgiveness from me—though I extend that to you as well.”
Forgiveness often manifests in pain on the part of the one forgiving because to truly forgive, we must truly acknowledge the offense.
The depth of pain Jesus endured shows the great lengths God went to forgive us.
There is no doubt that the names I mentioned above carried the physical and emotional scarring of what they forgave. In forgiving, they looked the perpetrator square in the face, in some cases literally, recognizing at once both the perpetrator’s horrific acts and humanity.
This, in itself, is a form of mercy. In his book, How To Know a Person, David Brooks says,
“Human beings need recognition as much as they need food and water. No crueler punishment can be devised than to not see someone, to render them unimportant or invisible.”
And then there are examples of those who engage but do not pursue depth of relationship. Jesus, during his earthly ministry, is an example of this in John 2:24.
Whether fortunately or unfortunately, there isn’t a black and white path extending from the crossroads of forgiveness. For those forgiven, we are called to forgive. That much is clear.
But the steps resulting from forgiveness can be confusing and even painful.
Truth is often complex and denial simple. Deep offenses are often multilayered, confusing, and disorienting.
To squelch the pain of facing reality, the dissonance of right and wrong, or the struggle of pain and healing, it may feel easier to look at an offense as unworthy of justice or simply a slight to move on from.
But this bypasses the reality of sin, the suffering of Jesus, and the mercy of God. After all, every offense we endure is one Jesus suffered for. And so here we find God in the nuance of pain.
The gospel is so much more than forgiveness. It is extreme mercy, utter compassion, and grace for our very human state.
When I look at this gospel, I see that forgiveness is not synonymous with forgetting. Neither it is not synonymous with reconciliation, but it is a step that can lead to it.
Whatever the road from forgiveness looks like, it will not undermine our holy calling to do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with the author of it all.