Forgiveness by Renae Miller

Talking about forgiveness this week, this verse comes to mind from Matthew 22:

Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me? Up to seven times?”

22Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.

After these words, Jesus goes on to discuss the parable of the unmerciful servant, where one person is forgiven a lot of debt and then refuses to forgive a much smaller amount of debt from the person who owes him, which is meant to point to the great amount of debt we have to God that God forgives—the relatively much smaller amount of debt others owe us which we should then be able to forgive.

There are a lot of things that could be said about these verses or this parable, but one of the main things that I take away from it is that Peter was coming to ask Jesus about forgiveness- it was most definitely not the other way around. One could argue that Peter was only asking because he was trying to find out if he could get away with just a little bit of forgiveness or if he could get away with not forgiving someone after a few times of forgiving them. These words from Jesus would indicate that forgiveness is meant to be almost limitless. The unending forgiveness is what I have heard focused on a lot of times in this passage.

But I think an equally important aspect of this passage is that Jesus was not just going around telling someone who had just been hurt to forgive the person who hurt them. In Matthew 6 in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says to forgive each other in the context of when he is teaching people how to pray, but he doesn’t immediately confront someone who has just been hurt and tells them to forgive.

Lots of times we do that, though, don’t we? I think as humans, we are tempted to hurry up and quiet down someone who is hurting. As Christians, people are often tempted to tell someone to hurry up and forgive the one who hurt them- almost as if we are speaking for Jesus and demanding forgiveness with an immediate urgency.

I love this picture of Peter asking Jesus how much he needs to forgive. I want to believe that Peter is wrestling with his own soul about forgiveness that might be needed in his life. He plainly knows that forgiveness is an expectation- he knows that forgiving at least once will be a given. I want to believe that he was ready to do some forgiving, and he was wrestling with what happens when it comes from an offense that is likely to be repeated. I know I have felt this way before- I may be ok with forgiving someone something once, but the idea of having to do it again and again because the offense is likely to be repeated, maybe endlessly, sounds far less appealing. How does forgiveness even look at that point? I know I don’t have answers to that question.

Peter is seeking guidance from Jesus about what needs to happen regarding his forgiveness- he is ready. I want to learn from Jesus and wait to tell someone that they need to forgive until they ask me, until they are actually seeking a way to rid themselves of the anger and resentment that often comes from unforgiveness.

As a counselor, the idea of forgiveness does come up a fair amount. Someone will come to me with the grief that they carry because they have not yet forgiven someone and feel that they should, or the grief that they carry because someone tells them they should just hurry up and forgive, but try as they might, they just can’t, or they are still so angry that they just don’t want to. Or they tell me that a big hurt in their life is not a problem (when it is very apparent this is a problem to everyone else in their life) because they’ve already forgiven the perpetrator so there is nothing left to talk about. In each of these situations, I want to tell them that the timing of their forgiveness is up to them and to God, and I can’t tell them when or how or even if it has to happen. I may also tell them that it is ok to sit with their anger and set boundaries that are needed before forgiveness happens. They have to be ready.

I think you and I have to be ready, too. I think that is why these stories are told by Jesus in this way. While it is true that we have been forgiven much, and theoretically we then should have great capacity for forgiveness, the timeline for that forgiveness could be quite a private matter, contingent on our readiness and not feeling forced into spiritualizing something that needs to be aired, verbalized, and/or felt first. I think of the psalmists- how they grieve and lament over the sins of their enemies- there is no mandate to themselves that they must forgive immediately. When we are ready, we can come to Jesus and ask about how might go about forgiving those who have hurt us.