This week was full of surprises, most of which were unwelcome. Monday morning, as I was rolling out of my driveway on my way to school, my car died. It was a minor inconvenience, and thankfully, a minor repair. Our family of two has two vehicles and life is not nearly complicated enough for us to be unable to manage under the circumstances. As I was now driving the vehicle usually used by my wife, I was in relatively foreign territory. In marriage, the two became one...but not one set of radio presets. I found myself listening not to my usual station, but rather NPR. Strangely, I did not change the station.
I found myself listening to the following radio interview with CNN's Christiane Amanpour:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=97744907&ft=1&f=1012
Christiane had recently finished a CNN documentary entitled "Screaming Bloody Murder" focusing on 6 stories of Genocide in the modern era and the concerned voices that tried to bring them to the world's attention. During her recounting of the situation in Rwanda, she told the story of a dinner she was invited to share with a Rwandan widow and the man of the rival tribe that had killed the woman's husband and children. For those that will listen to the interview above, the story starts at 10:17 on the track as you may not be interested in the life story of Christiane Amanpour. The murderer of the widow's family had been a neighbor. Now, she had found it within herself, and with God's help, to forgive him because, in her words, "Nothing is going to bring the dead back. I am a Christian and I believe in forgiveness." In stunned disbelief, Christiane watched as the woman prepared a meal for them and engaged the man in conversation about their daily lives.
As I listened, I began to think about the power of that forgiveness, but more precisely about the power of receiving it. Here was a woman that did not just say she forgave the man who took her life's heart away from her, but who continued a relationship with him even unto the point of gracious service. What could that forgiveness possibly feel like? Can that man conceive of the power of his release? Can we? I have heard the existence of Hell described as the complete and irreversible absence of God's love...that is, a permanent state, with the full knowledge of the wonder and immensity of God's love and the further knowledge that you will forever be apart from it. Take a second to dwell on that statement. What a dark, dark, place that must be. We pray every time we say The Lord's Prayer that God would "Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us"...yet how often do we create a Hell on Earth for those with whom we withhold forgiveness? And for what? I would venture to say far lesser things than murder. How many of us have friends or family that we don't speak to anymore because of something that happened in our collective pasts? What caliber of "sin" could they possibly have committed against us to warrant their own "little hell"? What pain and agony have we felt as members of the unforgiven? I have done my best to try not to feel on a daily basis the effects of divorce in my life. I cannot begin to describe how thankful I am to have a wife who has forever given me the triumph of faith, optimism, and love over the tragedy of my personal experience...a woman that has dedicated herself to being a model of God's unchanging love for and boundless forgiveness of...me. Are we able to forgive and crucify our pain? Are we able to allow it to die with Jesus so that we may rise with Him? Advent is a reminder that we were in the dark, but were given a great light. Who in your life needs that light? Have you given it freely or withheld it from them? Can you do it, even if it means it might not be returned?
With those questions being asked, we return to Don Henly and The Heart of the Matter:
There are people in your life who've come and gone
They let you down; you know they hurt your pride
You better put it all behind you baby; life goes on
You keep carryin that anger; it'll eat you up inside, baby
I've been trying to get down
To the heart of the matter
But my will gets weak
And my thoughts seem to scatter
But I think its about forgiveness
Forgiveness
Even if, even if, you don't love me anymore
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1 comment:
I have often dwelt on the nature of forgiveness. One question that I discussed at length with Dan once was whether or not someone needed to desire forgiveness for it to have any effect on them.
And that song is meaningful to me as well.
Post a Comment