On Forgiveness

By: Reagan Linde

 In C.S. Lewis’ book, The Four Loves, he discusses the different kinds of love that we will experience in our lifetime. He begins with affection, then friendship, moves to eros, and ends with charity (love perfected). These different kinds of love find their completion in different relationships. The affection (meant in the acquaintance sense) one feels for a co-worker is different than the friendship one feels for their best friend from home, which is inherently different from the eros one feels toward their spouse. Charity comes last and rises above all. As believers, it is the unselfish and self-sacrificial love of charity, modeled by the way that Christ loved the Church, that provides the framework to understand forgiveness. 

Growing in the virtue of charity takes time and refinement. And in theory, we should be able to serve one another with perfect love and forgiveness. But what do we do when the real world comes crashing in? When you and your friend have a falling out, when you have deep wounds to heal from with your family, or you get dumped out of nowhere? You have to reevaluate and put that perfect charity into practice. 

In The Four Loves, Lewis writes that

“To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable.”

If you close your hearts to any possibility of pain, you will also render yourself unable to love. We have all been wounded by those around us. But in the same way, all of us, both intentionally and unintentionally, have hurt, offended, or sinned against our fellow man. It can happen one time, or be an ongoing and difficult relationship. None of us escape this life unscathed, untouched by pain or suffering. At some point, the pain and offense threaten to take hold in our hearts and we are forced to consider how we will respond. 

Our default is to justify in our minds why we are right, and the offender is wrong. And at times, that is true. We question: why would they do that? What did I do to deserve that? Usually not out of genuine self-reflection, but attempting to preserve our own sense of self-worth and pride. But regardless of the motive of the offender or the depth of the offense, the problem ultimately lies within our own hearts. How will we respond to the hurt that we feel?

A few months after a rather harrowing breakup during my senior year of college, I felt the strong conviction to forgive. I wrestled with this prompting in prayer-I wanted to hold onto the pain because it was a tangible reminder of what had been. My iron-grip on the pain of my past made moving on even harder. The more I prayed for the Lord to take my pain and heal my heart, the more I was reminded to forgive. 

Eventually, I chose to let go and offer forgiveness. But when I finally chose to forgive, I was disappointed that my life didn’t immediately get better. Sure, there was a weight that was lifted, but I was still sad and upset about what had happened. Forgiveness is not a one-time thing. It is an attitude and a mindset that must be adopted daily. Each day, you must take up the cross of letting go of resentment and bitterness and replacing it with the open hands of forgiveness. Meditative prayer became a daily component of my life. Anytime I would think about my anger or would see something that reminded me of my pain, I would pray the benediction over him. 

“The Lord bless you and keep you

Make his face shine upon you

 and be gracious to you

The Lord turn his face toward you

And give you peace.

Amen.”

In Latin, benediction means blessed (bene: well, dicere: to speak). This prayer is intended to be a blessing upon all those it is offered over. It is an authoritative pronouncement of God’s presence, favor, and activity in one’s life. It is a statement given to send someone on their way. By praying it, you are relinquishing control and sending the other to go out and live the gospel. 

This prayer was tearfully offered in art studios, Chick-Fil-A drive-through lines, sitting in my bedroom, walking around campus, and everywhere in between. This seemingly simple and benign prayer had a powerful impact on my life. Each time I said it, the resentment and bitterness became a bit less powerful until one day, they were gone. This was something I had heard at the end of weekly chapel and jokingly said to my friends as a parting goodbye. It took on a new and profound meaning as I would surrender my own thoughts and feelings and choose to bless this person rather than wish them ill. With a few months of consistent prayer and surrender, the pain and knot of anger and grief began to ease.

One of the key steps on the path to forgiveness is to acknowledge your emotions and to evaluate how the situation impacted you. In my case, this was a breakup. I was embarrassed, hurt, and exposed. Those were real and powerful emotions to process, but now, I could not be more thankful for that breakup and the growth that choosing to forgive and heal provided me.

But that choice to forgive is the most important part. You don’t have to forgive if you don’t want to. We are called to love and pray for our enemies (Luke 6:27-28). It has to be an active choice to forgive and maintain an attitude of forgiveness as you go throughout the healing process. But beyond just the internal act of forgiveness. Once you do that, you must make a conscious choice to not speak ill of them. 

This one seems to be even more challenging. When someone has hurt you, it is much easier to vent to anyone and everyone about how awful you think that person is. Let me be clear, you should be honest with your thoughts and feelings as you walk along the path of forgiving to a select few people (i.e. don’t air your grievances to everyone in AJ’s). Remember that “the ​​tongue has the power of life and death” (Proverbs 18:21). Especially in a place like Hillsdale, words have a profound impact on how we perceive one another. It is hard to forgive and move on in the fishbowl but matters only get worse when the two parties continue to disparage one another. 

Finally, you have to let go of the control that that person and those emotions had over you. Once you have chosen to forgive, you can’t cling to them again and try to grab all of that anger and bitterness back. You have to let them go. Emotions are just like a wave. When you first experience them, the crest is powerful and overwhelming. As time passes and you choose to forgive, the waves get smaller and smaller until one day they are just a small ripple along the shore. 

So as you go about offering forgiveness to those around you, remember that we forgive because Christ forgave us. Not only does he set the example for perfect charity, but He provides the provision to offer this forgiveness and openness. He will always sustain you as you go to do the seemingly impossible. 

At the end of the day, we can know two truths: God is always faithful and God is always good. Many of our insecurities come from our doubting one of those two statements. Forgiveness requires trusting the Lord with that person and trusting our Father’s good judgment. He sees the big picture while we only see what is directly in front of us at that moment. God sees the ways in which we hurt one another. He sees the injustice and the pain of this world. And in the end, He will set all things right. Our job is to trust Him. Even with our broken hearts, even with our deepest wounds…even with the offender. God is in the business of restoration and will hold all things to account. He alone can truly bring beauty from ashes.