During his three years of public ministry, Jesus was able to preach and teach in various settings, from the intimacy of a dinner party to the large gatherings of people that would assemble upon learning of his arrival in their region. Those who had the good fortune of being with Jesus were blessed by his words and deeds, especially in healing and forgiveness. In addition to teaching, Jesus modeled faith in action while he walked among us.
Suppose we “fast forward” to the crucifixion account. In that case, we see Jesus demonstrating the ultimate love of neighbor by forgiving the people who were complicit in bringing about his passion and death. We read in the Gospel of Luke:
When they came to the place called the Skull, they crucified him and the criminals there, one on his right, the other on his left. Then Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, they know not what they do.” (Luke 23:33-34)
Jesus, as we have come to know, had the power to break free from the cross and save himself while retaliating with devastating force against his adversaries. Instead, he prayed for his accusers and forgave them. The divine power of forgiveness transcends what can be readily apprehended in the temporal realm and is only available to us by God’s grace. Saint Paul explains the paradox of strength working through weakness:
Three times I begged the Lord about this, that it might leave me, but he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.” I will rather boast most gladly of my weaknesses in order that the power of Christ may dwell with me. Therefore, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and constraints, for the sake of Christ; for when I am weak, then I am strong. (2 Corinthians 12:8-10)
Forgiving others, especially when weakness overcomes us, can only be accomplished with God’s strength. The two quotes below, one from scripture and one from the Catechism of the Catholic Church, explain how giving and receiving forgiveness are inextricably joined in God’s plan of salvation”:
If you forgive others their transgressions, your heavenly Father will forgive you. But if you do not forgive others, neither will your Father forgive your transgressions. (Matthew 6:14-15)
And the Lord himself taught us to pray: “Forgive us our trespasses,” linking our forgiveness of one another’s offenses to the forgiveness of our sins that God will grant us. (CCC 1425)
In the pericope entitled “Parable of the Unforgiving Debtor,” Jesus explains how the connection between receiving forgiveness from the Father and extending forgiveness to others cannot be separated or bracketed. The servant who withheld what he himself had just been given interrupted the flow of mercy that could have been realized by both him and his subordinate:
… [The] kingdom of heaven may be likened to a king who decided to settle accounts with his servants. When he began the accounting, a debtor was brought before him who owed him a huge amount. Since he had no way of paying it back, his master ordered him to be sold, along with his wife, his children, and all his property, in payment of the debt. At that, the servant fell down, did him homage, and said, “Be patient with me, and I will pay you back in full.” Moved with compassion the master of that servant let him go and forgave him the loan. When that servant had left, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a much smaller amount. He seized him and started to choke him, demanding, “Pay back what you owe.” Falling to his knees, his fellow servant begged him, “Be patient with me, and I will pay you back.” But he refused. Instead, he had him put in prison until he paid back the debt. Now when his fellow servants saw what had happened, they were deeply disturbed, and went to their master and reported the whole affair. His master summoned him and said to him, “You wicked servant! I forgave you your entire debt because you begged me to. Should you not have had pity on your fellow servant, as I had pity on you?” Then in anger his master handed him over to the torturers until he should pay back the whole debt. So will my heavenly Father do to you, unless each of you forgives his brother from his heart. (Matthew 18:23-35)
Let us pray to be humble enough to receive God’s forgiveness and, through the power of that forgiveness, to be merciful to others.
2 thoughts on “The Power of Forgiveness”
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I mind the time when I was out walking, when a thought came to me. “If you want to learn to live in life, you will have to learn to forgive in life.”
I kept on walking. A few steps later and another thought came to me. “If you want to learn to live, then you will have to learn to forgive.”
Why was I getting these thoughts I wondered. On reaching my destination, I got another thought.
“Living is forgiving.”
So much for that. I never gave it another thought until later in the week, when in conversation with others, this particular individual started to say hurtful things about me. It felt like he was stabbing me with a knife every time he spoke. I wanted to smash his face to shut him up.
My blood was beginning to boil, when I remembered those thoughts about, “Living is forgiving.”
I thought to myself, “OK, I’ll give it a go.”
Then, without saying a single word, I thought.” Alright, (name), I forgive you.”
Well, what happened next completely shocked me. It was as though the knife fell short and wasn’t going into me! He wasn’t hurting me! He wasn’t hurting me! I nearly burst out laughing, but I didn’t.
I wasn’t expecting that! I wasn’t expecting that!
No one ever told me that if I forgive, the hurt would be taken away. I didn’t know that. I never even heard about it. If I didn’t experience it for myself, I wouldn’t have believed it. Another thing I noticed was that, I wasn’t intimidated by him either.
What a wonderful discovery!
Have I just discovered “the secret of forgiveness?”
Have I just discovered “the power of forgiveness?”
It has brought a great change to my life, as you can well imagine. It has brought great freedom. There was a time that if there were twenty people in a room, but there was one person who had hurt me; I wouldn’t go into that room.
Things are not that way now. Oh, the freedom! The freedom.
I am no longer bound up! It’s just incredible. No hurt. No intimidation. No resentment. Almost no remembrance of the incident at all! The freedom is great. It’s really great.
Again, there are no hurts as bad as hurts of the heart. Can anyone hurt more than those closest to us? Yet this forgiveness is directly in the heart where it matters. You have to take this secret to heart. And forgive from the heart. Even to think about it is a help. Only then will you actually experience this, fundamental transformation of forgiveness.
Forgiveness is something that many have heard about all their lives, but it has had no effect on them whatsoever. Undoubtedly the secret of forgiveness and the power of forgiveness remains a secret to them.
Like I was, I didn’t know about the power of forgiveness either.
What a pity.
I only wish that I had discovered this secret long ago. My life would have been so different. If only I knew then, what I know now.
The only person that I heard of, who did speak about forgiveness, was Jesus Christ. It seems that Jesus wants us to forgive, because he doesn’t want us to hurt. (Bet you didn’t know that now.) The devil, on the other hand doesn’t want us to forgive, because it wants us to hurt.
I have “learned” more about forgiveness. (Who wouldn’t have plenty of practises?) Jesus was asked if we should forgive seven times.
“Ah. Seventy times seven times.” Says he.
I think I discovered the reason for that. It could take a number of times.
Sometimes a hurtful individual will come to mind. It could happen many times. Each time I would forgive.
You see, it may take more than four or five times before you are free from the hurt. The freedom will come, about that, there is no doubt. Neither will you feel intimidated. Forgiveness can take away both feelings of hurt and intimidation. Then you will not be resentful and looking for revenge. And you will experience the freedom.
Have you ever heard someone say, “I could never forgive them for as long as I live?” It’s frightening.
One cannot afford to die in a state of unforgivingness.
Where you are going to depends on where you are coming from.
I’ll say it again. One cannot afford to die in a state of unforgivingness.
If you want to learn to live in life, then you have to learn to forgive in life.
If you want to learn to live, then you have to learn to forgive.
Living is forgiving.
I have often wondered if the experience of forgiveness that I had had were genuine. If that were so, then Jesus when he was on the cross would have no experience of hurt emotionally. After all, he is forgiveness itself. Then during Palm Sunday the readings revealed that I was right. Isaiah Chapter 50 verse 7. It states
(“The Lord comes to my help, so that I am untouched by the insults”)
It is by the insults that people hurt us, and it is this that is removed by forgiveness. How about that?
Forgiveness is something I think that I have learned about.