Note: You can watch this teaching on CrossWalk’s YouTube channel.
Barbara Cawthrone Crafton continues her teaching and group interaction on the subject of forgiveness.
Process this (from the Embracing Forgiveness workbook, Morehouse):
One of the reasons that we have a hard time with forgiveness is that we hold incorrect ideas about what it is. Perhaps we are trying to do things in forgiveness that are not life-giving, edifying and useful.
Here is a review of six things that Barbara refutes as characteristics of forgiveness. For each one, there is a quote or two from Barbara to remind you of the fullness of her teaching on that matter.
You have heard it said that to forgive is to forget, but I say to you forgiveness is not forgetting.
People don’t forget important chapters in their lives. Forgiveness does not erase history. Your history has happened and it deserves to be honoured. If it’s not honoured it’s liable to be repeated.
You have heard it said that to forgive is to acquit, but I say to you forgiveness is not acquittal or exoneration.
We still have to pay the price for what we do. If someone is acquitted it means they didn’t do anything. We only forgive those who are guilty of something.
You have heard it said that to forgive is to pardon, but I say to you forgiveness is not pardon.
Even when forgiven, you may still have to pay for what you did. When you are pardoned, you don’t have consequences.
You have heard it said that forgiveness is a matter of degree, but I say to you forgiveness is not a matter of degree.
We have confused our feeling of horror at the crime with the capacity or lack of capacity to forgive. Even one death is too much. It’s difficult for us because of the horror we feel for large and heinous crimes. We cannot say that the power of God is not greater than these things. It might take us a while to wrap our minds around this one; and longer to wrap our hearts around it. “Okay” has nothing to do with anything when we’re talking about forgiveness.
You have heard it said that forgiveness is led by feeling, but I say to you forgiveness is not feeling.
If forgiveness is a feeling and if somehow, in order to forgive, I have to develop warm fuzzy feelings about someone who did something horrible to me; or, with regard to my own shame, if somehow I have to develop feelings of being welcomed and loved before I can be forgiven—feelings can’t lead me to that state.
You have heard it said that forgiveness is all about the past, but I say to you forgiveness is not about the past.
Forgiveness is about the present and the future. Who do I want my future to belong: the guy who hurt me in 1998 or me and God? I want to live my life with God. I don’t want to give it to anybody else. I want my present to be mine. I want my future to be mine.
As you listened to Barbara teaching about what forgiveness is not, where did you find her teaching intersecting with your lived experience? Which of these six “nots” has the most energy for you as you consider this matter of forgiveness?
Share stories and insights in twos, threes or small group, as time allows
In the midst of talking about what forgiveness is not, Barbara offers a helpful reflection on forgiveness as a process:
There’s a trinity of the human being: we are reason—we are feeling—we are will. We are not any one of these three things exclusively. All three are present in us, or we are not human. No one of these three can lead all the time. They each have functions. We have to balance them.
In the project of forgiveness, feelings aren’t going to lead you there. You might be too mad or too hurt. But feelings can follow. What will lead you to forgiveness is your will. I can’t make myself not hurt, but I can make myself take a step forward. If I can say, “I don’t forgive him. I don’t even want to forgive him, but I want to want to forgive; I want to be different,” then we’ve taken the first step. We haven’t taken the last; forgiveness is a process, not a moment.
If you can say, “Yes, I’ve begun the process of forgiving. I haven’t finished. It might take a whole life time to finish it, but I have begun here, so I can answer yes.” My will has begun to lead me in a direction that my feelings never could. If I can take a small step, God will bless that step and will increase it. It is a theological decision.
Tell the story of a time when you experienced forgiveness as process, not as a moment.