Category Archives: Texas Culture

Why We Should Forgive the Unrepentant

Church, Personal, Texas Culture, Thoughts, ,

I was asked this question in our home group recently, after a larger discussion on church discipline, and forgiving the repentant. I found a large number of documents online with various opinions. I read through the first nine that showed up on a google search, and summarized their positions below. I found it interesting that this question, like many questions, didn’t have two answers to the same question, but rather two answers to two different questions.  That is, these sites don’t so much differ on whether we should forgive the unrepentant, but on what forgiveness means, and/or how God forgives (conditionally or unconditionally).

How does this happen? There is a cool word we use in linguistics that will help us out a lot here: polysemy. Poly is many, and sem is meaning (and -y is the condition), so this is the condition of a word or phrase having multiple meanings. This can cause us problems when we don’t recognize it, because one person may use a word in one sense, and another person may use the same word in another sense, and they may not even realize they’re using the word differently. I deal with this in Bible study a lot, where two different verses or passages may use the same word with different meanings; if we don’t recognize this, we may think they are contradictory, or in some other way saying something they aren’t.

One classic case of polysemy is “the law”. When reading this phrase in the Bible you really must ask yourself, is it referring to:

  1. The Mosaic Law, i.e., the set of laws given to Moses
  2. Another set of specific laws, given to someone else, e.g., Adam, or Noah
  3. The Pentateuch (first five books of the OT), e.g., “the law and the prophets”
  4. Moral principles in nature, e.g., the natural law
  5. Moral principles known to individuals subconsciously, i.e., conscience
  6. Any set of principles that describes behavior or action, e.g., scientific laws
  7. Or some other written or unwritten code or principle.

I hope it is evident that when you read “the law” as referring to one of these, when the author intended another, there is bound to be misunderstanding.

In final defense of polysemy (in case the above does not pursuade you), I would refer you to any dictionary of quality. Almost every word in a good dictionary has multiple senses/meanings, usually indicated as in the following: “chair: 1. a separate seat for one person, typically with a back and four legs. 2. the person in charge of a meeting or organization (used as a neutral alternative to chairman or chairwoman).”

So what is forgiveness? Looking at these websites (as a good descriptive linguist would of course do), it is clear that forgiveness is being used in at least two distinct senses:

  1. Giving up a grudge against someone who has sinned against you.
  2. Declaring and/or acting as if a particular sin is no longer an issue.

Closely tied to these is a third that also occurred on occasion:

  1. reconciling relationship between offended parties

Before addressing the above, I would like to consider another point that occurred frequently on the “Forgiveness conditional on repentance” camp, AKA the “Forgive as God Forgives” camp. This side claims that God doesn’t forgive the unrepentant, so we shouldn’t. This is in the legal sense of the presence of sin, not the maintenance of a grudge. But is this the case, even legally? Does God have a PRE-condition of repentance before he forgives? I think it is Biblically clear that repentance and forgiveness go together, but I don’t know that the one must precede the other. In fact, insisting that we repent before God forgives us is tantamount to saying that we must become alive (c.f., Eph 2) before God can give us life.

To put it otherwise, a precondition of repentance is a works based righteousness, claiming that we have forgiveness because we have done the work of repentance. Rather, as our Lord said: “You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you.” (John 15:16 ESV). Or as Paul said, “but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Rom 5:8 ESV) and again “But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved….For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.” (Eph 2:4,5,8,9 ESV)

But even if you take God’s forgiveness to have a pre-condition of repentance, I think the connection to our forgiveness must break down. For when Paul speaks of the action of God on our behalf across eternity: “And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.” (Rom 8:30 ESV) we understand that repentance is implied, even if not stated.  But that is not a repentance that we come up with on our own, or else Paul’s argument doesn’t work. What would happen if God predestined, called, and justified someone who then refused to repent? Rather, we understand that God’s gracious calling also grants us the grace to repent. But this is not something we can do for others. If someone sins against me, I simply cannot provide him the power to repent. When God effectually desires to save and provide repentance, he does. But we, on the other hand, may well desire repentance and salvation for years, with no apparent change. Should we wait for that?

Some of the people cited below say “yes” to that question. But let’s be clear that they are saying that they will not say that a person’s sin has been paid for until those sins have actually been paid for. This I get, and I respect it so far.  But alongside that comes a temptation, I think, to hold a grudge. And this is where the polysemy above is important. Almost across the board, answers to this question have affirmed that we need to be willing to forgive. I think this is essentially one thing under the sense of giving up a grudge. Whether or not someone has a debt in their account with God, we simply cannot go through life blocked by that fact. On this point modern psychologists and Biblical scholars agree.

One point that has come up multiple times is to consider the alternative: will we really withhold relationship from everyone who has not explicitly apologized to us? If so, how would we ever get anything else done? Do we want to be held captive by the millions of peccadilloes we suffer each day?

In any case, it is clear that this willingness to forgive should be there before repentance:

  • “And Jesus said, ‘Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.'” (Luke 23:34 ESV)
  • “And as they were stoning Stephen….he cried out with a loud voice, ‘Lord, do not hold this sin against them.'” (Acts 7:59-60 ESV)

The ultimate response to this question for me, however, is to consider the meaning of “Forgive as God forgives you”. An important rule of Bible study is to look at the context. Two verses which end with this quote are as follows:

Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you. (Eph 4:31-32 ESV)

What is this talking about? Is Paul saying here, that we should NOT forgive until the offender repents? Even if he thought that were true, that is not his point here. Put away bad feelings towards each other sounds an awful lot like giving up on grudges, rather than like making sure your sin accounts match God’s. when I think of How God forgives me, lots of things come to mind, which are more relevant to this context:

  • God in Christ forgave me freely
  • God in Christ forgave me graciously
  • God in Christ forgave me completely
  • God in Christ forgave me lovingly
  • God in Christ forgave me for my good
  • God in Christ forgave me to satisfy His wrath
  • God in Christ forgave me while I was dead
  • God in Christ forgave me while I was His enemy

If you wrestle with the idea of giving up a grudge against someone who has wronged you, someone who hasn’t apologized, I would strongly encourage you to consider your own standing before God. Do you really understand the depth of your own depravity? Do you really understand what it cost Him to forgive you? Do you really think you changed your heart on your own? Do you really think that this other person will do what you didn’t?

And with regard to keeping our accounts in line with God’s: “Who are you to pass judgment on the servant of another? It is before his own master that he stands or falls.” (Rom 14:4 ESV) God is the only and final judge, and He does that better than us, anyway.

Putting these two points together (that we and they must each give account to God):

Why do you pass judgment on your brother? Or you, why do you despise your brother? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God;  for it is written,

“As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me,
    and every tongue shall confess to God.”

So then each of us will give an account of himself to God. (Rom 14:10-12 ESV)

And this is the lesson we teach our kids on a daily basis: deal with your own issues; they are more than enough for you. Fix your side of the problem, before worrying about their side. Or, if you prefer to hear it from Jesus: “first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.” (Matt 7:5 ESV)

Appendix: Two different questions on Forgiveness

Benefit to the forgiver

Christianity Today: “If we wait for those who have hurt us to repent first, we will almost certainly wait for a long, long time.…  Even non-Christian organizations are emerging to show the value of forgiveness; their premise is that the greatest benefit of forgiveness accrues not to the one who is forgiven, but to the one who forgives….One of Jesus’ main teachings was that we love our enemies, pray for them, and do good to those who have hurt us.”

Focus on the Family: “You really have no choice. Either you forgive or you slowly poison your mind and heart. If you hold on to unresolved bitterness it will destroy you.…We offer this forgiveness to others purely in response to the grace we have already received from the Lord. If we are not willing to forgive, it is an indication that we have not fully understood or experienced the grace of being forgiven (see Luke 7:47). ”

Ancientfaith.com: “On a personal level we also find ourselves feeling justified in withholding forgiveness, using our anger and resentment, and the weight of a broken relationship as tools of punishment. …To forgive a brother who repents, works towards our own repentance. To forgive even when no sorrow has been offered in return works an even greater repentance….It is a mistake to become formulaic about forgiveness and repentance, creating rules about what must come first or the conditions required.…The believer who lives waiting to be asked to forgive is dangerously close to the Lawyer who asks, “Who is my neighbor?” He is too likely only to forgive with the measure of someone’s sorrow and learns to hold back what could be given freely. There is a caution in his heart that becomes the enemy of grace and repentance.”

The Gospel Coalition: Recognize that sin goes both ways.  Distinguishing (attitude of) forgiveness v reconciliation/restauration (of relationship). Rom 12:18 If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.

Forgiveness conditional on repentance (?As God Forgives)

Gotquestions.org: “We need to make an effort to understand God’s forgiveness of us if we are going to forgive others in a way that reflects God’s forgiveness. Sadly, in recent decades the word forgiveness has taken on a connotation of “psychological freedom” instead of freedom from sin, and this has brought some confusion about the whole concept of what it means to forgive.…Forgiveness offered and forgiveness received are entirely different, and we don’t help ourselves by using a catch-all word for both.… First John 1:9 shows that the process of forgiveness is primarily to free the sinner; forgiveness ends the rejection, thus reconciling the relationship….In short, we should withhold forgiveness from those who do not confess and repent; at the same time, we should extend the offer of forgiveness and maintain an attitude of readiness to forgive.”

Questions.org: ” Offering forgiveness without repentance, however, does not follow the biblical model of forgiveness (Luke 17:3,4).…We must recognize our sin and repent to receive and enjoy God’s merciful forgiveness. God requires repentance and so must we.…If we don’t admit our sin, it’s impossible to be transformed.… If as believers we don’t require repentance on the part of the offender, we stand in the way of that person’s coming to see his need for God and experiencing His forgiveness.…It’s wrong, however, to assume that if we don’t forgive someone, we’ll be weighed down with hatred, bitterness, and revengeful desires. That’s not necessarily true because the Bible says we are to love a person regardless of whether or not he or she shows any remorse. We can love our enemies, but continue to have an unsettled issue with them. In many cases, it is more loving to withhold forgiveness until a change of heart is demonstrated than it is to offer forgiveness without the offender’s acknowledgment of deliberate wrongdoing.…Instead of giving in to revenge, we can soften our hearts toward those who have hurt us when we humbly admit that we, too, have hurt others.…The ultimate purpose of forgiveness is the healing of a relationship. This healing occurs only when the offender repents and demonstrates remorse and the offended one grants a pardon and demonstrates loving acceptance. ”

Luke173ministries.org (wrt adult children of abuse): “Biblically speaking, NO ONE gets forgiven without changing his ways and turning to God and godliness.…The Bible does in fact tell us that we should forgive as the Lord forgave us (Colossians 3:13; Ephesians 4:32).    But there are requirements for forgiveness.  If we read in more depth and in context about God forgiving us, including the hows, whys and under what circumstances, we will see that he only forgives us when we come to him in the spirit of remorse, change our lives through his Son, ask for forgiveness, and repent (CHANGE). So if we are to forgive others as God forgives us, then we are to forgive them AFTER they have shown genuine remorse by the grace of Jesus’ cleansing blood, and AFTER they have repented (CHANGED), NOT BEFORE.  That is the formula for forgiveness which God models for us, and that is the formula which he instructs us to follow. ”

HeadHeartHand.org: “4. God’s forgiveness is conditional upon repentance (Luke 13:3; 17:3; Acts 2:38): God’s forgiveness is conditional upon the offender wanting forgiveness and wanting to turn from His offending ways. 5. Forgiveness through repentance produce reconciliation on both sides: Offering forgiveness reduces the temperature of the conflict; but only the giving of forgiveness, in response to repentance, ends it. ….We must be willing, ready, and eager to forgive everyone….We must offer forgiveness to everyone….Some people say, ‘I can never forgive until Jim repents.’ If so, you are going to carry around a huge and growing load of resentment as you pile up unresolved conflicts in your life.”

ThoughtsTheological.com: “Nevertheless, when we take the initiative in extending forgiveness, prior to repentance on the part of the criminal (as Christ died for us, while we were still sinners), we are expressing our willingness to give up our personal grievance against that individual, a readiness to bear the cost of this gracious act ourselves. But, as in the case of God’s relationship with sinners, reconciliation between us and the one who wronged us can only be brought about by the transgressor’s repentance. Our offer of forgiveness is not dependent upon his repentance, but the reconciliation between us, which brings to fruition our act of forgiving, is conditional upon his acceptance of his forgiveness which necessarily entails an admission of his guilt and a genuine sorrow at the (possibly irreparable) harm he has done.”

Christmas Depression

Church, Holidays, Personal, Texas Culture, Thoughts, ,

As we approached the Christmas season, I’ve asked various groups to pray for the depressed on a number of occasions. I’ve been aware of the general increase in depression around Christmas for some time. But I hadn’t thought seriously recently about my own struggles in feeling left behind in the joy others seem to feel, especially at this time of year. Which is a serious shame for a Christian, as we are guardians of the greatest hope of Joy this life has to offer.

This week I had a short but substantive list of things to get done before being able to take time off for Christmas, and enjoy the holiday with my family. This morning, Christmas eve, only one item on that list is done, and that not entirely. My kids are enjoying playing a game in the other room, and I’m still working on a project that really should have been done yesterday.  And I’ve abandoned another project that should have been done earlier.

So where do we go from here?  I’m told that maintaining routines is good for putting the breaks on the downward spiral of depression. One of my routines is to read through a Bible reading plan which has portions of psalms, proverbs, other old testament, and new testament each day to cover the Bible in a year. Yesterday’s reading (which I was catching up on today; did I say I was behind on things?) has Psalm 142, which seemed apropos for my mood today (the following is ESV):

1 With my voice I cry out to the Lord;
    with my voice I plead for mercy to the Lord.
2 I pour out my complaint before him;
    I tell my trouble before him.

Another thing I’ve learned about depression, which I believe is absolutely critical for Christians, is that we must express our worst feelings. We often try to bottle them up and deny them, but they only fester and rot inside, until we ultimately burst. At which point things are uglier than if we had just been honest upfront. What’s worse, I think the desire to keep things bottled up comes from a desire to look like we have it all together. Which comes from a mistaken belief that it is even possible to have it together (c.f., Romans 1-3), which amounts to a basic denial of the Gospel. How can we fully rely on the Good News of God’s provision of Jesus for our sin, while at the same time believing (and or pretending) that we have it all together?

When we are tempted to fake holiness until we make it, while feeling like a tomb full of rotting bones, the gospel shows us another way. And this psalm gives us a way that may even work with our cultural sensibilities. If you can’t show up to church without makeup, fine. Don’t tell anyone else your problems, if you can’t bear it, but you must cry out to the Lord. He already knows your troubles anyway, so you’re really just being honest with yourself — which is a good start to emotional health. Ultimately you’ll want to be honest with others, too, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

Once we’re committed to crying out to the Lord, what can we say?

3 When my spirit faints within me,
    you know my way!
In the path where I walk
    they have hidden a trap for me.

Once we’re committed to seeing and admitting to what’s going on inside of us, and crying it out to God, it’s amazing what comes out. To have a fainting spirit that you can’t acknowledge is a great burden. As is feeling like there are traps everywhere you walk. If you feel on the verge of death (physically, emotionally, spiritually, or in any other way), this is a good thing to bring to the surface. One particular pain many feel is loneliness:

4 Look to the right and see:
    there is none who takes notice of me;
no refuge remains to me;
    no one cares for my soul.

There is nothing quite like feeling there are two groups of people out there: those that are against you, and those that don’t see you. I mentioned already the downward spiral of depression; I think it is helpful to at least acknowledge at this point that if we are unwilling to share our pain, we should only expect that no one would know it, or us. Beginning to acknowledge and share our pain, loneliness, and depression is the beginning of the path out of loneliness. But in the mean time, even if not one really cares (which rationally thinking, is probably never true of anyone), you can still tell God you feel that way. Even if you can’t communicate your feelings with another human being, you can talk to God. In doing so, we do eventually find that there is Someone who cares for our soul, however much it doesn’t feel like that now. Ultimately we will be able to say with the psalmist:

5 I cry to you, O Lord;
    I say, “You are my refuge,
    my portion in the land of the living.”

I don’t think the psalmist necessarily believes this as he speaks; I find that I often have to speak truth before I feel it is even possibly true. Sure, He doesn’t feel like a refuge, though we know that He is. I have to decide to proclaim what I know to be true in some part of me, even if that part is so small and feeble at the time. We stand with the father’s prayer: “I believe; help my unbelief!” (Mark 9:24 ESV) Even if our speech denies that we believe what we’re saying, crying out for help is a necessary part of getting where we want to be. We need a refuge, but feel that there is none. We see the Bible claiming God as our refuge (Psalms 18, 46, 71, 92; Proverbs 14:26, 18:10; Isaiah 25:4; Jeremiah 16:19, inter alia), but we don’t feel it. Cry it out anyway. This is our need, and this is God’s promise. We must cry out and ask for the safety we feel we need.

But sometimes we need more than just a safe place:

6 Attend to my cry,
    for I am brought very low!
Deliver me from my persecutors,
    for they are too strong for me!

Sometimes we feel like we are being actively persecuted. Like it isn’t enough for people to just ignore us; we feel attacked. There is no safe place, because we are pursued by people who hate us, who are stronger than us. The rational part of me knows this is never true; not only has God provided us refuge, He is also stronger than any adversary (c.f., Rom 8:31-39). But while it doesn’t feel that way, we must cry out and say so, while we wait for the Truth to sink in.

7 Bring me out of prison,
    that I may give thanks to your name!

Sometimes we feel like the work of our adversaries has not only been against us, but has imprisoned us. We are not just attacked, but locked up, and someone else has the key. We need someone to let us out, even if the prison is more a function of our own issues than the actions of others. When Jesus quoted Isaiah 61:1-2a in Luke 4:18-19, he explicitly referenced liberty and the Gospel (ESV):

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives
and recovering of sight to the blind,
to set at liberty those who are oppressed,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

This was Jesus’ mission, set down long before He was born. But in the mean time, we feel poor, imprisoned, blind, and oppressed. To me, the best news in this situation is that if we begin to acknowledge just how horrible we feel, then we are ripe to hear Jesus’ proclamation of Good News. He came to deal with these things. He came to meet our need. If we cry out to him, and tell him how horribly oppressed we feel, then we join the ranks of those He spent most of His time with during His earthly ministry, and we stand apart from those He criticized, who had religious systems in place to feel like they had it all together.

After all this crying out, the psalmist has a glimmer of hope:

The righteous will surround me,
    for you will deal bountifully with me.

Again I’m not sure how much he believed this, but it is a good thing to say, and to trust that we will ultimately feel. Do we feel lonely? Yes, but the righteous will surround me. Why, because I’m a cool person with lots of money and a winning personality? No. Because the Lord will deal bountifully with me. He is our hope and our shield. He is the liberator of the oppressed. He is the one we need. Crying out to Him, then, is really the only hope any one of us ever had.

 

Boys cabin

image

Joel poses with a couple of his cabin mates. They all started out best friends, as nine of the ten of them were in the same cabin last year. But this afternoon, one wanted to stay in bed because others were being mean. So we took a break from our activity (rock wall), to share and reconcile. We read 1 John 4:20, and finished off by memorizing palms 133:1 – “How good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell together in unity.”
So it was good to see them get through that, and we trust that they’re growing together through it, both as a group and as individual young men.

Awards and Inductions

School, Texas Culture

So we’ve apparently entered the end of the year awards season, which like other things seems bigger in Texas. James got inducted into the National Jr. Honors Society this morning:

JamesJrHonnorSociety_IMG_7168
And Joel got awards for no infractions and A honor roll all year:
JoelAwards_IMG_7186

We were worried when the K-3 awards ceremony, which had been scheduled for 8-10am, was still going at 10:15 (and in the same venue as the grades 4-6 ceremony, which was to start at 10am…). But they made up some time during the second ceremony, ending just after 11, and thereby deserving the Howard H. Sage Award for Procedural Efficiency (IMHO).

 

Mourning

Family, Personal, Texas Culture, Thoughts, , ,

Last night I heard that a woman I’ve been in ministry with has filed for divorce. I could only respond “ouch”. There are lots of details I don’t know (and that’s probably good), but I can only think how much our enemy is laughing.
And that we need to continue holding each other up in prayer. We need to pray that we as individuals would have the grace to see our sins and repent of them on a daily basis (c.f., Luther’s thesis #1). And that we would have the grace to see relational troubles between ourselves and others (including spouses) and do something about them. And that we would continue to take all these troubles and sins to God through Christ by faith, trusting that He will be good to us, and much more than we deserve.
Because however much our enemy is laughing now, He who laughs last laughs longest. So let’s continue to hold up each other, as we trust in the One who will win in the end.

The Content of Our Character

Holidays, Homeschool, Texas Culture, Thoughts, ,
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character. 
-Martin Luther King, Jr.

Life in the Pacific Northwest basically persuaded me that civil rights and racism were issues argued by academics and politicians for academic and political reasons. Since moving to Texas, however, I’ve found that the issues are more than skin deep, as it were. As in, many people don’t want to talk about race, yet their actions, and things said tangentially or avoided altogether, indicate that tensions are still quite alive.

But rather than to pretend to solve this nations race problems, I’d like to talk about a good friend of mine, and how he envisions the ideals of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Way’s skin is darker than mine, but I’ve never seen that as relevant in our relationship. He is an elder at a church I attended some time ago, and hope to visit again this summer. When he preaches, he preaches boldly and clearly, and with insight. He speaks out against corruption, which has played a large part in keeping his area in poverty. And when he thinks I’m wrong, he doesn’t hesitate to say so.

Yet he was the the one called on to give the sermon at a funeral of several young men killed by those of a rival group. The fact that the community called on him in this potentially explosive moment shows that they trust him to to speak the truth without bias, and in love. In a moment where many called for retribution, Way lived and preached the ideal Dr. King referred to as he said “Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred…. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence.”

But not only has he promoted peace when and where others sought violence and revenge, he is also a constructive part of building his community. As head of a development college at a local university, he teaches students about practical and applicable development. He requires and supervises student work that makes a difference in the area. Where there is not clean water, he has built wells. But anyone can dig wells; they do it in a way that the community can pitch in, both financially and logistically, so they have the self respect of having participated in the project (not just receiving a gift). So the well improves the health of the community physically, but also morally, as the people benefiting see that they can be a part of improving their lives. Which brings me to another Dr King quote: “You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive.” It is too easy to look at hardship and sit down. But Way has been an example to me of working hard in hardship, to make things better for himself and others.

Which brings me to the most fundamental Dr. King quote, cited above.  While we argue and fight about what each other really think, I yearn for the time where character is the basis of judgment, not skin color. Which is to say that I think that judgment is necessary. Police brutality is wrong, and should be stopped. But I yearn for the day where it is neither vilified nor excused because it was white on black. I yearn for the day that a reporter can talk about the character of the abused before giving a racial description. I think of the “Mom of the year” recipient, who dragged her son out of a mob and beat him. If a man is committing a crime, he should be lawfully arrested and tried, however we might describe his skin. And if he’s innocent, that should be found without prejudice, and he should be left in peace, again without reference to skin. Character is what should count, not skin. But perhaps we’re a ways off of that.