1. Because healing only comes through accepting the harm
If someone has inflicted harm on you, you can war against them either in your heart alone or externally. But even as you try and undo the harm or redress the balance the splinter only slips deeper and deeper into your soul. It is commonly commented that the bitterness or anger will kill you slowly unless you accept the harm done to you (painful as that may be initially), forgive and move on (cf. pp. 188ff, Tim Keller, The Reason for God).
This is deeply true, and is a good reason to forgive, although as clever Kim Fabricius notes
"Counsellors tell us to forgive people lest we become embittered and twisted. Thus forgiveness itself becomes a fashionable therapy, all about me."
2. Because we have been forgiven much
Like the servant in Matthew 18:23-35 we have been forgiven an enormous debt that dwarfs anything we may be owed. We have been forgiven the enormous sin of rejecting our creator and redeemer and instead of an eternity of punishment we have an eternity of glory in Christ Jesus. In that light, how can we not forgive others their minor offences against us? Anything that has been taken from us by a person is only a drop in the ocean of riches we have in Christ. It is not a loss worth dwelling on.
3. Because they have already been offered forgiveness by the judge of all the earth
I am loving reading Romans 1-2-1 with a friend at the moment. Reaching chapter 14 it is surprising that the reason we should not judge or despise our brother (okay, a little different to forgiving) is because God does not judge or despise them. There is no condemnation for them now in God's eyes (8:1) so how can we mere humans condemn them? In fact we should "welcome" those who God welcomes (14:1, 3). Any sin we have suffered is also a sin against God (Ps 51:4) and God has already offered forgiveness to that person. Therefore, we echo God's word of forgiveness to those who have wronged us.
Sigh No More by Mumford and Sons is a great album. But, contrary to many Christian commentators I cannot see it as an album full of grace.
Marcus Mumford is the son of two of the leaders of the Vineyard group of churches in the UK [1]. But in interviews he and the other band members don't speak very much about their religious beliefs so, although it seems at least some of them are Christians [2], I don't know what he believes now. The album is full of biblical allusions and Christian jargon, but it is also an album of struggles with a God who accuses.
I think "Roll Away Your Stone" is a song in conversation with God, although you can also imagine it being between Mumford and his parents. It contains a description of grace in the third verse drawing upon imagery from the Parable of the Prodigal Son in Luke 15 (which has echos in other parts of the album).
It seems that all my bridges have been burnt
But you say that's exactly how this grace thing works
It's not the long walk home that will change your heart
But the welcome I receive with the restart
By itself that is powerful indication that he knows something of the power of grace to conquer all that he has done. And yet, the walk is a 'long' one and it is not clear whether he thinks he can make it to the welcome at the end.
The rest of the song is much darker. The first verse is an invitation to mutual confession and investigation into past. He'll "roll away" the stone to let the light into the cave/grave of his soul, but he's afraid of what he "will discover inside". In the second verse he recalls how he's been told that he would find within his soul a "void" or "hole" (perhaps the god-shaped hole people often talk about). But on self-examination he has filled that hole "with things unreal" that steal his character.
He recognises that this all seems quite dark, so in the chorus he protests that he should sing about it becuase "it dominates the things" he sees.
As the third verse of grace I quoted follows these bleak reflections on his sins, you may see a movement from guilt to forgiveness in the song. But the fourth and fifth verses suggest that he doesn't embrace this "grace", but recoils from it.
"Stars hide your fires" is a quotation from Macbeth Act 1, Scene 4:
Stars, hide your fires,
Let not light see my black and deep desires
And John 3:19-20 is also brought to mind:
Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed.
The light has shone into his life, he's seen his plight, but I'm not sure that he can embrace the salvation in verse 3. He will stick his stake in the ground "Marking the territory of this newly empassioned soul". He wants to declare his ownership of his own soul because, as he says to the person he is addressing, "you've gone too far too far this time" and have no justification "to take this soul that is so rightfully mine".
It seems that he comes so close but in the end cannot surrender his life to a God he doesn't quite trust or love. It's really a very sad song, and a very sad album.
In other songs he suggests that the accusation of sin is what has driven him from God. In "the Cave" he sings, "The shame that sent me off from the / God that I once loved". "Timshel" is a reflection on the Lord seeming to offer a choice to Cain of whether sin will rule over him or not according to John Steinbeck's East of Eden. "Little Lion Man" is dominated by guilt and the fear that "grace is wasted". "Thistle and weeds" has obvious illusions to the Parable of the Sower. In "Awake my Soul" he looks to the day when he will "meet [his] maker" - not a phrase used by those looking forward to Christ's return.
"Dust Bowl Dance" is perhaps the darkest song of all. To me he seems to see Jesus, God's "only son", as his "accuser" who will lay out the singer's crimes before announcing he'll get his gun to execute judgment. The singer then steals himself, admits his crimes but seems to declare he'll fight back by going to get his own gun!
Please correct me if you think I'm hearing the album wrongly, but the grace is surely a minor note in the Album. Perhaps I'm the one only seeing darkness, but guilt seems to be the dominant note.
Instead of being laid at the foot of the cross, Sigh No More is an album where recognition that we are sinners drives Marcus Mumford to stand his ground and take on his accuser head on. However, what seems clear is that doing that has not led to release from the guilt that haunts him. His experience does not seem to have been that of Charles Wesley when he let light into the dungeon of his heart:
Long my imprisoned spirit lay,
Fast bound in sin and nature’s night;
Thine eye diffused a quickening ray—
I woke, the dungeon flamed with light;
My chains fell off, my heart was free,
I rose, went forth, and followed Thee.
My chains fell off, my heart was free,
I rose, went forth, and followed Thee.
I have just received a package from Amazon containing a book I have bought for a friend. In intention this book is for my friend, but nobody knows that yet. I didn't tell Amazon, I haven't told anyone else and there is no indication on the book itself that it is for my friend.
Does the book belong to me or is it my friend's book? I think you could argue both ways at the moment.
However, when I wrap it up and give it to my friend saying 'this is for you,' then it will be clear that it is now his book. The act of giving, with the words accompanying it, achieve something. It is a speech-act which acomplishes what it says.
Jesus' death and resurrection can be like this. He died and was raised for us, but the event itself does not tell us that.
Jesus' own words and the Bible as a whole interpret the meaning of the event, but it becomes deeply personal when, as Christ's ambassadors Christians say 'you are forgiven,' and just that thing occurs. Forgiveness actually happens in that moment. It has already happened in the cruxifiction and resurrection of Christ, but it is applied in the declaration of absolution that Christians make on their Lord's behalf. Modern evangelicals may baulk at the weight of Jesus' instructions to his disciples, "if you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld" (John 20:23), but there is no more fundamental part of Gospel-ministry.
Under English law I cannot give a house to someone with only spoken words. It is considered that land is such an important asset that for it to be given away additional formalities have to be observed. So land can only be legally given by way of deed. A deed is written document signed by both parties, which until recently had also to be sealed (e.g. with impressed wax). This deed gives certainty to all the parties that the gift really happened and was not just empty words.
Baptism corresponds to this. It is a binding, visible promise of God that we have died and been raised with Christ and it achieves what it promises. If later in life we have doubts about our true identity or whether we have been forgiven, we point to the cross and resurrection of Jesus but through the word and sacrament that we have already received as a personal address to us. This is what Paul does in Romans 6, and what Luther did when he responded to the devil's acqusations by crying out "I am baptized!"
I may have been given a beautiful house but it is another thing to receive it and live in it.
There are a number of different ways I can respond to the gift:
(i) If I believe that this house is now both mine and more beautiful and solid than the house I currently live in I will joyfully move in all my possessions, explore every room, make myself at home and invite others to share in my joy by inviting them to stay.
(ii) But while I may believe that this house is mine I may doubt that it is really that nice a house. My heart may remain in my old house, and I may want to live there most of the time. When the floods come then I will finally realise that this house I have been given is the best, but in the meantime wise friends will warn me of the dangers of living in my old house, and extol the beauty and security that the new house offers. They won't spend time persuading me that the house is mine, but they will spend time persuading me that the house is a uniquely wonderful place to live.
(iii) Sadly, I may love the house but even with the deed in my hands not believe that it is really mine. Perhaps I think that past or present sins disqualify me from such a gift. I might feel I need to earn the house and start sending the giver cheques out of my wages - even though he never asked for them. To this person wise friends will point to the promise; the words and the title deeds. 'This house is yours, enjoy it!' 'You have been baptised, the promise is yours free of charge, live out that reality!'
(iv) Finally, I may doubt that the house exists at all and the house I live in is the only house there is. I may have heard the promise and been given the deeds but concluded that they are worthless pieces of paper. Wise friends will explain how they have seen the house, how it is attested by reliable witnesses and fits with the rest of our experience. To this person you may give Lee Strobel's The Case for Christ.
