Forgiveness

A group of men at my church are reading “What’s So Amazing About Grace?” by Philip Yancey and in chapter 8 he relates a story from “The Sunflower” by Simon Wiesenthal. In this book Wiesenthal hears a death bed confession from a German soldier and asks the young man for forgiveness. When the author tries to leave the German soldier grabs his arm. Wiesenthal walked out of the room without replying to the soldier’s plea. He then relates this event to other people around the world and asks if he should have forgiven the soldier. Yancey is quick to point out that holocaust is an extreme example of forgiveness. The chapter is titled Getting Even.

I am not Jewish and I do not think one person can forgive all of the actions of the Germans but we Christians should forgive people to emulate Jesus’ life. We should forgive out of love for God and other Christians. I am not perfect and may still hold offenses and unforgiveness. It is easier for me to forgive others than to forgive myself. I have been working on remembering that God’s forgiveness is more powerful than my guilt. Yancey writes that forgiveness is an “unnatural act” and I agree. It is easier, in our human flesh, to hold on to offenses than to forgive. So if you get cut off in traffic forgive the other driver.