Forgiveness...

I wonder when you’ve been hurt?
It might not have been something big, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t important.

I wonder when you’ve hurt others?
It might not have been something big, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t important.

I wonder if you can pinpoint the times when one of those things has been the result of the other, and you’ve hurt someone because you’ve been hurt?
That might be the person who hurt you, or it might be someone else who just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

I was asked to speak about Ephesians 4:32 : “Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.”

But I needed a little bit more context, so want to add in the verse before it as well.

Ephesians 4:31-32 (New International Version)

31 Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. 32 Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.

The Bible talks a lot about forgiveness, and suggests emphatically that it’s a good thing.

It talks about forgiveness being a sign of love, of being a way of restoration, a way of beginning to rebuild relationships, but mostly as a way of re-discovering Shalom...

... Shalom is something that has been around a lot longer than memes and Friday night dinner.
Shalom is often thought of (once we get past the memes) as meaning peace, calm and quiet, or a simple blessing. But it’s more than that. It’s about finding yourself in the position where there is nothing in the way of relationships. The focus is on the people involved rather than things around it. It’s about 2 parties being defined by their attention and care for each other, rather than for the things that have been done… including the things they do for us, the gifts they give to us, or the way they have hurt is.
To forgive is to get rid of those external definitions and return to the relationship itself.
That’s what it means between God and humans, and what it means between humans too.

But while the bible talks a lot about forgiveness, this is potentially the only part of the Bible where it tells people HOW to forgive.

“Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.”

Forgiving is about getting rid of the bitterness and instead being kind and compassionate.

It’s NOT about ignoring the problem and the pain. 

It’s about stepping out of one pattern and into another… A new pattern that sees the person outside of the issue, and invites them to join you on a journey towards a better relationship and a more mutually fulfilling outcome. 

Break the cycle.

Hurt people hurt people.

Bitterness, rage, anger, brawling, slander and malice are all symptoms of something bigger that’s going on. They’re the result of an investment in a relationship with someone that something toxic at its core, as its focus, and as its shared definition.

Hurt people hurt people.

And bitterness taints everything.

It taints the things you dislike and makes them worse. It taints the things you enjoy and takes away the pleasure.

The invitation is, to those who are strong enough or brave enough to try (because it’s one of the most difficult things to do), to be the one who sees where others have broken the cycle and join them, or to break the cycle you find yourself in.

Love, kindness and compassion, through forgiveness, are about getting off the hamster wheel, or the Escher painting, and finding the way out, the way forwards, and showing others that is it possible to do the same.
Forgiveness is saying “I can see where this comes from, and I can see what I need to do to get out of the way of both what will come round again and what I will inevitably end up doing.”
Being forgiven is about being shown there is another way.

That said, If your motivation is selfish it will collapse in on itself. It can’t heal you, it won’t save you or them, it can’t make you a good person.
Forgiveness is designed to set you free.
When you say “I forgive you” what you’re really saying is “I know what you did.”… “It’s not ok.”… “But I recognise you are more than that. I don’t want to hold us captive to this thing any more. I can heal myself, and I don’t need anything from you.

That gets rid of the chains and the prisoners. It doesn’t free the person from themselves or what they have done… They have to do it for themselves, but you are choosing to not be tethered to them.

Vengeance is intimacy with the person by virtue of the thing that has happened between you. You want to be involved in their lives, you want to cause them to feel. But the question remains, is it worth the investment?
Forgiveness is about shedding the intimacy with something that has hurt you, that the other person still needs to acknowledge was a problem to begin with, and allow yourself to leave them with their own hurt. You set an example of what it is to be free from hate, from vengeance, from chaining your story with the other person.

Forgiveness shows a better way and invites others to work out how they shed the chains to their limited and enslaving defining events, traits and moments, imposed by themselves and by others.

The can be freed from some by mimicking the act of “Forgiveness”.
They can be loosed from others by apology and genuine remorse (with both those who are yet to forgive and those who have already forgiven).

Only by shedding the load forwards and backwards are we able to break the cycle, get out of the hamster wheel, and discover the enormity of what it is to be human, in relationship with each other and with God.

That’s where “ForEgiveness” comes in… Because forgiveness isn’t just an act of response to some sort of guilt or apology, but also an offering before of a hand to re-define both self and relationship away from “that one* thing that one* time.”

ForEgiveness is giving ahead of apology, giving ahead of anything for potential relationship, and for freedom of the forgiver. 

(*”One” may not be the only number relevant.)


Maybe that’s where the “Like Jesus” bit really comes into play?

We’ve sung of the “Pardon for Sin…” (I’m not shunning the notion of Sin… I’m favouring the definition of sin being the “Culpable Disturbance of Shalom”)… We’ve heard that the substitution s our “Get out of jail free card”… We’ve been taught that forgiveness means that our perfection is achieved/possible/bestowed…

But what if it’s more than that?

To forgive is to cut the chains to the things that has become the definition of the relationship, where that thing is something that is inconsistent with the rule of Love.

The relationship between humanity and God have historically and continue to be defined by the distance between us, by the inconsistency between the image of God and the lived reality of humanity: We’re defined by the issue, not our relationship.
Forgiveness comes through the breaking of the cycle, Jesus showing that there is another way to live and to respond.

Remember, the cycle is perpetuated by the reality that “Hurt people hurt people” and the purpose of forgiveness is to break the cycle.

That’s why Jesus says “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do…”
They don’t know how to break the cycle. They don’t know how to discover humanity defined outside of the hurt.
Forgiveness is about stepping out of the way of the pain to discover how to bring life to the onlookers.
A forgiven people is a people who know how to break the cycle of pain, of failing to be all that it is to be human. To know Shalom.
Love is about getting off the hamster wheel, or the Escher painting, and finding the way out, the way forwards, and showing others that is it possible to do the same.
Forgiveness is saying “I can see where this comes from, and I can see what I need to do to get out of the way of both what will come round again and what I will inevitably end up doing.”
Being forgiven is about being shown there is another way.

Jesus shows that other way by stepping out of the cycle, modelling and inviting us to do the same, both in our relationship with God, and in our relationships with each other and the world itself.


Forgiveness is about finding out who you are rather than trying to prove yourself. It’s about defining your relationships by people, not the things that happen between you.

Hurt people hurt people. Break the cycle.