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Before
I begin the sermon, I thought perhaps I should make a disclaimer.
You need to know that I chose the theme for today and gave
the information to Janet Smylie for Steeple Notes over a month
ago, before we left for Florida. But in view of recent events
and news releases and headlines, perhaps I should clarify
that while I am going to be talking about the special
need of forgiveness within families, I am not trying
to make a case for presidential pardons. I thought I ought
to clarify that before someone asks me on the way out of church.
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Have you
ever wondered why Simon Peter asked how many times he should
forgive his brother? Perhaps you have assumed that
Simon used the word "brother" in the way the old
Quakers used to use it, as meaning any male of the fellowship.
Following that line of thought, in our day of concern about
non-discriminatory language, we would read his question as
if he had simply said "person," leaving it unspecific
and impersonal. I know I have usually read it in that more
general sense. In all honesty, that is probably the intent.
Some translations actually use "church member" here.
But the word is "brother," and whether it
means blood relations or simply those within a fellowship,
it implies a closer tie than some stranger who steps on your
foot in a crowd or beats you to the last seat at Bill Knapp's
on Mother's Day.
Simon
Peter had a brother, you know. His name was Andrew and, from
what we read about him, he seems like a very nice guy. But
after who knows how many readings, I found myself wondering
if that was who Simon Peter really meant when he asked his
question! I mean, since when does being a nice guy or gal
keep those closest to us from irritating us now and then?
"How many times shall my brother sin against me and I
forgive him?"
I am not
suggesting that we should not apply Jesus' teaching
in the broader relationships of life and reserve Jesus' celestial
mathematics of seventy times seven to blood relations, but
it did occur to me that the need for forgiveness does often
run the strongest in those realms of life where living is
closest. For where do we find more potential for hurting or
irritation than in those areas of life where the contacts
are more intense and more frequent? How would the casual stranger
ever find even the seven occasions to offend us, much less
the seventy times seven that Jesus spoke about?
But family
life is another matter. It is here that we encounter each
other when we are most sensitive - when our guard is down,
so to speak - and we are the most vulnerable. And for all
the joys and blessings that family living brings, togetherness
can bring stresses.
Two fathers
were talking about world problems, high taxes, the cost of
living, and other such father talk. Eventually, the conversation
got around to family.
"I
have three children," one of them said, proudly.
"That's
a nice family," the other one replied. "I wish
I had three children."
"Don't
you have any children?" asked the first, with sympathy
in his voice.
"Oh
yes," sighed the second man, "I have six."
Or there
is Erma Bombeck's favorite story about the Supermom who always
seemed to do everything right: kept a perfect house, was a
perfect hostess, kept her husband happy, always had a copy
of Bishop Sheen's latest book on the coffee table when the
priest came to call, etc., etc. One day, Erma asked her how
she did it and she said this is what the woman told her:
Every
evening, when the children are bathed and tucked into their
clean little beds, and the lunches are all lined up and
labeled and packed in the refrigerator, and the little shoes
are polished and racked up, and the driveway is waxed, and
I've heard all of the prayers of the children, I fall down
on my knees and say: "Thank you, God, for not letting
me kill one of them today."
Of course,
children have their complaints as well. Have you heard this
anonymous verse?
Her
cookie jar is always filled,
Her
car is at the ready;
She
never shouts when milk is spilled,
She
lets her kids go steady.
She
rings a most indulgent curfew,
Her
cooking's like no other.
Who
is this paragon of virtue?
Why,
EVERYBODY ELSE'S MOTHER!
Or there
was the 34-year-old son whose mother gave him two neckties
for Christmas. Knowing her sensitivity about such things,
he immediately went into the bedroom and put on an outfit
that would set one of them off nicely, only to come back and
have his mother ask him: "What's the matter, didn't you
like the other one?"
Tensions
in family life: they are real; they are with us all the time.
In spite of all of the love and good intentions, it is often
in our families, where living is close, that many of the hurts
of life occur. In fact, much of the violence against individuals
occurs in families: child abuse, spouse abuse, even murder,
occur in family settings with disturbing frequency in our
time.
Part of
the reason for some of this is, no doubt, simply because our
homes are where we are together most. There are more times
and occasions for hurts in families. But probably more critical
than time and opportunity is the fact that it is where living
is closest that our lives are at their most vulnerable levels.
It is in our homes that our defenses are down and our masks
are off and where we are weary of the pretenses that may make
up other parts of our days. The old story about the office
boy who came home and kicked his cat after having been picked
on by the secretary who had been yelled at by the manager
who had been chewed out by the superintendent who had been
hauled on the carpet by the president, has a great deal of
truth in it. But it isn't always the cat that catches the
fallout of our day. Sometimes it is our children or our husbands
or our wives who bear the brunt.
Let us
acknowledge that Jesus' word to Peter was a general principle
that includes the whole family of God, if we can do so by
the grace of God, but let us begin with the humble awareness
that the place we may need to hear it most is where living
is the closest. As William Cowper wisely said many years ago:
The
kindest and the happiest pair
Will
find occasion to forbear;
And
something, every day they live,
To
pity and perhaps forgive.
We are
inclined to think of the pressures and tensions on the family
as a new phenomena, and without question the pressures of
today are different than in other times. But as I read again
Peter's question and remember Paul's advice on family life
to the Ephesians about husbands loving their wives, and wives
respecting their husbands, and children obeying their parents,
and parents not angering their children, I find myself feeling
that it is more a matter of degree than of there once having
been some tension-free Golden Age from which we have fallen.
There never was any idyllic time in which there were no tensions
or troubles to worry about.
The underlying
principle in Jesus' admonition is for patience and understanding,
and that is a principle that has application in any age. Too
often those qualities are missing in family life.
A truck
driver on a long cross-country haul stopped in a little diner
for his breakfast. When the waitress asked for his order,
he said: "Bring me a cup of cold coffee, two slices of
burnt toast, two eggs sunny side up, then break the yolks
when you put them on the plate." The waitress stared
at him a moment, then shook her head and walked away to get
his order. When she brought it back a few minutes later he
looked at it and said: "Now sit down and nag me. I'm
homesick."
I think
my absolute favorite story about grouchiness is the one about
the husband whose attitude was really the pits before breakfast.
His wife knew it and tried to avoid arguments at that time
in the morning. But sometimes it was hard. One morning when
she asked what he wanted for breakfast, he replied: "Eggs.
One fried and one scrambled." Knowing it was going to
be a bad day, she said nothing and prepared the eggs. When
she put them before him, he looked at them and growled: "You
fried the wrong one!"
But did
you know that it is a proven fact that many people are grouchier
when they are hungry, or even just haven't eaten for a while?
Why do you think business lunches are popular? It isn't all
because our boss is such a nice gal or guy or that the company
can take it as a tax write-off, you know. It also has to do
with relationships. What would it mean in family relationships
if we noted things about our children or our spouse or recognized
them in ourselves and made it a point to avoid heavy discussions
at times when we (or they) were more apt to be at our worst?
Why should we do less by our families than we do by our business
associates?
I know
that we like to think that home is where we shouldn't have
to pretend and posture and put on a front. But that doesn't
mean relationships do not need any attention or any effort
on our part. It is not a case of acting, so much as caring
and letting the caring be known.
And so
we come to forgiveness. All of our discussions do not get
put off until the best time; all of the words or deeds of
those we love and who love us are not run through the filter
of thinking first, just as ours are not. Each of us ends up
being in a position in which we need to forgive and to be
forgiven if a relationship is to be what it ought to be.
Simon's
question quickly becomes our question. We may say "sister"
instead of "brother," or it may be son or daughter
or father or mother or wife or husband in our version of the
question, but by this time we know that Simon should
have meant those with whom we live the closest, whether that
was in his mind or not.
How do
we do what Jesus said we are to do? Peter's generous seven
times was judged to be insufficient. (And that was generous,
in that the rabbis suggested three times, and Peter was doubling
that and throwing in an extra one for good measure.) How do
we even begin to approach seventy times seven?
Well,
first of all, we stop counting. I think that was the real
point of Jesus' reply to Simon. This is another of those instances
in Scripture when to take a statement literally is to miss
the point. It would have been as wrong to tally 490 and gleefully
wait for 491 to deck the so-and-so as to have done a countdown
from seven. Jesus was really saying: "Forget the counting,
Simon. Just do it." But how do you do that?
In the
context of Peter's question Jesus told his parable of the
two debtors, the one who owed a great sum and who was forgiven
and then went out and demanded full payment from one who owed
him a fraction of the debt that he had owed. Clearly the lesson
there is that we should find the grace to forgive in the recognition
of having been forgiven. Notice that Jesus did not imply that
being forgiven automatically made us forgiving; he did not
suggest that forgiveness was some easy, inexpensive act. He
simply said that if we cannot integrate into our life that
which has been offered us in such great amounts, then we have
not recognized what we have received.
After
one of John Wesley's sermons on forgiveness, one of his hearers
said to him: "I never forgive and I never forget."
To which Mr. Wesley replied: "Then, sir, I hope that
you never sin."
But aside
from the "oughtness" of the matter, how do you do
the forgiving? It might be helpful to recall the prayer about
forgiveness that we probably pray more than any other: "Forgive
us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against
us." Those words suggest that we will set the pattern
by our actions - and that is a really scary thought! - but
suppose we start from the other end. How would we prefer that
God act to forgive us?
Alan McGinnis,
writing in Guideposts, told the story of a stockbroker
(whom he called George) who had a falling out with another
broker in the same office. (Close living, remember?) They
had a dispute over a customer, and after the incident, although
they passed each other's desk every day, they never spoke.
One day in church, George was praying the Lord's Prayer and
his relationship with his fellow worker came to his mind when
he came to that phrase I just quoted.
There
was no question in his mind, he said, about who was in the
wrong. Sam had been in the wrong when he stole his customer,
but it wasn't right that they were not speaking. While the
rest of the congregation finished the prayer, he asked God
to help him with Sam. These are George's words:
On Monday
afternoon, after the market had closed and I was finishing
up some papers, I breathed another prayer and went over
to Sam's desk and said: "You know, Sam, you used to
tell me about the trouble your wife was having with arthritis,
and I've been wondering how she's getting along."
Sam
looked startled at first, but then the words began to tumble
out - how they'd had her to three specialists in the past
year, and that she was a little better, thank you. And as
we talked he told me about taking a walk together for two
blocks the night before, which was pretty good. And among
other things, he said that he was too quick with his tongue
and often did things he didn't mean to do. Though he didn't
come out and say it, I knew that was Sam's way of apologizing.
And
the next morning when he came by my desk, he said, just
like he used to: "Good morning, George!" And I
said, just like I used to: "Good morning, Sam!"
Just like
they used to ...
There
is at least part of the secret of forgiveness: restoring relationships,
making things as if the wrong had never happened. You will
tell me that is difficult to do; I won't argue with you a
bit. When the hurt has been deep and painful, it may even
take a while to reach that point. But getting there is what
forgiveness is all about, and sometimes it is best arrived
at without a lot of demanding of formal apologies and wordy
explanations. Granted, such actions mean that the one who
is wronged may be the one to make the overture, but then that
is what God did, is it not? Wasn't that the marvel that Paul
expressed? "While we were yet sinners, Christ died for
us."
We are
inclined to think that forgiveness must be preceded by a formal
request, but often it is the attitude of forgiveness that
makes repentance possible.
This is
not to say that words are never appropriate or needed. Sometimes
words are needed very much. We may desperately need to hear
someone who has hurt us say: "I'm sorry; please forgive
me." And sometimes we are the ones who need to say those
words. But there are times when saying those words is awfully
hard, and if we can find the grace to act as if they have
been said, we will often discover that those actions enable
the words to be spoken, or at least for their feeling to be
communicated.
"How
many times shall my brother sin against me and I forgive him
...?" Intentionally or not, Simon's question points to
a part of life in which we often have the need of Jesus' word
of truth, for it is where the living is the closest that the
friction sometimes comes and it is here, by the grace of God,
that the healing of forgiveness can make the closeness even
finer than before.
Thanks
be to God...And with you. Amen.
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