Forgiveness

My research area academically is forgiveness. I am exploring a theory about forgiveness. the premises are as follows:

1. To forgive completely one must understand the full extent of the offense, the person's intent, the wounds/injuries his or her actions have inflicted and then the systemic effect of the sin on others impacted by one's life.

2. There is only one being in the universe who knows completely--God. He knows motive, the actual injury, my response to the injury (including possible sinful response to a sinful response), the extent of the wounds/injuries. So God can forgive (an event, once and done) because he knows completely.

3. We are finite. We are unable to understand if a small portion of what has happened and the effects in my life. Many Christians are taught "event forgiveness," once and done, move on. But this runs counter to our finitude. For us, as we move through time and various experiences, we feel twinges and we realize a wound we didn't even know was there. And then we see a person and feelings well up or we pass a critical calendar date and memories well up . . .

4. Forgiveness is not an event, it is process, probably a lifetime process for serious offenses . . . all through our lives we will be unwraveling the webb of hurt.

5. We must, however, move to a posture of forgiveness, in which the general inclination of our heart is to look full face on to the hurt and make a decision to forgive (as our heavenly Father forgives-to use the words of Jesus). And so it goes, forgiving, moving to a posture of forgiveness when new elements of the offense prick our hearts. Living in the grace for this day in which I repond to those parts of the other's offense and the offenses I committed in response to the first offense.

6. The posture of forgiveness allows us to move past being chained to the past actions of an individual or groups of individuals. Mutual forgiveness occurs when we live with a more realistic anthropology: that we will fail one another, enormously at times. But as we look fully, face to face at the wound (I think sometimes we don't actually really look at the offense because it is too painful for us) and the invasive, rippling effects of the offense, we can come to Jesus and ask for the grace extended by Father, Son and Spirit to allow our heart's inclination to be not focused then on the offense but in our response to the offense. We look very much like our Father when we forgive.

6.  Forgiveness is different than reconciliation and that is a topic for another time.