What's in a hug...?
This is the sermon for the churches in my benefice today (the 15th Sunday after Trinity), preaching on Genesis 50:15-21 and Matthew 18:21-35.
It went through several iterations and main themes on its way to becoming this, and owes several debts, especially to the work of Miroslav Volf, Wil Gafney, and Dietrich Bonhoeffer (who was in there till the last minute, until I realised that talking about ‘cheap grace’ was going to push the length too far), as well as too many conversations with friends and colleagues over the past few years to count
I.
“Now come give me a hug…”
I wonder how many of us have uttered these words, or words like them, to a child, a partner, a friend, with whom we’ve had some kind of disagreement or argument, with whom we’ve been trying to make up? A hug–or any kind of embrace–often seems to be the moment in which forgiveness is given and received; in which reconciliation is sealed. It frees us from tensions and allows us to move forwards.
Forgiveness is a key theme in our readings today. In our gospel passage Peter asks Jesus, ‘how many times should I forgive…?’ ‘Seventy-seven times’ says Jesus, in a response that is quite hyperbolic. ‘Infinity times’ he might as well have said. He then proceeds to tell a story about mercy and forgiveness which reminds that God’s forgiveness of all of our brokenness and sin, and his gift of new life and freedom should inspire us to have mercy on others, to forgive and to liberate in our turn.
The image of an embrace as a symbol of forgiveness has been seen by some Christian thinkers as illuminated by the picture of Christ on the cross, arms spread wide. Jesus’ death and resurrection is an event that makes possible our reconciliation with God, our own forgiveness and liberation—the beginning of the relationship in which our own ability to forgive finds its source. In many ways it sums up this parable’s account of forgiveness between the king and the first debtor.
It’s easy to see this kind of forgiveness exemplified in our Old Testament reading, which closes out the story of Joseph and his brothers. By this point, Joseph is the second most powerful man in Egypt and once their father dies, his brothers are terrified that he will finally take his revenge for the way that they sold him into slavery. So, they concoct a story, in which their father Jacob’s last wish was that Joseph would forgive his brothers. And Joseph forgives them, telling them that God has turned their evil deed into a good outcome, in the relief of the famine. Perhaps you can imagine the scenes that follow—joy and crying and very possibly, embracing.
Both stories illustrate how forgiveness, not vengeance, is a part of the way of life of God’s people, and it is something we are called to as Christians and members of the church, in our own families, and our congregations, and within the wider church. It breaks into cycles of hatred and violence and creates the possibilities for healing and new ways of living together.
II.
BUT (there’s always a but)—is it really this simple? Is forgiveness so uncomplicated? Are there not, perhaps, pitfalls and dangers in the reading of these passages that I’ve just given you? Doesn’t it risk making it seem like forgiveness should feel easy and natural for a Christian? Doesn’t it seem to set aside the need we feel for justice? Doesn’t it risk making us think that if we find it hard to forgive, if we find we can’t forgive at this time, that we’re ‘bad Christians’ or ‘bad people’?
I suspect most of us know that forgiveness very often isn’t easy and doesn’t feel natural and possible. I wonder how many of us have experienced the kind of request for a hug I described at the beginning not as something good and liberating, not just as an uncomplicated moment of reconciliation and forgiveness; but as something uncomfortable, something demanded of us, something we’re not quite ready to give? This reluctance to embrace forgiveness and a kind of closure might arise for any number of reasons.
Forgiveness is often one of the later steps in someone’s process of healing from a hurt and rebuilding a relationship. Pain has to be felt and processed; trauma, in particular takes time to be worked through. Rushing this is damaging: emotionally, physically and spiritually. People have to relearn how to understand themselves and their lives in the light of experiences of pain. The desire to offer of forgiveness may come as they do so, but it takes time. Black theologians who are the descendants of enslaved and colonised peoples remind us that only Joseph can encounter and describe God as being at work in his experience of being sold into slavery. Only he can choose to forgive. For his brothers to force him to forgive them would be a new kind of violence.
It can also be hard to forgive if you don’t receive repentance or justice. Perhaps justice systems are taking a long time, or not working for you. Perhaps the person who hurt you doesn’t think there’s anything to apologise for, or you can’t see them trying to make amends or do things differently in future. Were Joseph’s brothers really sorry, or just scared of what he might do to them once he had power over them? The absence of repentance and justice makes the process of healing harder; it makes forgiveness more difficult.
Forgiveness is costly for the person doing the forgiving and if we want to see Jesus’ arms spread wide on the cross as an image of an invitation to embrace and accept forgiveness and a new future, then we must also see the pain and suffering that make it possible.
III.
So, while forgiveness is something that God calls us to, and it is a gift from him that is a part of healing and reconciliation we do need to be careful about making demands for forgiveness ourselves and within the church, because we are asking people to do something hard.
It is very easy to emphasise the importance of forgiveness over its cost, and if we are honest, we’ve probably all done this as well—I know that I have. We are all people who have hurt others and need forgiveness, as well as being people who have been hurt.
We do it for any number of reasons—because it can be easier than struggling through a longer process; or because because people in pain can be difficult to live with, and be a reminder of our own weaknesses and failings, causing us a discomfort we’d rather cover up with a hug; or because we genuinely want to be forgiven or to reach the point of reconciliation, and we just don’t know how not to rush things.
We see this manifest in churches in so many ways: in disputes, discomforts, and differences that are pushed aside and simmer rather than being engaged with and resolved. In the ways the legacies and realities of racism, slavery and colonisation appear in microcosm in our congregations and are met with calls to ‘forgive and forget’. In the ways survivors of abuse and safeguarding failures in the church experience pressures to forgive those who abused them or enabled abuse of their sins without repentance or justice or change being apparent. These are things that cannot be set to one side following a hug.
We need to be honest about the fact that we’re not isolated from these realities here in our congregations, even if they’re not always obvious on the surface of our lives, and we have to recognise that we are part of a larger church that is also grappling with them. Its ability to do so is rooted in our own willingness to recognise that forgiveness is vital, and that forgiveness is hard. This starts with each of us taking the time look at ourselves quietly and honestly:
- To notice why and where we find it hard to forgive, and to both know God’s love in that reality and to wonder if there is a way through it.
- to notice where and why we are calling for forgiveness of others in a way that risks forcing them into it, and to wonder what that asks of us by way of repentance, making amends, or living with our feelings of discomfort.
Such noticing and wondering can become the beginnings of slow—and yes difficult—but hopefully real changes in our congregations and the wider church, in the ways in which relate to other people where forgiveness and healing are needed.
The good news is that God understands and loves us in all our pains and our weaknesses, and in all the ways we find forgiveness difficult. That Jesus’ open arms always inviting us into forgiveness, and patiently waiting for us to be ready to forgive and be forgiven.