AS WE FORGIVEReading: Matthew 6: 7-15
The disciples watched Jesus praying. They knew he did it ‘better’ than them! But what they were really picking up was the depth of his relationship with God. They wanted that, too, so he shares with them what we have come to know as the Lord’s Prayer. If people don’t know anything else, they know this prayer. It is common to all traditions. It can be rhymed or rattled off in countless different places and scenarios. It can be used so lightly and without any thought of what we’re saying. Yet Jesus specifically gave this prayer to those who were his disciples, so it’s a prayer for followers, for those who are in earnest about their journey of faith. It’s often called the family prayer but it’s really only that if we are referring to the family of believers. It acknowledges who we are speaking to and leads us from that point into what we might want to talk with God about.
When we say ‘Our Father’ we are acknowledging that there is one God who is father of all and, because he is, then we are sisters and brothers of each other. Did you ever notice that there is no ‘I’ or ‘me’ in the Lord’s Prayer? It’s all ‘we’ and ‘us.’ And God, our Father, is the creator of difference, of variety, of uniqueness. He calls us to unity in that diversity and therefore to accept one another across the various divisions invented by humankind that have been such a scandal to the witness of the Church throughout the ages. Some people may have difficulty with that and certainly have declared their difficulty in the strongest terms here in Northern Ireland over many years. January is the month when we think especially about the deep desire in the heart of God for unity among his followers. That is because for many years eight days in January are earmarked as the octave of prayer for Christian Unity. Perhaps over time this call to prayer has become a bit tired. Certainly it can become the conscience salver for those who feel if they do their bit in January then they can put it at the bottom of their agenda for the rest of the year. We cannot, by our own efforts, alert the Church to the fact that this call from God is vital, but we can pray that the Holy Spirit will awaken every believer to the fact that our unity in our diversity, not our uniformity, is the chief evangelistic tool we have been given to draw others into the kingdom.
Every phrase in the Lord’s Prayer is packed with meaning and it would not be appropriate to give more credence to one statement over another. But it does seem as if this community prayer reaches a very important crescendo with this particular petition: ‘Forgive us our sins, as we forgive those who sin against us.’ It’s amazing how many people don’t seriously take the second part of this petition on board. They take it simply as a prayer asking for forgiveness. But actually there is something very important and highly significant here. In fact, in Matthew’s account of this teaching on prayer, Jesus follows it up with this warning, “If you forgive those who sin against you, your heavenly Father will forgive you. But if you refuse to forgive others, your Father will not forgive your sins.” It’s not that God doesn’t want to forgive us, but if we are holding resentment, grudges or unforgiveness in our hearts, then somehow the flow of God’s forgiveness is obstructed, not from his side but from ours. Eugene Peterson pits it this way, “In prayer there is a connection between what God does and what you do. You can’t get forgiveness from God, for instance, without also forgiving others. If you refuse to do your part, you cut yourself off from God’s part.”* How often are we cutting ourselves off from God’s part, both individually and collectively because we are not doing our part? In refusing to forgive we are putting ourselves into a place of exile, a no-man’s land. It doesn’t alter God’s love for us, but in order for him to be true ‘to his name’ he isn’t free to act towards us in the way that he would like. Jean Vanier says often, “Community is founded on forgiveness and builds itself up through love.” I used to think that it should be the other way round, but now I see so clearly that he has it right. Mutual forgiveness is to be one of the chief hallmarks of God’s Kingdom. Having said that it is so important for us to be sensitive. Forgiveness is always a journey, a process that may take quite some time, especially if a person has been wounded very deeply. If they find it at any particular time impossible to let go of a hurt then we don’t need to be adding to their burden by heaping guilt upon them about their inability to forgive. It is the desire of the heart that God honours. If he sees that the desire of our heart is to forgive even although we cannot seem to actually do it at present, then the channels of his forgiveness and love, his compassion and mercy flow freely towards us.
‘As we forgive’ betokens a generosity of spirit, a heart that, even although it has been broken and wounded, can still say “Welcome!” It is an acknowledgement that we all form part of a common humanity, sinned against and sinning. Yet within the grace of God and in the mystery of relationship, that common humanity can bring its brokenness together and in the midst of all that is not understood can still move together in the power of forgiving love.
*Eugene Peterson, The Message (Colorado Springs: Navapress, 1994), p. 25