Believing Christ

Sorry, Stephen. I didn’t say directly how impressed I was by the post. Concise and profound.

John Nilsson,

I am a big proponent of the concept of Christ as the great healer of all relationships. For example, would you enjoy heaven if your actions permanently scarred another person (abuse, bearing false witness, Count of Monte Cristo stuff) which contributed to their choosing a bad path in life? Though God has forgiven you through your repentance, would you be able to feel comfortable in God’s presence knowing that another soul suffers (in part at least) because of your actions? What I need the atonement to accomplish is not just forgiveness for my sins, but healing for those that I’ve hurt.

It is my testimony that just as Christ has healed me and freed me from the pain and resentment of those that have wronged me, he will do the same for those I have wronged. Heaven is only heaven if all my relationships are at rights, and only Christ can approach the wronged and ask them to give him their pains.

Note that Jesus Christ never said “Forgive and forget” which has become the popular concept of forgiveness, which I think is misunderstood. The Online Etymology Dictionary says, “O.E. forgytan, from for- “passing by, letting go” (cf. forbear, forgo) + gietan “to grasp” (see get). A common Gmc. construction (cf. O.S. fargetan, Du. vergeten, Ger. vergessen “to forget”). The literal sense would be “to lose (one’s) grip on,…” Jesus did said that God “remembers no more” but I don’t see that standard applied to mortals.

Forgiveness is a willing act of giving the offender (and the offended) permission for a new life, to put off and embrace the new. It is such a burden to some persons when they think they have forgiven and yet still remember. Some people are toxic and unhealthful to have in one’s life; I think it is naive to think that the higher consciousness Jesus was offering was for us to continue in communion with such offending persons, even as we give them, and ourselves, permission to move on through forgiveness. It seems to me that Jesus is telling us of the sin — the separation from God, from enlightenment, from our heavenly present and future — if we “damn” our offender and ourselves by remaining stuck in the quagmire of trespasses and their aftermath. The forgiveness of some offenses, in my opinion, still rightly can involve a schism and separation from the offender and offended. That can be part of starting a new path and putting the past behind.

Kent said, “Though God has forgiven you through your repentance, would you be able to feel comfortable in God’s presence knowing that another soul suffers (in part at least) because of your actions? What I need the atonement to accomplish is not just forgiveness for my sins, but healing for those that I’ve hurt.”

Powerful and heartrending thought. This theme is what I thought was so beautiful about the film Atonement. Mortal forgiveness cannot alter the courses of past history, only invite new history to be written. Part of the new history can still be non-reconciliation of negative life courses, outcomes and events. We cannot Atone our sins. Only He. And oh, what hope is ours that it is His power to be able to heal soul wounds where we see no physical evidence, where we see only death or barriers, and have no mortal assurance that wrongs have been righted.

hawkgrrl said, “I, for one, think that forgiveness is the most critical unique teaching of Christianity. The change from eye for an eye in Law of Moses to forgiveness in the New Testament is pivotal and fundamental.”

I agree, yet I view “eye for an eye” with a different nuance than it is commonly juxtaposed against the New Testament. Rabbinical tradition is that “eye for an eye and tooth for a tooth” sets merciful limits to what justice can claim. In other words, penalty must balance and apportion to the crime; it cannot exceed its limits. I think this is a very sympathetic and insightful nuance. However, it is also tough to literally reconcile, in my mind, the various issues for which halachan (Levitical law) violation that death or stoning is a permissable punishment.

Yet seeking to find emotional fellowship with this Jewish perspective on “eye for an eye” representing mercy and justice I also find pivotal and fundamental hope in the incarnation of Christ. I see it this way: Where our mortal laws and efforts to fairly and appropriately balance justice and mercy may even have its praiseworthy and necessary function, it is not a dependable process by which we can reconcile ourselves before God and achieve earthly enlightenment (even as divine as they may try to approach). This took the most Divine of mercy and gifting to invite us to look beyond our best and most righteous intentions to recognize our profound limitations to right all wrongs. When we do this He has saved us in this life and the next.

It is remarkable to me how little we follow Christ to the cross. When we are offended as a nation, we dont even follow the lex talionis. There is rarely any proportionality in our reaction. The casualties in Afghanistan serve as a quick example.

I think that one of the most significant aspects of the atonement is Christ’s descent into the abyss of human misery, pain, abandonment, scapegoating, etc. And yet, he forgives. A lamb to the slaughter, no resistance. This is perhaps the grace so many talk about. The, he loved us while we were yet sinner. I feel as if Christ has already forgiven everything. The question is will we forgive ourselves, and others. Christ’s atonement seems to allow me both to forgive those who offend me and to be forgiven.

Someone mentioned earlier the difference between Islam and Christianity. I think the fact that there is no cross, no defeat in Islam is the crucial distinguishing factor between faiths. A God that is not a victim, who is not killed, is not a God that inspires us to forgive and be forgiven.

Rene Girard commented on this difference noting that Islam “lacks the essential thing in Christianity: the cross. Like Christianity, Islam rehabilitates the innocent victim, but it does this in a militant manner. The cross is the contrary, it is the end of the violent and archaic myths”

Kent wrote, “I am a big proponent of the concept of Christ as the great healer of all relationships. For example, would you enjoy heaven if your actions permanently scarred another person (abuse, bearing false witness, Count of Monte Cristo stuff) which contributed to their choosing a bad path in life? Though God has forgiven you through your repentance, would you be able to feel comfortable in God’s presence knowing that another soul suffers (in part at least) because of your actions? What I need the atonement to accomplish is not just forgiveness for my sins, but healing for those that I’ve hurt.

It is my testimony that just as Christ has healed me and freed me from the pain and resentment of those that have wronged me, he will do the same for those I have wronged. Heaven is only heaven if all my relationships are at rights, and only Christ can approach the wronged and ask them to give him their pains.”

This is right on! I couldn’t say anything else that would add to this.

I appreciate GB Smith’s observation of May 10. I am seeking to understand the Atonement of Christ on a deeper level than I ever have so that I can find my way clear to forgive my stepfather’s abuses 45 year ago. Yet it’s helpful that others realize this is not an easy task. In the end, if my stepfather is who he was, this achievement will be more for me than him but I feel a tremendous need to be able to do it. and that requires that I understand the Atonement.