Meditation Six: Forgiveness
“My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.” (1 John 2:1–2, ESV)
Each year members of the street community, head to prison, some reluctantly and others choosing to commit a crime so that they can have a roof over their head through winter. With a criminal record many are searching and longing for forgiveness. They long for the strength to forgive those who have wronged them, the grace to be forgiven by their victims and the mercy to forgive themselves. Many are also looking for forgiveness from God, this is especially true, as prison chaplains can testify, if the crime was of a violent or a sexual nature.
The wages of sin is death (Rom 3:23), and this death often begins within one's soul as the guilt and shame of criminality consume the dwindling reserves of identity and self-respect. However, the wonderful and beautiful truth of the gospel is that through the crucifixtion, humanity has entered a new era where forgiveness and intimacy with the Father are both offered and actualised. The cross of Jesus, with all its dehumanizing violence and humiliation, where the God-Man is sinned against, is simultaneously the place of extravagant mercy and unlimited love. Here, even the vilest offender finds pardon, peace, and forgiveness.
The roman soldiers, trained killers who killed at the behest of empire, tortured the innocent one, spat upon the great king, flogged the peacemaker, and butchered the good shepherd.
Before he breathed his last, the God-Man Jesus, the one who could have called down a legion of angels to destroy his executioners, spoke to those who had tortured him, and said ‘Father, forgive them they know not what they do.’
He who taught enemy love and forgiveness, in his final moments preached his final sermon.
In the midst of humiliation, love spoke. He still speaks, offering and actualises forgivness for the whole world.
The wages of sin is death, and the story of Israel found in the scriptures of old speaks of the consequences of transgression as curse, death, exile, and judgment. The wrath of God, a biblical word which doesn’t resonate well in contemporary contexts, may be understood as the the natural outworking of sin , the cause and effect.
Sin and judgment, a relationship of cause and consequence, is found in our own lives whereby chaos and rebellion damage and dehumanise us or lead us into a spiral of chaos and captivity. Our sin has no part in God’s future kingdom and if it were to remain we would be excluded (1 Cor 6:10, Rev 22:14-15)
Yet, in Jesus, we never receive the wages of sin, that is death , although it's what we deserve; instead, we receive the gift of reconciliation and eternal life.
“My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. He is the propitiation (hilsamo) for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.” (1 John 2:1–2, ESV)
“In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation (hilsamo) for our sins.” (1 John 4:10, ESV)
In these two verses John uses the greek word ‘hilsamo’ and it’s the only place they appears in the New Testament. In the greek translation of the Old Testament, the septuagint, it is appears 6 times, and relates to the removal of guilt usually through sacrifice. Scholarship debates as to whether it should best be translated as atoning sacrifice, place of mercy, expiation (removal of guilt) or propitiation (removal of Gods anger).
Pagan understandings of God, and variations of it within Christianity, sometimes portray God as full of wrath towards sinners, with blood sacrifice of an animal or a human allowing the appeasement of God's wrath.
This pagan concept has no place within a trinitarian understanding of God, for the Father is the agent of reconciliation who 'sent his Son.'
The narrative trajectory towards the cross is not found to be found in in either wrath or anger, but rather within the saving embrace of a loving Father who sends his Son on a reconciling mission to deal with sin so that there can be reconciliation and restoration.. The exact theological mechanics of this, I can't grasp; it is a holy mystery. However, we can confess and celebrate that in the death of Jesus, sins are wiped away (expiation), and Jesus, as Israel's representative and Messiah, takes upon himself the curse, the exile, and the wrath of God. The barriers of sin and shame, that which keep us from intimacy, have been removed.
“Jesus, the innocent one, the one person who has done nothing wrong, the one innocent of the crimes of which Israel as a whole was guilty, has become identified with rebel Israel who represents God’s whole rebel world; with us who are rebels, unclean, unfaithful, unloving, unholy – so that he may take that sin as it were into himself and deal with it, and give us instead his holiness as a robe, his purity as a gift and a power.”- N.T Wright
Ace knows she shouldn't have done it, and as soon as it happened, she knew there would be consequences. Barbara, her best friend and partner in crime, wouldn't walk again, but with disability access for prison visits, Ace was able to hear the words from Barbara: 'I forgive you.'
Barbara had recently become a Christian, and these words were healing for Ace, but Ace was still looking to forgive herself. Over a number of prison visits leading up to Easter, Barbara shared the story of Jesus and explained why the church calls the day he died Good Friday. At that moment, in the visitors' wing, the spiritual lights came on, and Ace, with tears in her eyes, saw afresh that the death of Jesus was the gateway to forgiveness and reconciliation. The death of Jesus showed the gravity of sin, and Ace perceived the words of Jesus, 'Father, forgive them; they know not what they do,' as being answered right there and then in her own life.
In the coming weeks, Ace, in acceptance of the actuality of divine forgiveness, went on to forgive herself. Her chains fell off, her heart was free, and she rose, went forth, and followed her King.
