Forgiveness Part 2: "if only..."

image: http://wise-grasshopper.blogspot.com/2011/02/monkey-and-coocnut-art-of-wanting-less.html

Shalom Mennonite Church

Sunday, April 28, 2013

Don't Forgive Too Soon—Part 3: Bargaining

Texts: Psalm 130:1-6, Genesis 32:1-18, 33:1-9

Eric Massanari

“if only”

If only you knew how much you hurt me...

If only you could feel that hurt...

If only you could suffer the pain that I have known...

If only you would pay back all you have taken from me...

If only you understood how angry I am

and how much I want to see you pay

for what you have done...

…then, maybe then, I might be able to forgive you.

One can imagine Esau thinking and saying

such things after being betrayed by

his brother Jacob, and being robbed

of his birthright and blessing from their father.

If only...

If only I could somehow take it back...

If only I could go back and have a “do over”

of that terrible moment...

If only there was some way to reverse things...

If only I could assume the suffering I have caused you...

If only you knew how sorry I am...

...then, maybe then, you could forgive me.

One can imagine Jacob thinking and saying

such things after betraying his brother,

after learning some difficult life lessons,

and after being wounded in his wrestling match with God.

But first the brothers have to move through,

twenty years of separation and struggle,

saying to themselves:

If only....

This is the language of bargaining

on the journey of forgiveness.

Bargaining, you might say, is an act of

placing certain conditions on the outflow

of our love toward our sister or brother.

Bargaining is also the act of placing constraints

on our capacity to receive the flow of love

coming from our sister or brother.

That may make it sound negative,

however, the process of bargaining

is very natural and understandable

when there has been hurt inflicted

in our human relationships.

Such constraints and conditions

may be necessary when deep wounding has happened.

Bargaining can have a healthy aspect to it.

• It is a way we can articulate what has hurt us...
  You shared something with someone that I told you in confidence. I can forgive you if I can hear you acknowledge how this violated my trust in you.
  
  
• Bargaining is way we express our needs...
  You were careless when you were caring for my cat while I was on vacation. You made a poor choice to feed it Snickers bars instead of cat food. I need you to take responsibility for what happened and to help make it right before I can trust you to care for my cat again. I need you to come help me clean up my house!

• Bargaining is a way we name our boundaries...
  You have abused me and I do not feel safe with you. I need distance from you and I need the abuse to stop immediately.

Bargaining can be a vital, healthy step.

However, because bargaining means

placing conditions and constraints

on our relationships and our

capacity to relate to others

it can sometimes become a barrier

to the unfolding journey of forgiveness.

Sometimes our “if only's” become ultimatums,

and sometimes we set conditions on forgiveness

that simply are not reasonable or possible.

Most of us live with a myriad of “if only's”

in our engagement with life and one another:

If only I had more money...

If only I had a better job...

If only you could see things my way...

If only this moment could be different than it is right now...

Our bargaining can eventually

hamstring us, trap us, and prevent us

from growing to a new place.

I once heard about a clever monkey trap

used in parts of East Asia.

A coconut is hollowed out, and a small

hole is cut in one end, just large enough

for a monkey's hand to reach in.

Inside the coconut they place a piece of candy.

The monkey reaches into the trap,

his empty hand easily fitting through the hole,

but once he grabs the candy

and makes a fist, he cannot remove his hand.

In the end, the thing that traps the monkey

is his own refusal to let go.

Our bargaining has something to teach us,

its own gift to offer, but in time,

and when we are ready, our conditions

and constraints must eventually be released.

In order for forgiveness to come to its fullness,

we must release the hold that the past

has on our lives; we must eventually let go.

Consider how Jacob and Esau

stand before one another at the end of their story:

They stand on the soil of their homeland,

with their possessions and the people

they treasure gathered around them,

but in the end they must stand

empty handed before one another,

wounded, weeping, yielded, open.

Jacob, the one who has wounded his brother,

is now limping and wounded from his

late night wrestling match with God.

He bows on the ground, seven times,

as a sign of his contrition.

He had first considered sending

all of his family and possessions

on ahead of him with a message of how sorry he was.

That would have been the choice of self-preservation,

not the choice that leads into the freedom of forgiveness.

That was the cowardly option.

Instead, Jacob's encounter with God

has changed him, freeing him to stand

before the brother he had betrayed,

willing to accept the consequences of his actions.

We don't know about what happened

to Esau during those twenty years of separation.

It is clear he has prospered.

It is also clear that over time his suffering and

his own bargaining has dissipated and fallen away.

Because he, too, stands before his

brother open, yielded and

able to forgive without condition or constraint.

In order to come to its fruition,

forgiveness requires us to release they other person

with whom we have become bound by hurt.

Otherwise we remain tied to them

and unable to be fully free.

Twenty years, and many challenges of life

were needed for Jacob and Esau to reach this point.

It is important for us to recognize that.

They were not ready for this meeting before then.

And, even then, in this moment

of forgiveness and freedom

shared by the two brothers,

it is important to recognize what happens next:

they go their separate ways.

The freedom that comes with forgiveness

can lead many different directions

and into other unfolding journeys:

reconciliation,

separation,

reunion,

dissolution...

When we receive the gift of forgiveness

we soon realize that it becomes yet another

new beginning.

Amen