Psalm 103:8-13, CEB - The Lord is compassionate
and merciful,
very patient,
and full of faithful love.
God won’t always play the judge;
he won’t be
angry forever.
He doesn’t deal with us according to our sin
or repay us
according to our wrongdoing,
because as high as heaven is above the earth,
that’s how
large God’s faithful love is for those who honor him.
As far as east is from west—
that’s how far
God has removed our sin from us.
Like a parent feels compassion for their children—
that’s how the
Lord feels compassion for those who honor him.
Today,
on the second day of Easter (Easter is a season of 50 days, not just one day),
we begin a series devotional reflections on the different facets of
forgiveness. With all the conflict,
hate, division and violence taking center stage in our world today, forgiveness
is more important than ever. There are
so many misunderstandings regarding forgiveness that keep people from
experiencing it and practicing it; we will walk through those biblically with
the goal of developing this discipline as one of the distinguishing
characteristics of the Christian community.
So here we go.
Any
discussion of forgiveness begins with God, just as any discussion of love
begins with God. As creatures made in
the image of God, if God isn’t forgiving, than we don’t have a chance at being
forgiven or practicing forgiveness ourselves.
So the character of God is where the possibility of forgiveness being
part of creation is where we begin. The
core question is, “Is God One who forgives naturally as part of God’s
character?”
For
people of faith through the ages, the answer hasn’t always been yes. Even now, many people believe God to be
essentially angry toward those who transgress.
In many present Christians traditions, there is almost a distinction
made between the God of the Old Testament (the God of the Hebrews) and the God
of the New Testament (the God of the Christians). OT (Old Testament) God is angry at those who
sin and demands sacrifice and penance before relenting in that wrath. NT (New Testament) God seems to have “learned”
to be more forgiving. Perhaps, NT God
has been satisfied with the sacrifice and penance of offered by God’s own Son
Jesus on the cross on behalf of all humanity.
Because of Jesus’s offering, no more sacrifices are needed to diminish
God’s wrath. God can now love and forgive
us because of what Jesus did. It is a
conservative estimate that more than half of Christian theological traditions talk
about God that way.
Here’s just
one problem with that (there are many others).
It assumes that God’s core character toward us, God’s flawed and
fumbling creatures, is anger and frustration, not love. It assumes that God’s “mind and heart” have
to be changed about us before we can have a proper loving relationship with
God. It is God that has to change for a loving
divine-human relationship to be possible, not us. This is highly problematic for obvious
reasons. I don’t know about you, but I’m
real uncomfortable with the notion that God had to change God’s mind about me
and I don’t have to change at all. So
for me, any notion that God’s core character is not loving and forgiving
towards us even in the midst of our imperfection and sinfulness is
backwards.
Fortunately,
even in the Old Testament, there are minority voices that dispute the angry
nature of OT God. The above psalm,
written by King David of the Hebrews, is one of them. David is a poster child of flawed humanity. He is one described as a “man after God’s own
heart” (1 Sam. 13:14), but he stole the wife of one on his officers, had that
man killed, and then tried to cover it up.
At the same time, David is the author of many amazingly eloquent psalms
about the nature of God that he served. In
the one above, David speaks of God as One whose essential stance towards
humanity is love and forgiveness.
David
is not alone in this view, even among the authors of the Old Testament. We shall get to some of those important
voices as we go through this series of reflections on forgiveness, but for
today, I just encourage us to begin to consider the core thought I have tied to
express here today. God is not angry with
us until God’s mind is changed; God loves
us and is waiting to forgive us because that is essentially who God is. God IS love.
God is the inventor of forgiveness.
Questions: What are
your assumptions about the God’s core nature?
Does God need to change who God is in order for you and God to have a
relationship?
Prayer: God, may we
know You as You truly are at Your core. Thank you for the victory and celebration
of Easter. Show us you heart so that our
relationship with You may flourish and deepen.
Prayer Focus: Pray
for peace in all the places of deep conflict in the world today.
Song: You Are Good -
Israel Houghton (LIVE RECORDING)
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