Last autumn I wrote a post on Forgiveness in my <30-30 series> My Top 30 Life Lesssons in 30 Years>. To this date it has been the most trafficked post I have ever written. It seems that I am not the only one who finds forgiveness a relevant and difficult topic to wrestle with. 

Tonight I gave a talk at our weekly student gathering on the topic of forgiveness. Maybe I was asked to deliver it because I have wrestled with it so darn much. I won’t give you all of it.. but here are a few things that have stood out to me over the year as I have had to forgive again and again one particular person who brought me much pain as well as the many others I’ve forgiven or had to apologize to in the tides of what makes for normal relationship breakdowns. 

I am a total people pleaser. I love people. I want to be in good standing with people. I want people to like me. I almost always like people. I have been told off for thinking the best of people and choosing to trust people when others think I am a fool for this, which is why this has been a difficult lesson. Just because you forgive someone does not mean you need to be in a reconciled relationship with them. Reconciliation, or the restoration of the relationship is dependent on the one who has done the harm. You can forgive someone for their actions but not everyone you will be able to restore the relationship with. Reconciliation is the goal. It is the pattern of relationships for Christians because of our model of God coming to us and seeking a reconciled relationship through Himself absorbing the cost and punishment for our sin. “While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” 

But not everyone we need to forgive we will be able or will it be helpful to have a restored relationship with. Differing from forgiveness, reconciliation is often conditioned on the attitude and actions of the offender. The process of reconciliation depends on the attitude of the offender, the depth of the betrayal, and the pattern of offense. Some behaviours need time to see if there is change before trust can be restored. If someone is truly repentant and has caused harm to someone, they should be able to give someone this time and space. In the case of addictions one might need to see time and change before they allow themselves back into a relationship again so as not to be an enabler to someone’s alcohol or drug addiction. In the case of rape or verbal or emotional or physical abuse it is dependent on the offended party as to whether there is restored relationship. It might be more harmful than good for the victim to experience a relationship with their abuser. It is still good and necessary and healthy for the victim to come to forgive but that does not guarantee a reconciled relationship. If someone is not repentant, or is lying, or there is evidence that their behaviour is an unending pattern, it might hinder the one injured from trusting again or being willing to reconcile the relationship. 

“If we can restore to full and intimate fellowship with ourselves a sinning and unrepentant brother,” John R. W. Stott wrote in Confess Your Sins, “we reveal not the depth of our love, but its shallowness, for we are doing what is not for his highest good. Forgiveness which by-passes the need for repentance issues not from love but from sentimentality.”

My thoughts on reconciliation have been shaped by a lot of painful circumstances, learning healthy boundaries, counseling, and wise friends. I read some interesting things here that I poached that you might find helpful in more depth as well. How to Move from Forgiveness to Reconciliation . Praying to be a person who loves deeply, forgives authentically, and seeks reconciliation. But I am wiser to want to love rather than reach for vain sentimentality… 

                                   click: A sketch I did for a friend’s music project a few years back.. 

                                                 http://nowtherabbithasthegun.bandcamp.com

This is so good. A good 35 minutes spent.. Makes me want to sing about the grace of God..

“Here’s the thing you always have to watch on external self righteousness. If you’re comparing your righteousness by finding someone else who isn’t as good as you and measuring how well you’re doing based off of how well they are doing, you are already in a scary rebellion against the God of the universe. What He is holding you to is not your idiot friends’ holiness, but His holiness.”  – Matt Chandler 

A child kicks his legs rhythmically through excess, not absence, of life. Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, “Do it again”… perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun; and every evening, “Do it again” to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but he has never got tired of making them. It may be that he has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we. The repetition in Nature may not be a mere recurrence; it may be a theatrical encore. – G.K. Chesterton 

“The shit will hit the fan. And when it does. Do you want to be with this person?” – Mark Daniel

Who knows you? The real you? The messy you? The broken you.

This week I have been reflecting on the safest people in the world. The safest people in the world I have decided are not ones who are always kicks and giggles with. They aren’t necessarily the life of the party. Some are. They come in a million different personality types and traits and dispositions.

The safest people in the world are those who know the real you and love you anyways. They are not afraid to make you not like them by saying something you don’t want to hear for your good. But even when they say difficult things they are kind because they are “for” you. They don’t enable you.. but they make you feel safe, loved, known, cared for.

I once heard a quote that says something like “I am afraid you’ll reject me and me is all I have..” or something to that affect. Actually that’s not it at all other than the “me is all I have” bit… But it strikes desire in me… deep desire to be known and to know. It highlights the fear we all have.. that if the real me was known, I would be rejected and that would bring shame and I couldn’t bear it.

But what if someone knew everything. Everything to your soul insides and out. And they stayed with you. They loved you. Were for you. Prayed for you. Laughed with you. Cried with you. How would that make you feel?

Intimacy is really what it is. 

I have found safe people. I think of a couple off of the top of my head whom I can bear my soul with and who know my worst and my fears and love me anyways. I am grateful I have people who let me love them in that state as well. I look around the people I work with and actually as an organization…. it is oddly more full of safe people than nearly any place I have known on earth (aside from church). People know one another and not just the good things.. they know one another worst and love one another anyways. It is like an oasis in a desert you didn’t realize you were thirsting in.

Are you a safe person?
Do you have safe people in your life?
Do you hide or let people in?
What are your barriers to emotional intimacy and letting people know the real you?