Loading...Most weeks, except during the season of Easter,
we pray together a Collect for Purity and a Confession.
We pray for forgiveness of sins – things done and left undone.
And we hear words of absolution from God.
These are meaningful and moving words,
and they tend to evoke in us
recognition of reconciliation between us and God.
Many of us hear these words as God forgiving us and “PHEW!”
Even if the break between you and God is significant,
there is still the tremendous relief, release, and freedom
that comes with forgiveness.
Forgiveness, reconciliation, restoration, and sin:
These words and ideas are all over our Scripture stories this week,
as they may be on your mind, as the ideas are in our society,
world, and news.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
David, King David – the beautiful shepherd boy known for killing Goliath with a stone flung from his slingshot, the hymn-writer and singer, the friends of Jonathan (the son of the king at the time), the anointed and chosen king of Israel (even though there already WAS a king), the brilliant military strategist, AND the selfish, arrogant king –
Yes, that King David is walking on the roof of the palace one day,
and sees a beautiful woman bathing (in a private bathing area in a women-only courtyard).
David sees her, lusts after her, has one of the servants bring her to him, and then rapes her.
She became pregnant,
so David comes up with a hare-brained scheme to solve the problem:
bring Bathsheeba’s husband – yes, she was married – back from the war and encourage him to “sleep” with her. But Uriah, her husband, wasn’t interested, “I’m a soldier first, so I will abstain”.
ACK!
David then sends Uriah back to the war and to the front line where he will surely be killed by the fighting. And, he is.
Let’s look at this again: rape, lying, murder by conspiracy.
David’s not doing very well.
And, God is not happy.
Nathan, the prophet, goes to David to talk.
He doesn’t go to David straight on and talk bluntly about these issues.
Rather, he comes in “sideways” with a story about two men, wealth, sheep, and a dinner.
It’s a pretty dramatic little story, and is a thinly veiled version of what David has done – stealing the poor man’s one little ewe lamb even though he had many, many sheep. Yet, David does not recognize himself in the story.
Instead, he declares that the wealthy man is in. the. wrong!
Nathan turns to him and says, “You are the man!”
David repents! Nathan proclaims forgiveness.
And, as the story goes, then David wrote Psalm 51.
Forgiveness is given, but the consequences are grave.
For one thing, David cannot undo what was done:
Bathsheeba was raped by David.
Uriah was killed on David’s orders.
Plus, Bathsheeba’s lament is deep and consuming –
the death of her husband,
a forced marriage to her rapist,
the illness and death of her son.
God forgave David,
but then David had to work to repair the broken relationships all around him.
The truth is,
some were too broken to repair; the fissure was too deep.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The story of Bathsheeba, David, Nathan, and God
is stark in its description of damage and grief that we can cause one another.
And the story shows us that forgiveness is not just about the penitent and God;
e.g. David and God; or you and Jesus.
Forgiveness of sin is not about eternal salvation
(as many contemporary Christians espouse,
and as, indeed, tradition seems to lean towards).
Forgiveness is about relationship and the reconciliation and restoration
that we must be a part of if we are to live fully in God’s shalom and grace.
We humans have a tremendous capacity to hurt one another.
So much so that the words of absolution can be empty;
and the words of the psalmist who sings
“Happy are those whose sin is forgiven” can be hollow in their praise.
Words can be empty and hollow if they forget about the one who has been wronged and hurt, or if they do not acknowledge the damage done to a family, community, or society.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This past week, all over the news and social media,
was the story of the trial and sentencing of a college student who raped an unconscious woman behind a dumpster in an alley.
The story really got splashed on the headlines when the rapist’s father begged the judge for leniency in sentence for “20 minutes of action”. And, amazingly, the judge agreed with the request for leniency.
We do not know the name of the woman who was raped, but we know some details of the incident –
details that have been used to blame her for what happened;
details that have highlighted our skewed system
that blames the one sexually assaulted
rather than placing the blame on the one who attacked.
It’s not just this story that seemed to be everywhere in the news this week.
We are, as a people, turning on and “trolling” one another with hateful words.
Hatred, bigotry, racism, classism, homophobia, misogyny spewed on social media, in political rhetoric, in road rage, in schools.
If these sins were just about the individual who did the deed,
a simple transaction between God and the penitent would seem to solve the problem.
But, it’s not so straightforward.
It’s about so much more –
those we hurt,
a system that allows for injustice because it, for example,
sees some people as property,
not considering long term ramifications of actions,
patterns of behavior that become expected and taught
(not just for an individual but for a whole group, e.g. “boys will be boys”, or “girls should learn to dress less provocatively, or not drink – what does she expect will happen if she does?”)
or a culture that acts as though sexual assault against a woman is a natural consequence of being, well, female and not hiding it well enough.
We have a tremendous capacity to hurt one another
and words of absolution and forgiveness
can be empty and hollow unless they include words and actions of restoring our human community.
Especially if we are the one who has hurt another because of our actions and words, then we bring more healing into the world when we don’t just keep the forgiveness from God to ourselves, but share it through working towards reconciliation and healing amongst people.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Forgiveness is given to a woman who comes to a dinner party:
she is unnamed, but a story is told.
It is not a story of her sin (by the way, we don’t actually know what her sin is supposed to have been; we just know she’s known as a sinner);
it is not a story of why she is alone (in that day and age, a woman would not have shown up at a party – invited or not – by herself; where is the rest of her family?).
It is, however, a story of her gift of hospitality, something that the wealthy host forgot.
It is a story of her hope for justice, of forgiveness given, and of restoration back into the community.
It is a story of hope that God would see her, love her, and offer shalom.
In this last week of many articles, blog posts, and opinions shared about the trial and sentencing of the man who raped the unnamed woman,
one letter rose above the rest, I think.
It was a letter written to the unnamed woman who was raped six months ago and who herself wrote a letter to her attacker.
The letter, written by VP Biden was heartfelt and beautiful,
filled with anger at the injustice she experienced and
with words of encouragement and solidarity.
The phrase that VP Biden wrote in his letter that was most memorable to me was this: “I see you.”
In other words, you are not forgotten. In the midst of this story that swirls around your attacker and what his punishment should be, I see you. You are remembered. Justice and restoration of you to full humanity and into community is here.
When David attacks Bathsheeba and then has her husband killed,
God says to Bathsheeba, “I see you.
You are not forgotten.
Your grief has not been in vain.
You are being restored to your full humanity and you have my full justice."
The woman who is known as a sinner who comes into Jesus’ presence when he’s at a wealthy man’s house for dinner,
and washes his feet with her tears,
dries them with her hair,
and anoints them with ointment,
is scorned by The Powers That Be and by society.
But Jesus says, “I see you.
You are not forgotten.
Your grief has not been in vain.
You are being restored to your full humanity.
You are forgiven. You are loved.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Forgiveness from God is a gift.
It is release from the prison of guilt.
It is relief from the walls of shame.
It gives us another chance (over and over again)
It can send transform us and send us in a new direction of living each day.
There is no doubt that forgiveness from God is a gift of life.
But, forgiveness also frees us.
Forgiveness frees us to turn to one another
to make amends
to work for justice for others
to share the same freedom that we’ve experienced
to restore community
to reconcile brokenness that is around us.
Our own experience of forgiveness
prompts us to look outside ourselves and our own release
to see others.
To see the hurts we may have caused, or that someone else experiences.
As we are seen,
we see.
As we are forgiven,
we forgive.
As we are loved,
we love.
As we are healed,
we heal.
And, indeed, Happy are they whose transgressions are forgiven,
and whose sin is put away!
Amen
