“‘How oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? till seven times?’ Jesus saith unto him, ‘I say not unto thee, until seven times; but until seventy time seven’.” (Matt. 18. 21-22)
Yet again this Sunday, one of the appointed readings
talks about forgiveness, surely one of the central themes of the Gospels and
our Lord’s teaching. Four weeks ago, on
the 18th Sunday after Trinity when in the Gospel passage for the
day, Jesus articulated the Summary of the Law, the two great Commandments on
which all of the Law and the Prophets are founded, I spoke about just exactly
what the commandment to love means.
Incorporated in that, and mentioning the phrase “forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive them that trespass against us” as we had just completed our
review of the Lord’s Prayer in Bible study, was the observation that it is not
possible to love our neighbours unless we are first able to forgive them if we
have aught against them.
How fortuitous that the topic of forgiveness should
come up as the central theme today, which has been proclaimed as the
International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church by the Voice of the
Martyrs. And how fortuitous that that
should coincide this year with Remembrance Sunday, when we recall with
thankfulness the sacrifices made by so many to preserve our democratic
freedoms, and therefore, our religious freedom.
And is this not an often forgotten aspect of
Remembrance Day or Remembrance Sunday that, in my brief experience, is rarely
mentioned - the need for forgiveness? In
the aforementioned sermon for Trinity 18, I quoted from C. S. Lewis in Mere
Christianity, which he wrote just after World War II. Here is part of that which I quoted, “I
wonder how you’d feel about forgiving the Gestapo if you were a Pole or a
Jew? So do I. I wonder very much. Just as when Christianity tells me that I
must not deny my religion even to save myself from death by torture, I wonder
very much what I should do when it came to that point. I am not trying to tell you in this book what
I could do - I can do precious little - I am telling you what Christianity
is. I did not invent it. And there, right in the middle of it, I find
‘Forgive us our sins as we forgive those that sin against us.’ There is no slightest suggestion that we are
offered forgiveness on any other terms.
It is made perfectly clear that if we do not forgive we shall not be
forgiven. There are no two ways about
it.”
A very sobering thought indeed when we consider the
totalitarian monsters throughout human history who have caused so very much
misery and death of innocent civilians.
Not just Hitler, not just Mussolini; but Josef Stalin, Idi Amin,
Mohammar Ghadaffi, Pol Pot, the Khartoum government, Robert Mugabe, Saddam
Hussein - and the list goes on. I
expressed in that sermon how very incredulous it is when members of a Christian
parish get into knots over the most trivial little things, “You put the toilet
paper roll on backwards!” And then the
person on the receiving end of that observation becomes angry with the other -
and off we go into a situation where both parties are upset with each other,
neither feeling that they have done anything wrong, and most certainly neither
feeling that they have anything for which to apologize, nor to forgive. Against such truly unfortunate episodes in
the life of very many Christian parishes, how in the world can we possibly
undertake to forgive the truly evil, on the scale that Lewis places in front of
us - yet that is what we are commanded to do.
Just as it was observed in that previous sermon that
it is beyond our natural capacity to love the unlovable - we are only able to
do so when God fills our hearts and flows through us - so too is seems beyond
our natural capacity to forgive at all times.
Again we must turn towards God, and allow Him to work through us, ever
reminding ourselves that the command to forgive is unconditional - we may not
first expect that others must apologize first before we are prepared to forgive
them - our Lord placed no such condition on His direct commandment. Remembrance Sunday’s different thought for
this year.
It is quite interesting that Lewis’ quotation
includes the phrase, “Christianity tells me that I must not deny my religion
even to save myself from death by torture.”
This fits so very well with the International Day of Prayer. The some 200 million Christians around the
world who are thus persecuted in our own day by equally monstrous regimes as
those we have mentioned, ask for our prayers.
Specifically, that their faith in Jesus Christ may remain steadfast in
face of persecution that often results in death. I daresay that the direction of the toilet
paper roll is the furthest thing from the minds of these Christians, when they
live daily with the very real possibility that they will be dragged off,
sometimes to jail, sometimes to places of detention that are in some cases, on
a par with concentration camps, and where torture and even death are often the
result.
It is most revealing to listen to some Christians
who have been subjected to such horrors - their quite genuine prayers for
forgiveness of their captors, torturers and persecutors is not just revealing,
it is convicting when measured against our sometimes very petty squabbles here
in the West.
In years gone by on this Sunday that has been
proclaimed as the International Day of Prayer, we have waited until after an
abbreviated fellowship time to pray the Litany for the Persecuted Church
that accompanies today’s bulletin. This
year, we thought that, with so many intersecting and coinciding themes on this
particular Sunday, it would be most appropriate for us to pray it collectively,
during the service, all the while pondering those themes: sacrifice,
persecution, religious freedom; but above all as our Lord taught St. Peter in
today’s Gospel passage, unlimited, and at all times - forgiveness.
[[Litany for the Persecuted Church]]
ANNUNCIATION,
OTTAWA 2006 CLRK