The Backside of Helplessness
I had once joked about shaving my head. As I still, even two months later, gawk at the reflection in the mirror, I’m fairly sure this is as close as I ever want to come to that scenario. I had specifically explained to the hairdresser what I wanted, had even corrected her when she didn’t look to be following what I’d requested, and now have to live with the consequences of her having not listened.
I’ve creatively tried barrettes and scarves to cover the surface damage, but what I haven’t been able to cover is what a pair of cutting shears has left staring at me daily: that there are moments when our will is totally overridden by someone who wasn’t ‘listening.’ That, when we are left with no alternative but to accept the damage, when there is no easy way to hasten ourselves out of the painful repercussions, we have but one solution: to forgive.
It’s terribly easy to see forgiving as a last resort, our only viable option when all other resources are exhausted; when - backed into a corner - we have no other way to cope. And with that mistaken impression, we reckon that, conversely, retaliation must be a mark of strength; an exhibition of some control over an otherwise hopeless situation for our defense.
And yet we would then miss the backside of helplessness.
For it is where we had not the voice to counter the one offending, and could not overpower the person who sinned against us, that we are given the unique access to a power greater than that which spurred the offense. In every area where we submit to the consequences of the transgression, we are enabled to declare that what we forfeit is not a love for that person, but any desire for vengeance.
But how does that process translate when the reality staring back at us is the daily consequence of someone’s not obeying?
Forgiveness…
…leans on God’s righteousness as Judge
“…and while being reviled, He did not revile in return; while suffering, He uttered no threats, but kept entrusting Himself to Him who judges righteously” (1 Peter 2:23). As one pastor put it, the silence which Christ exhibited was majestic (see Matt. 26:63); a silence of ‘innocence, of integrity, of trust in His Father as Righteous Judge.’ When there is total confidence that “the eyes of the LORD move to and fro throughout the earth that He may strongly support those whose heart is completely His” (2 Ch. 16:9); when there is utmost conviction that God “knows the secrets of the heart” (Ps. 44:21), and is able to judge between one servant and another (see 2 Chronicles 6:23), we are then released from having to advocate for ourselves. For vindictiveness could not, in all its might, yield the justice which comes from entrusting our souls to our “faithful Creator in doing what is right” (1 Peter 4:19).
…learns to relinquish personal rights
“Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death…” (Ph. 2:8). Once we recognize that walking in like manner as our Savior means surrendering our fight for self-preservation, we are brought into the awareness that we are vessels, ambassadors of the message of His very life: “…namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation” (2 Corinthians 5:19). Praise be to God for eyes to see past the devil’s scheme of keeping us from pardoning another (2 Cor. 2:11), that we may likewise ‘empty ourselves’ (Ph. 2:7) and declare that we do not count our lives as ‘dear to ourselves,’ but only useful in the ministry which we received from the Lord Jesus (Acts 20:24).
…looks to benefit the offender
“But if we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation…” (2 Cor. 1:6). When we stand in the assurance that our ‘Advocate is on high’ (Job 16:19), and that we were called to exhibit the same self-sacrifice as our Master (Jn. 15:13), we are then freed to demonstrate, through the Holy Spirit’s power residing within us, that we would do ‘nothing from selfish ambition… but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than ourselves’ (Ph. 2:3). It is God’s sheer grace that, once we set our will to forgive, He would give us eyes by which we ‘recognize no one according to the flesh’ any longer (2 Cor. 5:16), but as a ‘fellow heir of the grace of life’ (1 Pe. 3:7). And it is through His vision in us that we can then determine to “do good” to those who hate, to “bless” those who curse (Luke 6:27-28). As Psalm 122:9 words it, what Christ has given us, in His example of sacrifice, and His power to forgive through us, is the strength to say to the one injuring us, “I will seek your good.”
For what we once considered sheer helplessness becomes, through God’s transforming good, the unique avenue by which we can state with wholehearted sincerity that we will seek the good of another; that we, enabled by His resurrection life, can be infused with the same power which raised Christ from the dead, and declare with our lives that we ‘have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example for us to follow in His footsteps’ (2 Pe. 2:21).
“Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.”
Romans 12:21
I’ve creatively tried barrettes and scarves to cover the surface damage, but what I haven’t been able to cover is what a pair of cutting shears has left staring at me daily: that there are moments when our will is totally overridden by someone who wasn’t ‘listening.’ That, when we are left with no alternative but to accept the damage, when there is no easy way to hasten ourselves out of the painful repercussions, we have but one solution: to forgive.
It’s terribly easy to see forgiving as a last resort, our only viable option when all other resources are exhausted; when - backed into a corner - we have no other way to cope. And with that mistaken impression, we reckon that, conversely, retaliation must be a mark of strength; an exhibition of some control over an otherwise hopeless situation for our defense.
And yet we would then miss the backside of helplessness.
For it is where we had not the voice to counter the one offending, and could not overpower the person who sinned against us, that we are given the unique access to a power greater than that which spurred the offense. In every area where we submit to the consequences of the transgression, we are enabled to declare that what we forfeit is not a love for that person, but any desire for vengeance.
But how does that process translate when the reality staring back at us is the daily consequence of someone’s not obeying?
Forgiveness…
…leans on God’s righteousness as Judge
“…and while being reviled, He did not revile in return; while suffering, He uttered no threats, but kept entrusting Himself to Him who judges righteously” (1 Peter 2:23). As one pastor put it, the silence which Christ exhibited was majestic (see Matt. 26:63); a silence of ‘innocence, of integrity, of trust in His Father as Righteous Judge.’ When there is total confidence that “the eyes of the LORD move to and fro throughout the earth that He may strongly support those whose heart is completely His” (2 Ch. 16:9); when there is utmost conviction that God “knows the secrets of the heart” (Ps. 44:21), and is able to judge between one servant and another (see 2 Chronicles 6:23), we are then released from having to advocate for ourselves. For vindictiveness could not, in all its might, yield the justice which comes from entrusting our souls to our “faithful Creator in doing what is right” (1 Peter 4:19).
…learns to relinquish personal rights
“Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death…” (Ph. 2:8). Once we recognize that walking in like manner as our Savior means surrendering our fight for self-preservation, we are brought into the awareness that we are vessels, ambassadors of the message of His very life: “…namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation” (2 Corinthians 5:19). Praise be to God for eyes to see past the devil’s scheme of keeping us from pardoning another (2 Cor. 2:11), that we may likewise ‘empty ourselves’ (Ph. 2:7) and declare that we do not count our lives as ‘dear to ourselves,’ but only useful in the ministry which we received from the Lord Jesus (Acts 20:24).
…looks to benefit the offender
“But if we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation…” (2 Cor. 1:6). When we stand in the assurance that our ‘Advocate is on high’ (Job 16:19), and that we were called to exhibit the same self-sacrifice as our Master (Jn. 15:13), we are then freed to demonstrate, through the Holy Spirit’s power residing within us, that we would do ‘nothing from selfish ambition… but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than ourselves’ (Ph. 2:3). It is God’s sheer grace that, once we set our will to forgive, He would give us eyes by which we ‘recognize no one according to the flesh’ any longer (2 Cor. 5:16), but as a ‘fellow heir of the grace of life’ (1 Pe. 3:7). And it is through His vision in us that we can then determine to “do good” to those who hate, to “bless” those who curse (Luke 6:27-28). As Psalm 122:9 words it, what Christ has given us, in His example of sacrifice, and His power to forgive through us, is the strength to say to the one injuring us, “I will seek your good.”
For what we once considered sheer helplessness becomes, through God’s transforming good, the unique avenue by which we can state with wholehearted sincerity that we will seek the good of another; that we, enabled by His resurrection life, can be infused with the same power which raised Christ from the dead, and declare with our lives that we ‘have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example for us to follow in His footsteps’ (2 Pe. 2:21).
“Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.”
Romans 12:21
posted by Purple at 10:22 PM
1 Comments:
So this definitely makes me want a picture...
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