Scripture can be found here....
It is not often that forgiveness
makes the news.
This week our local paper carried
stories about hydraulic fracturing, the honoring of local police officers, our
state school and property taxes, and ongoing stories of recovery from our
historic September flood.
National news continued its (already
interminable) coverage of the 2012 presidential election, a Chinese dissident
who escaped house arrest and is seeking to come to the United States, a family
fight over a television ministry, and the shutting down of Japan’s last
operating nuclear reactor, following last year’s earthquake and tsunami
disaster.
Nothing about forgiveness,
though.
I can recall just two stories
about forgiveness that made the news in the past several years, though there
were probably others. Both stories that come to mind involved the Amish, a
Christian sect whose followers are recognizable by their plain clothing and
their tendency to drive the horse-and-buggy rather than automobile. They are
recognizable for their actions, too, most recently, for their radical, almost
unbelievable acts of forgiveness and reconciliation.
The most famous of these stories
had to do with a shooting that took place more than five years ago, in Nickel
Mines, PA. A man with a gun took children and adults hostage in an Amish
one-room schoolhouse, and eventually killed five girls and himself. Of course,
the shooting made the news, just like the shootings at Columbine High School
and Virginia Tech and Ecole Polytechnique in Montreal. These things often
result in what is called “wall-to-wall” coverage on the news. We’re in the age
of “if it bleeds, it leads.”
However, in the aftermath of the
terrible, tragic crime, something unexpected took over the coverage: the
immediate and continuing actions and words of the Amish community were all
about forgiveness. On the very day of the shooting, a grandfather of one of the
murdered Amish girls was overheard warning some young relatives not to hate the
killer, saying, “We must not think evil of this man.” A community leader told
the reporters covering the story, “I don't think there's anybody here that
wants to do anything but forgive and not only reach out to those who have
suffered a loss in that way but to reach out to the family of the man who
committed these acts.”
The community did reach out to
the family of the killer, setting up a charitable fund for his widow and
children, and attending his funeral. One Amish farmer held the sobbing father
of the killer in his arms for an hour.
Outsiders were quick to criticize
all this forgiveness and reconciliation. One journalist wrote, “… this story
disturbs me deeply — because there can be no question that anger can be as
righteous as forgiveness. I’m not sure I would want to be someone who succeeded
in rising above hatred of those who murder children.”[i]
Much as my purpose today is to
invite us all into Jesus’ ethic of forgiveness, I recognize the emotion behind
what that writer says. Maybe this story is too much for us to ponder, too
herculean an act of forgiveness for beginners like me. After all, the actions
of the Amish don’t spring from a vacuum, but from a deeply entrenched ethic of
forgiveness and reconciliation that becomes, for them, an instinct—much as the
tendency to righteous indignation becomes an instinct for those of us who are
soaked, not in scripture, but in the coverage of presidential campaigns and
debates over hydraulic fracturing.
So, let’s start with another
story of Amish forgiveness, one that doesn’t make our hair stand on end.
Because, as it turns out, the Amish are like most communities, in that, it
takes all kinds. There are saints who are also sinners in their midst. And in the community of Sugarcreek, Ohio,
there lives an Amish Bernie Madoff, only
his name is Monroe Beachy. Like Mr. Madoff, Mr. Beachy ran a successful
investment firm, with many clients who were friends, neighbors, relatives, and
even charitable organizations, all trusting for many years in his advice and
services. And like Mr. Madoff’s clients, those of Mr. Beachy were stunned to
learn, last September, that it had all been a Ponzi scheme, and their money was
gone.
At this point, though, the stories
diverge, because of the way in which the community of Sugarcreek responded.
While the owners of the Mets and other famous and prominent Madoff clients
fight it out in court to see who will be able to recover invested principle and
fictional profits, the people of Sugarcreek have insisted that the neediest
among them are cared for first, even if it means they don’t get their share.
While Bernie Madoff’s wife and sons can’t go out for a hamburger or a haircut
in Manhattan without being dogged and attacked by a public that simply hates
their guts, the Beachy family still lives quietly in a farmhouse, and are
welcomed by their church and neighbors. And in the most fascinating aspect of
the Beachy case, the church leadership petitioned the court to place the case
in the hands of the church’s judicial system, for the following reasons:
That would accomplish three worthy goals, they said. It would allow a
less expensive, more advantageous financial workout “based on Christian
principles of love and care for the poor and needy.” It would create a setting
in which “Biblical forgiveness and restoration can be found between Monroe
Beachy” and those he is accused of betraying. And it would repair “the
tarnished testimony and integrity of the Plain Community.”[ii]
That’s what the Amish call themselves: the Plain Community.
In today’s reading from John’s
gospel, Jesus says to his followers, “Abide in me as I abide in you. Just as
the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither
can you unless you abide in me” [John 15:4]. Jesus is speaking here of
connectedness, and of the death that occurs when connection is severed, much as
the branches that have been cut away from the trunk cannot leaf out or flower
or bear fruit. To “abide” is to remain connected.
Forgiveness is lived out by the
Amish in an instinctive way that comes from a lifetime of being steeped in
scripture, as well as a lifetime of practice through regular forgiveness of
lesser offenses such as, say, being cut off by an impatient car when you’re out
driving your buggy. No one who experiences trauma on the level of losing a
loved one violently, or losing one’s life savings through duplicity, should
expect to learn forgiveness at such a moment. It takes practice. Practice in
small ways, every day, building up the lifelong habit of forgiveness the way we
build up habits such as brushing our teeth or doing the dishes after dinner.
In the name of abiding, being
connected, it might be worth practicing forgiveness. Of course, we tend to think
we need most to stay connected with those we already know and love. But I
believe we also need to open ourselves to a connection with those we don’t
know, we may never know, but who are God’s children nevertheless. And so, in
the name of abiding, and being connected, here are three things for which I
regularly don’t forgive people, but which, this week, I promise I will try:
I will try to forgive the driver
who is overly aggressive and/or cuts me off.
I will try to forgive the person
who sends text messages during the movie.
I will try to forgive the stranger
who interrupts my well-planned day with something unexpected.
I know it all sounds pretty small
and pathetic. I am a beginner at forgiveness, not an Olympic marathoner on the
level of the Plain folk. And you may be ready to start at a much higher level
than me—forgiving a family member for a real hurt, for example. As for me,
beginner that I am, that’s my list of three. What’s yours?
To abide is to be connected, to Jesus and to
one another. We cannot abide, we cannot be connected, unless we cultivate in
ourselves the habit, the instinct, of forgiveness. But we have to start small.
We have to start where we are. In celebration of baby steps, tiny, halting
movements toward forgiveness, we gather at this table where we know ourselves
to be forgiven and made free. Thanks be to God. Amen.
[i]
John Podhoretz,
“Hating a Child Killer,” The National
Review, October 5, 2006. http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/129694/hating-child-killer/john-podhoretz#.
[ii]
Diana B. Henriques,
“Broken Trust in God’s Country,” New York
Times, February 26, 2012, Business Section p. 1. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/26/business/in-amish-country-accusations-of-a-ponzi-scheme.html?pagewanted=all.
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