Forgiveness, the Acceptance of God

People are either searchers for the meaning of life or they aren’t, and never the twain shall meet it seems.  But of the searchers, many find and pursue the wrong way.  Maybe this is because they want the easy way in preference to the right way.  It is hard for us as human beings to discern the right way when easier options are presented.

The way to LIFE is the path less travelled, through what Jesus calls the “narrow gate” (Matthew 7:13-14).

The easy way is almost 
always the wrong way.

An easy way taken usually reveals 
a wrongly committed heart.

As a force for LIFE,
it is up to us to commit 
to choose what is right,
but that way is usually not easy.

The way to LIFE seems hard in the beginning,
but is always the easier way when looking back.

Many people prefer “easy” in the early going,
only to lament the folly of such choices.

~

THE CHRISTIAN IMPERATIVE OF “WAITING”

There’s a 2003 song by Christian artist, Nathan Tasker, titled “Waiting” that describes the authentic Christian life that not many Christians actually commit to living.

A harder way that is 
easier in the longer run.

“Waiting” talks about a man “who lost everything he owned; everything he treasured was ripped from his hands and he found himself all on his own.”  How is such a man to respond?  I know this reality personally.  It happened to me in September 2003.  This song was a prophetic anthem for what was happening in my life—at just the right time.

In losing almost everything, 
a great deal was discovered.

The lyrics of the song describe a form of living integrally committed to God.  One WAITS faithfully for the promised delivery of a reliable hope beyond this world:

“And then I know that my waiting
Will not be in vain
For everything I give up for Him
He’ll give it back again.”

The lyrics reflect true discipleship.  I call this lifestyle of true worship living intentionally for eternity.  “Waiting” describes an existence of self-discipline lived to the glory of God.  It is always a blessing to the Christ follower who embarks on such a daily journey.

There are so many distractions in our worldly life.  So many things compete for our attention.  So many of these things take our focus OFF where our focus ought to be.

Seeing everything through the lens of eternity, 
on the other hand,
attunes our focus to what really counts.

Seeing everything through the lens of eternity, and it is possible one day at a time, makes life better, easier, more focused.  It simplifies life.  It is the right approach to life.

We must become accustomed 
to saying no to many things 
we would like to say yes to.

The four lines of lyrics above reveal a fundamental shift in one’s philosophy of life.  Do you see it?  It is important to ask this as a question.  Waiting is not done in vain.  It is good to cling to hope in the expectation that all will be redeemed, ultimately:

“Everything that He took from me, 
He will give back again...”

Now, THAT is faith!

~

BIBLICAL ACCEPTANCE WISDOM UNDERPINS FORGIVENESS

Psalm 37 is the ultimate in wisdom for people living this life in terms of acceptance leading to forgiveness.  I call Psalm 37 a form of biblical acceptance wisdom.  Throughout the forty verses are pithy lessons on how to live this life wisely.

Psalm 37 commends us to accept injustices as they are—as they will always be.  There WILL be injustice on earth.  But God has already won, as dictated by Psalm 37’s wisdom.

The psalm heralds the inevitability of eternity.  It helps us to know there is a better way than railing against the unavoidable injustices.  It proclaims waiting as that way.

Verse 8 has always captivated me, and I have included verse 9 as both verses are a couplet:

“Refrain from anger and turn from wrath;
do not fret—it leads only to evil.
For those who are evil will be destroyed,
but those who hope in the Lord will inherit the land.”

Jarring, isn’t it?  There is no sugar-coating Scripture unless we were to disobey the Lord and re-write it to suit our own purposes.

My point from this pithy passage 
is that fretting leads only to evil.

When it is unpacked,
Fretting = Unmanaged Anxiety

Knowing this, managing our anxiety best—choosing to trust God by conscious intention—we can mitigate relational conflict.  This is especially important given we cannot control people—their perceptions, their thoughts, their reactions, and their actions.

Acceptance is THE way we mitigate fretting 
that equals unmanaged anxiety 
that leads to evil.

~

ACCEPTANCE LEADING TO FORGIVENESS IS WISDOM

Using this acceptance wisdom we live a prosperous life.

This is because it is wisdom to honour the Lord in the normal flow of life BY honouring the way life works.  Fret and we cause evil—we become propagators of malevolence.  But live by acceptance, and we align with how life actually works.

Living a life of faith, which is so often about accepting everything we cannot change, we live in the lap of the wisdom of Psalm 37.

Live by commitment to goodness,
and we are blessed in the moment 
even as we are also eventually blessed.

~

The only way we can truly arrive 
at acceptance is to forgive.

Indeed, acceptance and forgiveness 
are basically interchangeable.

When we truly live-and-let-live we demonstrate our capacity to accept that we are NOT God.  We show that we accept our human finiteness.  We accept that we are not in control of an amazing number of things in this life.  We are growing when we can accept these things.

The ability to accept the things we 
cannot change is one third of wisdom.

The other two thirds are having the courage to change the things we can and having the wisdom to discern the difference between acceptance and need for agency to create change.

FORGIVENESS AND JUSTICE MUST COEXIST

Given that God’s forgiveness is the undeserved favour we enjoy, we are to accept that undeserved favour ourselves and extend it, as far as forgiveness is concerned, to others.

This does not mean that people will 
not face the consequences of their actions.

Forgiveness and justice are not mutually exclusive.

Forgiveness and justice do, and often must, 
occur at the same time on the same matters.

Given that the full gravity of justice can still occur, within the same bounds of the fullness of forgiveness, justice is free to be done aside the releasing of relational debts.

This means persons can forgive 
all the while 
perpetrators are eventually held to account.

~

GOD’S ACCEPTANCE WISDOM

In life, it does not matter who wins and who loses, or who gets ahead when they shouldn’t, or even who seems favoured over those who aren’t.  None of this matters in the overall scheme of things.

Everything is SEEN by God
who eventually brings justice.

This will be revealed in the end, and EVERYTHING pales into insignificance in the light of the eventual truth that will be revealed.

God’s acceptance wisdom is something we are invited into.  By partaking in what is God’s—because God shares with us all He is and all He is about—we embark on a life beyond the troubles and struggles of this world.  Not that we won’t have them.

The point is, we WILL!  But they won’t matter to us as much.  The troubles and struggles of this world will not have the typical effect, and in some ways, we will be even more concerned because of the impact these troubles and struggles have on others.

There WILL be injustice
but with acceptance is peace.

Attaining God’s acceptance wisdom is a gift of such surrender that WHEN we have it, we are simply just so very pleased we do.  It is a miracle of reception.  In the receiving is the enhancement of faith, for we bear witness to the power of God to subdue our flesh to the degree that we delight in waiting, in losing, in NOT possessing.

In this, we know deep within ourselves that the true rewards are heavenly.  These heavenly rewards are bestowed on us for our relinquishing our grip on what we have here and now.

ACCEPTANCE WISDOM FOR OURSELVES AND OTHERS

God’s acceptance wisdom is powerful not only for us, but it is also powerful in effect for our approach to others.  When we are living it, we readily accept that others will often appear favoured, others will get ahead, others will win.

We accept it.

We accept that fretting and 
becoming frustrated leads only to evil.

We have faith that our loving responses 
serve both the other person and us.

We are not to get angry about unfavourable realities, and we can even celebrate with others when we lose or don’t get our own way.  As if losing and winning and getting our own way or not is even the point of life!  It isn’t.

In such acceptance wisdom is peace for all 
and good for the culture amid community.

Remember the reason this is HOW it is.

Our faith is in the eventual justice 
that always seems to be delayed.

All things will be righted, eventually.
There is nothing surer.

See how in this is the wisdom of forgiveness?

~

Lord, help us!

Forgiveness, the Heart of God

The heart of God is always true.  It always calls humanity to what is true.  And the paradox is that truth is often enigmatic.  Discerning truth and the correct response are not always straight forward—discernment and correct responses come from a humble heart.

Yes, that’s right, the heart of God specifies what is required as a good response in situations.  The heart of God searches and challenges our heart.  That heart—our motives—behind our STANCE on the situation.  Our heart directs us to right or wrong, wisdom or folly.

A humble heart is found to be right and wise, 
whereas a threatened or selfish heart 
is found to be wrong and foolish.

God searches our hearts, discerning our motives, for wisdom and folly.  “Wisdom is shown to be right by what it does,” said Jesus in Matthew 11:19.  A humble heart directs us along right paths.

~

The heart is the absolute centre of God’s universe.

God is most interested in the heart;
less interested in outcomes.

Wherever there is evil,
the heart is culpable.

The heart is responsible for evil,
just as it is capable of good.

~

Oh how God’s heart yearns
for all hearts to align to the truth;
for all hearts to be humbled and see truth.

~

THE TRUTH HUMBLES US

When a person’s heart aligns with the truth, that truth humbles that person.  This is because a person’s heart sees the truth, and the person sees how far they are from where they would like to be.  They honour the truth.  The truth is reverenced.  And the truth heals that heart.

Truth be told, none of us truly measure up to what is true, only as we choose for truth.  But when we face the truth in humility, our response is not one of shame but of awe.  Humility prepares us to receive truth appropriately.  In humility, truth is freedom, not condemnation.

The truth makes us all better than we were.

The truth blesses us even as it 
humbles us by its goodness.

Do you see how the truth, that can seem horrendous—that can seem like the worst thing ever—is the best thing ever?  Moments like this attest to the wondrous power of God to give us everything we ever needed through a means we always avoided!

There is a sense that truth 
could always be embraced, 
when we can receive it in humility.

~

THE TRUTH ABOUT THE HUMAN HEART & WHAT IT NEEDS

British evangelist Canon J. John says, “The heart of the human problem is the problem of the human heart.”  Yes, we ARE made in the image of God.  Yes, we are never-more-precious in His sight.  So much Scripture attests to this.

But our hearts are evidence enough 
of our need of truth, our need of God.

We live in an era where we especially don’t like to admit that our hearts are problematic; an era where there is much resistance to the idea that we human beings are sinners.

Nobody likes to have their heart revealed to them when it is wrong.  Even Christians.

Yet, the moment our heart is humbled is the moment the heart of God comes in to redeem it.  There is nothing more made-in-the-image-of-God-like in a human life than a human life seeing its need of God in these moments.

Somehow it is the truth that reconciles hearts back to God.  At the same time a person responds well to the truth, their heart is shown as healed by the peace of humility.

TRUTH IS THE MIRACLE THAT HUMBLES AND HEALS THE HEART

God can only and will only redeem humbled hearts—as it is written:

“My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit;
a broken and contrite heart
you, God, will not despise.”
—Psalm 51:17 (NIVUK)

Even more, God craves humble hearts, hearts that see and honour truth.  God’s heart softens in response to a softened heart, a heart humbled by the truth.

Think about it.  The humbling of a heart is THE condition required of salvation.

The humbling of a heart is also the condition required to truly give and receive love.  A humbled heart opens the door.  This is because it’s only those who party with the truth—who are comfortable, resigned to facing their own truth—who can, in that moment, love.

Truth is the miracle that humbles and heals the heart.
Truth is what opens the human heart to love.
Truth makes the human heart accessible.

~

WHAT IS THE HEART OF GOD LIKE?

The heart of God is full of compassion, but the heart of God will also put each of us to the test.  That is because, most of all, God is most interested in our hearts.  And how hard it is to truly KNOW the heart of God!—discerning right action to certain situations in life testifies to the inscrutability of this fact.

The struggle we have as humans knowing the heart of God is explained in the incomprehensibility of suffering in this world.  Nobody has an answer to satisfy the human heart’s longing that justice be perfectly served on this earth.  There is, of course, a Christian theology of suffering called theodicy—the vindication of divine providence despite evil.

Keeping things simple, we know we can trust God.  We know God’s heart is holy and good, and that our goal is to mirror the heart of God, even as we are made in His image.

Knowing God’s heart is perfect, we in our humanity still doubt the goodness of God when we suffer.  This is the revelation of our own hearts in adversity.  Yet suffering is also the circumstance that can transform our hearts when we trust what our faith sees as the truth—that God is good and faithful.

We hardly need to say it, the heart of God is holy and good, even to the extent that God’s heart uses adversity to help us transcend even ourselves.

The miracle in suffering is it 
can sanctify us despite the pain.

~

WHEN THE HEART OF GOD BREAKS THROUGH

The heart of God wants the truth to be revealed in each of us; for each of us to be humbled under the weight of it enough that we would see and acknowledge the truth.

The less of a weight required 
to humble us, the better.

The less the weight,
the more the disciple.

Only once we see the truth, only once we stop running from it, does the compassion of God catch up with us.  In the final analysis, we are found only to have been running away from our OWN judgement and condemnation, not God’s.

In God’s truth,
we were acquitted long ago.

God always knew the truth.  God always knew that we needed Him.  And God always knew that we would encounter Him most, and the fullness of His heart of compassion, when we were finally surrendered to the truth.  When we no longer shied away from it.  When we finally came to realise we needed Him, and that it wasn’t His judgement we were running from or were afraid of facing in the end.

When God breaks through upon a heart,
God vindicates that heart,
for that heart knows God’s mercy.

At the precise moment judgement is expected,
God’s mercy breaks through upon the heart.

That, my friends, is GRACE,
living and active from the eternal reaches
into the present day—every day—
into any heart humbled by the truth.

~

ABOUT THOSE RESISTING THE HEART OF GOD

One of the saddest realities for those who have accepted God’s heart is there are loved ones, friends, associates, acquaintances, and strangers who still resist God.  Because they are not open to the truth, they have not been humbled, and they stand in enmity against God and others.  They are islands, and purposely so.

But the real test of those who have 
God’s heart is they are repentant.

That might seem a shock in the case of those who seem outwardly not to honour God.  It is people’s attitudes toward the harm they cause and the deeds they do that matters.  That is truth that God is urgently interested in, and those who can face such truth have God’s heart.  Simply put, those who do no harm or repent of the harm they do already have God’s heart.

This can mean some non-Christians, and it can also push some Christians to the periphery.

That’s right, it’s the repentant that set themselves apart to the purposes and heart of God.

THE HEART OF GOD AND FORGIVENESS

The heart of God is merciful, willing to forgive from eternity to eternity.  This heart of God is abundantly more merciful than even our own hearts are toward ourselves.

None of this ought to surprise us because Jesus’ Kingdom is upside down—it favours those that this world does not favour.

The heart of God is found as merciful when it is least expected, when it is anticipated that God’s heart would otherwise condemn.  It is God’s heart that we would receive the truth of forgiveness.

Forgiveness redeems our hope;
it makes us better than we were.

The truth blesses us even as it 
humbles us by its goodness.

As we forgive, 
it makes those we forgive 
better than they were
because of the mercy in grace.

~

WE ARE TO EMULATE THE HEART OF GOD

The wisdom, the truth, the heart of God is what we humans are to emulate.

In the simplest possible imperative, we are to LIVE the heart of God by facilitating mercy in the presence of humility.  Wherever we see or encounter or witness truth we are to celebrate such victories.

The heart of God is forgiveness 
where truth is reconciled,
where humility prevails,
and the people receiving
thrive upon a second chance.

Forgiveness, the Light of God

There are two forces in this world, and those forces compete for our allegiance.  The forces are Light and darkness.  The Light is full of truth and the darkness is full of deception.  Light is life, but darkness is death.

Light is the gift of the forgiveness of God for all humankind.  But it is a gift that must be received with an open heart and open hands.  Far too many people have no interest in it.  They see no benefit in it, and they certainly don’t see that it is the right way to life.  They lean on what seems the only understanding they need—their own.

But there is no Light in our own understanding.
Light comes from without, not from within.

Forgiveness is the Light of God,
shed abroad in receptive hearts.

Forgiveness is, of course, a gift.

Forgiveness, as a gift, is given by God.  It is to be imparted.  It is to be experienced as forgiveness to be given by those who would thereby forgive.  That’s right, the forgiven forgive.

All who give and receive forgiveness enjoy its light.

I mentioned in my previous article, Forgiveness, the Kindness of God, that “the love of scandalous abandon underpins [kindness],” because kindness truly seeks no reward.

Kindness loves because it can, and because it seeks no return or reward it is true love.  It gives itself away, running, as it were, from the reciprocating pursuer.  Kindness wants nothing of the reward and is only truly satisfied when it has gotten away with paying it forward.

Kindness is truly altruistic when there are many forms 
of “altruism” that are not altruistic at all.

So, what motivates kindness?  What is behind love?  It has only now occurred to me to ask this question.  I’m ready to write it.  It is LIGHT that compels us to be kind.

The following passage sets out plainly the thrust of what is discussed in the rest of this article:

“Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates a brother or sister is still in the darkness.  Anyone who loves their brother and sister lives in the light, and there is nothing in them to make them stumble.  But anyone who hates a brother or sister is in the darkness and walks around in the darkness.  They do not know where they are going, because the darkness has blinded them.”
—1 John 2:9-11 (NIV)

These forces—Light and darkness—if you like, the Spirit and the flesh—are ever at war in us from the moment we pledge allegiance to Christ.  Light operates in the love of forgiveness, but darkness operates as the common default.  Light transcends the world, but darkness mires us away from the Light.

Darkness justifies divisive words and deeds, 
but Light sees to it that God is trusted.

Light shines truth and navigates us by faith.

~

HOW DO WE KNOW THAT THE LIGHT HAS GOT US?

We need to know very EARLY in our Christian faith walk—and it might come at the 40-year mark on our walk with Jesus—that we are sold out to the Light, that the darkness will not overcome it (John 1:5).  Jesus is “the light of the world,” (John 8:12) just as we who “live by the truth” come “into the light” (John 3:21).

See the connection between “early” in our Christian walk and something nonchalant like a 40-year period after.  If we reconcile Light this side of eternity, it really does not matter how long it took us to get there, but the earlier the better!  There is no time to waste, but all the same it does not matter how long it takes to get there so long as we arrive.

The truth is that arrival at the Light 
is a constant state of repentance.

Repentance is arrival;
repentance that sticks;
repentance as a lifestyle.

That’s how we know the Light has got us.  Every waking moment we live in the prayer of Psalm 139:23-24.  We pursue the truth, and the truth pursues us.  The truth lights us up!

Even as we catch ourselves in our self-righteousness, we find we are IN the Light because we have allowed the Light to shine upon the darkness and purge the darkness out of us; the Light rooted it out of us.  As soon as the Light shines, the darkness cannot bear it.  Light a room and the darkness is gone, instantly.

See how being WRONG is the greatest thing on the journey of truth.  It’s only as we see ourselves as wrong that we are positioned as right.  Praise God for His revelation of our wrongness!

If only we can get excited about such a thing, we know that sinful pride is captive to the Spirit of God to the glory and honour of His Name.

We know that the Light has got us 
when we are capable of being humbled.

Even better to be willing to be humbled.
Yet best by far to celebrate being humbled.

Even as we glory in being humbled, 
the Light grants us access to the city of God.

~

THE TRUTH IN LIGHT THAT SETS US FREE TO LOVE

The truth in Light that sets us free to love is principally manifest in forgiveness.  Forgiveness is an act of such faith that it beckons the Light to us.  Light comes from forgiveness, even as we see that Light of our unforgiveness as a deceiving darkness.

There is NOTHING that will help us 
see truth better than the LIGHT 
that comes from forgiveness.

Even as we forgive,
the LIGHT is given to us—to SEE.

LIGHT is LOVE to TRANSACT, SEEING;
seeing in truth because forgiveness is love.

But the opposite is also true.  I am astonished as to how much darkness and enmity is in the world, and I especially see it in the background of my corporate setting, from individual to individual, most where we are supposed to be providing “services” for people in crisis.  It is so unbecoming of people who have supposedly committed their lives to saving lives and property and helping community to recover from disasters.  Almost without exception people are ‘in it’ for themselves!  But this is what life is like for us all.  That darkness is in me and you!

It is evidence enough that the darkness must be purged from us all, especially including those in serving roles, who are called formally to help.  And in Christian settings, our default is also inherently about missing the mark of kindness and entering judgement.

The moment we judge is the moment we lose the plot;
the Light is not in us when we judge.

The moment we refuse to forgive, the enemy has us!

But...

The truth in Light that sets us free to love 
is principally manifest in forgiveness.

At every juncture we notice the yawning gap between judgement and kindness, we must appreciate it without entering judgement ourselves, for in judgement is darkness, but in kindness is the Light.  He or she who has eyes to see, praise God that they see!

LIGHT MUST BECOME OUR ALL – BUT IT WILL COST!

Though living in the Light will cost us much, it is worth it, and indeed it can be seen that the Light is the price we must pay to truly live.

The Light as much as anything in this life 
is worth more than anything.

We would be gullible if we thought we could transact in the Light—in God’s tremendous eternal power—without paying for it.  It will cost us everything else, but the truth is everything else is folly in comparison to it.  As is often said, a person is no fool to give up what they cannot keep—earthly riches—to gain what they cannot lose—riches of eternity.

So we can think of living this life in the Light as Life’s Admission Fee.  Refuse to pay and we cannot enter what our days are supposed to afford us, and our legacy would be one of real everlasting regret.

A life well lived is a life lived in the Light.

The price to pay for such a life is a daily deposit.

~

PURGING THE SELF OF DARKNESS – A DAILY DISCIPLINE

This is where I want to close.  In the sobering reflection of a healthy person who can humbly say, “But the darkness and enmity are in me, too!”

The very reason we are motivated to BE the person of Light is that we have acknowledged that the darkness is IN us on a daily basis.  It should inspire us to come back to the truth each and every day.

It’s on a daily basis that we must “let the light in,” to let the Light have its way in us, to be honest and accountable, to be free from the self-deception where we are tempted to think we are wholly/holy good.

Sure, we have some goodness in us, but it isn’t the whole story.  There are always things that threaten to keep us in the dark, just as there are things that rise up in us—fears, for instance; guilt and shame are two others—that threaten to prevent the Light purging the darkness from us.

Day by day, it is our choice, to leave the darkness and enter the Light with intention.

Daily we could pray a little prayer, even as we wake up:

LORD,
may it be in me today,
as I awaken to this Light,
as my eyes open to see this Light,
and as I allow the Light in through these portals,
as my body leaves the darkness of sleep which is rest but not reality,
and I consciously embrace the Day of Light that is now here,
may I agree that the Light would have its way in me,
so please make that occur today, LORD.
And may my moments continue,
in this vein, today.
AMEN.

If this prayer is to work in me,
I must see the truth and allow others to see me, too.

Forgiveness, the Kindness of God

God’s empathy for a fallen humankind, the sending of the Messiah to save, being God’s instrument of forgiveness, demonstrates the cosmic understanding that was and is and always will be there.  God understands, accepts, and forgives our imperfection.

Our challenge is to accept our own and others’ imperfections,
and to forgive ourselves and others when we get it wrong.

Our central challenge is of understanding;
to receive and give the understanding of God.

God really, truly understands us, and 
loves us beyond our own comprehension.

And that understanding produces kindness.
God offers kindness for our imperfections,
and we are to offer kindness to one another,
one imperfect one to another, without prejudice.

We are to offer kindness to others without expecting our kindness to be returned.  It is not kindness otherwise.  The thing about kindness is this: kindness is its own gift to the heart of genuine kindness.  God gives kindness to the one who gives kindness.

Kindness is a power all its own.  Nothing and nobody can defeat a person committed to kindness, and such is the gospel power in it.  Kindness overwhelms foes on every side with an incomprehensible yet obvious power.  It is a love of God that defeats Satan and the enemy knows not why or how, because the love of scandalous abandon underpins it.

God has already given his kindness to all humankind, but humankind typically has shown scant disregard for it, preferring to transact in the hell of judgement instead.

~

At the risk of putting you off, this article is brought to you by the stinging rebuke in Romans 2:1-4 (NIV):

“You, therefore, have no excuse, you who pass judgment on someone else, for at whatever point you judge another, you are condemning yourself, because you who pass judgment do the same things.  Now we know that God’s judgment against those who do such things is based on truth.  So when you, a mere human being, pass judgment on them and yet do the same things, do you think you will escape God’s judgment?  Or do you show contempt for the riches of his kindness, forbearance and patience, not realizing that God’s kindness is intended to lead you to repentance?”

Repentance, put another way, is a humble person’s response when they’ve been presented with an inconvenient truth.  God has presented Jesus hung on a cross as testimony.  Such is God the Father’s kindness, appearing as impotent to all, but resplendent with power FOR us all.  The appropriate response is repentance, period.  And instead of behaving in judgement, we are to behave in kindness.

Kindness is reflective of a repentant heart humbled 
by the grace of a shockingly undeserved favour 
poured out toward that person.

~

KINDNESS & JUDGEMENT

The opposite of kindness, from a human viewpoint, is judgement, unless of course the people judging have the express role of assessing people and are therefore presumably kind and fair about it.  As I compare kindness and judgement, I am doing it through the lens of a judgement that does not have such an appropriate role and is unkind.

Unkindness is characteristic of humankind 
because kindness does not come naturally.

Few people are blessed with an innate regard 
for kindness toward their fellow humanity.

These people are particularly empathetic and empathic.  They have powers of being able to see the redeeming features in people.  They see the judging and condemning attitudes and behaviours of people as unnecessarily harsh.  They believe people are ten-out-of-ten.  They are believers in people.  They happen to see with the eyes of God.  They are often misunderstood.  More blessed are they when they forgive those misunderstandings.

Most people respond innately to sincere kindness.  Such kindness has power to transform moments by the power of the second chance and through the law of reciprocity.

HOW QUICKLY & PERVASIVELY PEOPLE JUDGE

The powers of the human mind are not all positive.  Judging thinking, for instance, is called “dualistic thinking” and this cognitive power is unparalleled in all our lives.

We are driven by biases, largely unconscious to who we are, and those biases run in favour of those we like and who are like us, and they run against those who are different to us, and those who disagree.  Only those who are aware of this judging dualistic thinking can keep themselves to account.  I’d argue that this self-awareness is the absolute key to living truthfully before God and being emotional intelligent.

The dualistic mind is the basis of war.

It preferences thinking like itself and 
produces enmity toward those unlike itself.

There are so many people in this world who defiantly and even violently stand against people.  When people choose to stand against people, they not only violate others, but they also cut themselves off from the joy it is to be a blessing to friend and stranger alike.

But not all people engage in belligerence so intently.  Many people engage in belligerence unintentionally.  Belligerence is the epitome of the spirit of judgement.

KINDNESS AS THE ANTIDOTE TO JUDGEMENT

True Christian faith is quintessentially kind.  And kind to the degree that it is quick to see its own bias; its, or our, own wrong.  Such kindness sacrifices for others.  It prefers to be wrong than right if there is an opportunity to be kind.  Such a faith is righteous because it sees aright.  It is not self-righteous, seeing itself as THE source of rightness.  The rightness in kindness would rather see itself as wrong and BE kind.  It is a compelling love!  Kindness is no threat and can’t be threatened.  Kindness is psychological safety.

Kindness is the antidote to judgement because it can SEE its own judgement and repents of it on the spot.  Indeed, the more we can see and own our propensity to judge, the more we can reverse the trend, repent in the moment, and target our kindness creatively and extravagantly.  Again, as much as it remains cogent, this is such a compelling love!

People will see and experience the power of Jesus when they see and experience this radical form of love in real terms as kindness, the antithesis of judgement.  Perhaps such kindness is a form of self-judgement which is repentance.

There is no kindness like a person preferring that we are favoured over themselves.  That’s a love when done consistently that can be trusted, that builds relationships, that heals the planet, because it chooses against itself and FOR others.  This is a radical love of Jesus that changes the world.  This kindness is done to others as if it were doing it to oneself.  “Do to others as you would have them do to you.”

FORGIVENESS AS THE ULTIMATE KINDNESS

Such is the radical love for one’s neighbour that the world knows nothing about.  This is forgiveness in the terms of extending mercy to those who have committed crimes against us.

Such forgiveness only has one parallel; the forgiveness of a humanity that has no hope of deserving the mercy extended.  It is a forgiveness after the Lord’s own.

It must be the ultimate in kindness.  It is a kindness that has no logical explanation.  It will seem absurd to some because in the world’s terms it does not compute.  Instead of gaining, kindness gives.  Clemency when justice is warranted, yet those who receive clemency stand to be transformed by such love, as does the giver who brings eternity to earth.

The more we throw caution to the wind and aggressively forgive, the more freedom we will experience for having the audacity to set the criminal free.  And some of those criminals will get it; they will be like the thieves on either side of Jesus at Golgotha.  Some will say, “I don’t deserve this favour, this mercy bestowed upon me!”  And such is the power of love in these moments that they will repent and receive their salvation.

Yes, the ultimate in kindness in the forgiveness they experience will lead them to fall to their knees and claim their own salvation.  They will have been touched by the Almighty.

FORGIVENESS AS THE ANTIDOTE TO JUDGEMENT

The world desperately needs to be healed of judgement.  THIS is the freedom of the gospel, but none are free unless all are free.  The presence of right and wrong, of good and bad, sets people apart from each other, and love has no chance to win in these situations.

But when all are equals no matter who they are, then love in forgiveness has healed the world because of the grace that is poured out toward the undeserving.  As we all are.

Forgiveness is a humbling.
To be forgiven when we need 
to be; that is a humbling experience.

There is no greater love in this world than 
for a person to release their right to justice.

There is nothing more powerful than for a person to say, “I forgive that despicable thing you did, and will hold it against you no more,” and to back it up with deeds that suggest it is ever behind them.

When these two are equals again 
with nothing owed one to another.

When a person forgives a person like this, there is an olive branch of peace extended that says, “If I’ve forgiven this thing, nothing will ever come between us again.”  Think of the power of love in that!  That is the love of God in one human being to another.  Both are healed in an instant.

~

The kindness of the gospel of God is the love that comparatively few understand, until that is you are convicted of the crimes of your sin and plead for the forgiveness on offer, knowing you deserve the full weight of judgement.

Those who experience the grace of God truly 
understand and extend the kindness of God to others.

Those who know how MUCH 
they have been forgiven, forgive much.

Those who have received MUCH kindness,
know how extravagant such kindness is.

~

We will never truly LIVE until we have been THIS kind.

Until we have LIVED the kindness of God
we will not have ascended to the heavens.