Descendants of Freedom

They answered him, ‘We are descendants of Abraham and have never been slaves to anyone. What do you mean by saying, “You will be made free”?’ (John 8:33)

A couple years ago I read Desmond Tutu’s book No Future Without Forgiveness wherein he not only discussed the individual and community healing that can flow through forgiveness but he made no bones about its messiness. Forgiveness is tough work.

“Forgiving and being reconciled to our enemies or our loved ones are not about pretending that things are other than they are. It is not about patting one another on the back and turning a blind eye to the wrong. True reconciliation exposes the awfulness, the abuse, the hurt, the truth. It could even sometimes make things worse. It is a risky undertaking but in the end it is worthwhile, because in the end only an honest confrontation with reality can bring real healing. Superficial reconciliation can bring only superficial healing.”  - Desmond Tutu

 If you are looking for quick, neat and tidy solutions, forgiveness may not be the first word that crosses your mind; it may be something closer to revenge. Revenge, or the instinct to desire revenge, comes from a deep innate place of justice – a deep yearning for justice to be done. Surely we can have some measure of empathy for the anguish and bitter hatred expressed by victims of hideous crimes. We want to see justice done – and quickly please. We seek justice; this is good.

Sadly, it is likely not too difficult for us to image mass deportation, war and even genocide. It has been all over the news during my lifetime alone. The Psalmists lived through such a time of exile and hated their captors. Their land had been conquered, language despised, culture ridiculed, sacred places of worship and community gatherings destroyed, and vessels used for religious rites desecrated during drunken parties. The feverish pitch of the visceral desire for revenge, and a yearning for divine justice is expressed throughout the Psalms. These yearnings exist today by many peoples.

Psalm 139 is a staple for those who seek the comfort of being fully know and fully loved in spite of sin. It has moments of a mysterious divine gentleness in being intimately known and sings out in amazement and joy that “such knowledge is too wonderful for me.” Yet, it quickly turns on the issue of justice with a guttural desire for their oppressors to be slain. “Do I not hate them, O Lord…I hate them with perfect hatred; I count them my enemies.” And just as quickly as the psalm turned toward the pain and delight of revenge it turns back in surrender to a just God. “Search me, O God, and know my heart…see if there is any wicked way in me and lead me in the way everlasting.”

The appeal is to a God of eternal justice. As a follower of Jesus I must confront the reality that divine justice is intimately bound up in forgiveness as an enabler of perfect freedom. Forgiveness frees individuals to heal and to participate in authentic community. Forgiveness has the power to liberate us from inner turmoil, cultural hurts and systems of injustices. It is messy work but forgiveness powerfully enables healing.

As I reflect on the reintegration of prisoners back into community I often think about justice, community safety and hope. I would like you to consider a reality many prisoners experience - they are outsiders in a world of insiders. They come to see that, to quote one man, “I was a prisoner long before I went to jail.” This is not to lessen the reality of the crime and the sometimes horrendous consequences on the victim. It is, however, to suggest that sometimes we come to see ourselves as slaves of a freedom-depriving macro system. And we realize we don’t like being slaves. A slave is a prisoner to some power dynamic, craving, insecurity, injustice or false god in society. To see oneself as stuck in a slave-master relationship with someone or something is to plant a seed of injustice and a desire for justice. Slavery is a false identity imposed on another by coercion or in some cases simply societal norms. Slavery is life-depriving. The truth is that we are set free and the sooner we learn to walk in freedom the sooner we can deepen in the truth of justice. Seeing oneself freed from the shackles of slavery is the starting point for authentic healing.

Freedom is not a birthright but a revealed and learned identity.

We become more ourselves by participating in the lives of others. Yes, it is messy work, but should that surprise us? Surely we can admit that we all have our messy bits on the inside. Learn to forgive yourself, to be merciful to yourself and it becomes easier to forgive others and to offer mercy to the other. This is the building blocks of the common good, our collective home, our community and we will surely get glimpses of the Kingdom of God as we begin lifting these building blocks.

A dear friend of mine is a crack addict who has been clean for some time now. He does not take a healthy, drug-free day for granted and he knows the next craving could be just around the corner. He knows the feeling of living out of an identity in exile, a slave in a foreign land. He also gets glimpses from time-to-time of a freedom born out of his true identity and he knows the power of an enemy which deprives him from living out of this true identity and true nature. He knows this voice of guilt, shame and fear. He also knows that every day of walking in the image and likeness of his true identity allows the place of exile to feel more distant; it becomes a place to which he no longer wants to return. This personal journey of “slavery” to “freedom” involved going to prison and the embrace of a forgiving community who are as interested in holding themselves accountable as they are in holding the other accountable.

We have a tremendous capacity to keep ourselves busy. Maybe we can find a little time to delve into the messy reality of forgiveness. I think our freedom is somehow bound up in forgiveness.