YeKengalé

When last have you heard the latter part of John 20:23 expounded from a pulpit?

and “whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained.”

Jesus, according to the Johannine record, breathed on His disciples and said ‘Receive the Holy Ghost.’ Then he authorized them to remit (forgive) or retain (hold accountable) sins on earth on God’s behalf. It might be useful for today’s disciples who have also been given the keys of the kingdom to learn how to use them.

Luke 17, tells us

“In life transgressions are unavoidable, but woe unto the transgressor.”

Forgiveness is a blessing. It is not mete to bless transgressors.

It goes on to say:

 “If your brother sins against you, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him. ” Only then does Jesus recommend:

“And if he sins against you seven times in a day, and seven times in a day returns to you, saying, ‘I repent,’ you should forgive him.”

Why is it that the conditional part, the crucial part of Jesus’ teaching never gets emphasized or even mentioned? The clear condition for remittance (forgiveness) of sin is rebuke and repentance. To forgive (remit) where there has been no rebuke (confrontation) and no repentance (penitence and willingness to repair) is not just unscriptural, it breeds evil, as any judge, accountant, or parent innately knows. So why have we drunk the erroneous forgive-and-forget cool aide?

How in God’s Name could anyone be obliged to forgive? Forgiveness is an act of mercy. Once obligation is introduced, the quality of mercy is strained away. The carte blanche forgive-everybody-everything-all-the-time theology is so one sided it is pernicious. … Not just bad theology, but despicable.

The issue here isn’t hatred (of enemies), (so the vengeful hotheads and grudgeful bad-minded among us really do need to take the Forgiveness 101 course for the sake of their own mental and emotional health). It’s Justice and/or Mercy (for transgressors). The two (Justice & Mercy) ought never be divorced. That’s the double edge of truth. Everybody transgresses at some point, so not to be willing and ready to forgive those who transgress against us (and that’s what the popular and unbalanced 70 x 7 forgive-your-enemies teaching is about – the willingness to forgive) is neither fair nor wise as what goes around comes around.

However, the offer of forgiveness is a totally different matter. That releases one party from obligation and the other from expectation. That is a gift of mercy and there is a biblical injunction against casting your pearls before swine. Neither did Jesus give apostolic keys to a bunch of neophytes. He disciplined and prepared them, then commissioned and sent them out with authority to shift the destiny of nations.

Folk still stuck in an Old Testament punitive approach to justice paradigm see justice as mere punishment of transgressors so the transgressed against might have reprieve. Most folk really dont even bother invoking law unless they are transgressed against personally, (or someone close to them). The law for them is Big Brother – the avenging angel to administer God’s wrath against their adversaries.

However, (sorry for any disappointment caused) and (apparently contrary to the belief of a few) the law is not there for one, or even just some but for all. Its truest aim is reconciliation and the restoration of social harmony, the correction and deterrence of the nihilistic human impulse. When social boundaries are breached it is generally because social bonds are weak or were never properly formed. Restorative justice aims at correcting both these.

Of course it’s much easier to merely cast the errant into the prison or hell of choice to satisfy the offended feeling of the aggrieved. There still are those who imagine that it is God Himself that is offended by man’s transgression – as if God can be discomforted. But the Law is made for man, not vice versa. If the Divine was more concerned about principles than people, He would not have declared Himself pro-Choice in the Garden. Love honors individual freedom and makes allowance for individual choice, including wrong ones. If the creator wanted perfection, he would have created a clock not mankind.

Law only steps in (or only ought step in) to safeguard the ship when unchecked breach threatens its security. (Those for whom law is more about social control rather than social harmony always give birth to hell on earth.) That’s why transgression must be confronted, because it’s not about you, me, or any single aggrieved party. Human behavior tends to be habitual, and when allowance is made for evil to go unchecked, it more often does, and accelerates. Same knife stick sheep stick goat. Gi dem a yard dem tek a mile.

Even though there is a long, long list of grievances showing how the earth has suffered under White Male Patriarchy, it is neither offended sentiment nor sustained injury (though so grave and grievous both be); but dangerous precedent that compels God’s true prophets today, full of the Holy Ghost, to declare (as surely as Jesus, in defiance of social convention, proclaimed “Woman thou art loosed!”) “White Man thou art bound!”

Nobody seems to get what’s at stake when The Rumsfields and Rhodes of this world are allowed to rest in peace. Hitler was anathematized because the world never again wanted to have to deal with the conflagration of evil he inspired. Restorative Justice can be punitive, but seldom so. Likewise, Punitive Justice can be restorative, but you may want to check some recidivism statistics to establish how seldom so that is.

A people forced by pain of death to ‘love’ their tormentors don’t need to be schooled about forgiveness. They have pretty much mastered forbearance. To understand the proper application of justice and mercy however, they may need to be healed from hurtful pain of memories so bitter, they abandoned faith in both. When your experiences teach you that neither justice nor mercy listens nor responds to you, you learn to worship Acquiescence as key to Survival and Life, regardless of the mask of empty impotent religion hiding you from the ugly truth. Such a people are as in dire need of restoration and reconciliation as those whose wanton abuse of power with impunity now makes them a threat to life on the planet.

Reparations is beyond plea for racial justice or economic mercy, it is the requirement for planetary balance and human continuity. Can’t you hear the current cry of the masses escaping earth to heaven’s throne?

Those who confuse the All Consuming Fire Moses encountered in the Burning Bush (no mistake) with goosebumps up the spine on Sabbath morning and shouts of shallow, empty praise, need listen to UWI VC Sir Hilary Beckles. and ask for spiritual discernment from the Holy Ghost.

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