July 26, 2010

Good morning;

A four-year-old boy had been learning the Lord’s prayer in Sunday School.  After weeks of preparation and repetition, it was time to recite.  He stood up, puffed out his chest, took deep breath and started in.  He was a little nervous about standing in front of the class.  He began making his way through the prayer, trying not to let the lessons they had been studying about the meaning of the prayer clog his thoughts.  “Just say it!  Just say it!”  he said to himself. ”OK, here goes.  Our Father who art in heaven….”  He was off to great start.  When he got to the heart of the prayer he recited these words.  “And forgive us our trash baskets as we forgive those who put trash in our baskets.” This little misstep puts a smile on our faces and we chuckle a little.  I  believe, however, he may have captured the meaning of this part of the Lord’s prayer in simple language that brings its meaning to the forefront.

Forgiveness is not some hard-to-understand, multi-syllable, theological term that is only used in deeply spiritual, scholastic works written by those who inhabit the ivy-covered halls of universities, graduate schools or the hallowed ground of the theological and philosophical havens of Christianity and spoken about only by those who wear the robes and badges of the offices of the church.  Forgiveness is an easy concept to understand, just a hard one to put into practice.  It is the story of the Bible, especially the New Testament. 

 Throughout the Old Testament, sacrifices were brought to the Tabernacle and the Temple in an exercise of seeking forgiveness from God for wrong doings in thoughts, words and deeds.  In these times, restitution was also required before complete forgiveness was granted.  The entire theme of the New Testament is Christ’s sacrificial, once-and-for-all act to offer us forgiveness in the sight of God.  There is no sin or shortcoming His sacrifice does not cover for us in the eyes of God.

So what is so hard about forgiveness?  Why is it so hard for us to forgive when forgiveness was offered to us freely and graciously by God on the cross?  Peter asks Jesus how many times should one forgive another.  Jesus answers 70 times 7 times.  We get so caught up on forgiveness that many will take this passage literally and count the times forgiven to 490 and then stop.  I don’t think that is what is meant here.  We are called to forgive as we have been forgiven.  Withholding forgiveness only hurts the one who will not forgive.  It will eat at us from the inside out.  We’ll lose sleep.  It will affect our lives and lifestyle.  Withholding forgiveness is trash we put in our trash baskets.  We ask and expect God to forgive those things.  In turn, God expects us to forgive the trash other people put in our baskets. 

Take a moment this morning and look into the trash basket of your life.  Maybe there are some old, dirty, rotten things in there for which you need to ask for forgiveness.  Perhaps there are also some old, dirty, rotten things others have thrown into your basket you need to forgive.  The basket needs emptying every day or it will begin to smell and decay to the point that we will not want to be around it and no one else will want to be around it or us either.

 God, through His son Jesus, cleans out the trash we put in our baskets at our asking.  What a great gift God has given us!!!

 We are called to empty the trash, through forgiveness, others place there.  What a great gift we can give ourselves!!!

 Its time to take out the trash!!   Have a great week.

–
Rev. J. Pete Hyde