Forgiveness

 Scripture passages:

February 22-Matthew 18: 15-35

March 1- Matthew 20:1-16

March 8- Matthew 22:1-14

On Forgiveness

 “Forgiveness is a door to peace and happiness.  It is a small, narrow door, and cannot be entered without stooping.  It is also hard to find.  But no matter how long the search, it can be found.”

 ~ Johann Christoph Arnold 

“There is a hard law…when an injury is done to us, we never recover until we forgive.” ~ Alan Paton

“Resentment is like drinking poison and then hoping it will kill your enemies.”  ~Nelson Mandela

“It is not right to try to remove all suffering, no is it right to endure it stoically.  Suffering can be used, turned to good account.  What makes a life happy or unhappy is not outward circumstances, but our inner attitude to them.”  ~Eberhard Arnold

Questions for reflection:

What forgiveness are you withholding?

What resentment do you hold that no one knows about?

Lenten series book recommendation:

The Abundant Community: Awakening the Power of Families and Neighborhoods by John McKnight and Peter Block

“The Connections among local people are what awaken the power of families and neighborhoods to weave the social fabric of an abundant and competent community.”  (pg 83)

“[Forgiveness] is especially rare in a mobile society, where we are always moving on.  In community, we cannot run from our history together.  Forgiveness is required when we have to live together.  Forgiveness means we find a way to accept fallibility in the world.  We find a way to accept the dark side of our own past and somehow complete it.  Not forget or pretend it did not happen, but discover that our unwillingness to forgive keeps us imprisoned and unable to either offer our gifts or receive the gifts of those around us who are most problematic.  This is easy to say and  hard to choose, but we do know that it is a community based on abundance that creates a context where forgiveness is more likely to occur.” (pg 88)

“We are responsible for each other.  This is the meaning of community.  We take seriously the idealistic notion that our future is dependent on each of us and if one of us is not free, or valued, or participating in a full life, then these are not possible for any of us.” (pg 66)

“A competent community is the place where I can be myself.  Neighbors exist to encourage this.  For each of us, reclaiming the personal is about aliveness and vitality.  Who I am.” (pg 55)

Do you hide your flaws from your neighbors? [For example: picking up every stray item before inviting them in, smiling falsely- saving your angry face for when you enter the house, never calling your neighbor for help. ]Have you lost the capability of being personal with your neighbors?   Who are the people in your neighborhood with whom you can be vulnerable?  How might you reclaim the ability to be personal, real, and vulnerable within your neighborhood?