Unconditional Forgiveness?

I’ve been reflecting and thinking a lot about what Bruce had to say on Sunday and I wanted to raise a question or thought around this idea of forgiveness, especially unconditional forgiveness. In this season on Lent I’ve been contemplating a lot about the saving work of Jesus Christ and what it means to me and how I understand what happened in the birth, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus both in the context of society and personally.

In light of that, I’ve just recently finished a book called Proverbs of Ashes  that shook me to the core. It is about what we as the church may be telling people about how to live out their lives. The book focuses on how the use of the Christian theory of atonement can perpetuate the cycle of violence in relationships. The classic view of atonement is critiqued by these two women’s experience with violence and abuse. So my question is, does the idea of “unconditional forgiveness” tell people (especially women) to forgive without change in action (by the other) to stay in an abusive relationships?

Do we get too caught up in trying to tell people that God wants to have a relationship with them "how they are now" that it leads us to do damage? I believe that we have to be extremely careful when we talk about unconditional forgiveness especially when we are doing it within the Christian framework. I appreciated Bruce talking about how forgiveness is reconciling relationships and I agree that Sin should be talked about in terms of broken relationships not moral miss-steps or laundry lists of bad deeds. I agree that we should do our best to reconcile relationships with one another regardless of the horrific atrocities that we can impose on one another as human beings. But how do you tell someone who is being dominated by another human being that forgiveness should be unconditional? 

How does “unconditional forgiveness” display itself in scripture? Is Jesus unconditional in his forgiveness? Is God? Looking first back through scripture I’ve come to understand that God acts in covenants with humanity, the covenant with Noah, with Moses, and even Jesus talks about the “new covenant.” If God is a covenantal God does that make God conditional instead of unconditional? Covenant means a solemn contract, oath, or bond. So what does it mean for us to understand God as having conditional oaths with Israel in the times of the Hebrew Scriptures? And how does that affect our view to offer unconditional forgiveness? What might be our role in a two-sided covenantal agreement?

I agree with Bruce who used some great passages (Matthew 26: 14-30, 47-55, 69-75) to talk about denial and forgiveness from Christ. Based on what I read in the Gospel accounts I think that Christ shows us someone who acts with unconditional forgiveness. He is someone who is more interested in the healing and creating right relationships than swearing them to uphold an oath (or even doctrine?). 

But this all brings me back around to Rebecca Parker and Rita Brock in Proverbs of Ashes and their experience that being told to forgive unconditionally just drives people to stay in abusive relationships. How can we talk about this Christian unconditional forgiveness without telling people to stay in abusive broken relationships?

Comments

[Erik Christensen]

Good thoughts. Does forgiving someone necessarily mean you continue to enable their bad behavior? It seems like forgiveness doesn't necessarily mean trusting that the person will never sin again. In a severe case like abuse, it seems like a spouse could "forgive" but also move out of the house and/or seek a divorce without being inconsistent.

[Reyes-Chow]

yes, I totally agree, while we can't expect or even offer forgiveness on expectation of change, forgiveness does NOT mean continuing in a relationship of abuse or destruction of physical or spiritual relationships.

[katherine]

this is how i figure it: i can forgive someone and walk away freely- knowing that it is my choice whether or not i want to be close to that person. or i can walk away in anger or 'in grudge' and not forgive them. but ultimately, walking away, in and of itself, is not the same thing as not forgiving someone. sometimes, the best thing we can do is walk away, because it gives us the distance and clarity to be able to see someone clearly, see how they 'are broken', and then forgive them.

[Nick Larson]

Can and/or does the question of unconditional forgiveness towards others make implicit a submissive mentality? If so, how does one speak about resistance along with forgiveness? How do you respond to someone who approaches you and tells you they are in a 'broken' relationship and they love their partner and they think Christ teaches them to stay in the relationship and to forgive the other person? As Katherine put it how do you help someone create distance?

Is there any way that we as a community to change that concept when talking about forgiveness in the sense of unconditional verse conditional that leaves out an element of enabling the 'broken' behaviors?

ps. Can all I do is ask questions? ;)

[Phil Cha]

Forgiveness, to me, is always an ongoing process that is part of a more complex exchange of BOTH receiving and granting forgiveness--can't have one without the other. As Jesus prayed, "forgive us our sins as we forgive..." Then there is the issue of individual vs. corporate forgiveness. As Bruce mentioned in the sermon, ALL of us who call ourselves AMERICANS, for instance, need to be forgiven by those whose blood and sweat allow us to enjoy our status.

[lisa]

To respond to one of your questions, Nick, I do think offering unconditional forgiveness means being submissive - but not to the other person's sin. It means being obedient to God and recognizing that no matter how "bad" we may deem another person to be, God does indeed want to have a relationship with them, just as they are. We can't condone sin, but neither can we tell people that their sin makes them unworthy of being in our Christian community or unworthy of relationship with God or unworthy of our forgiveness.

When we are talking about abusive relationships, some people may have a tendency to unconsciously encourage people to continue to be abused. At the same time, some people have a tendency to look upon abuse itself as a sin that is (as Bruce mentioned Sunday) "worse" than other sins. Neither tendency is fair.

[Alex]

It's hard to know what unconditional forgiveness means because so often we are told TO forgive but not HOW to forgive, which can be frusterating since forgiveness is crucial. I would recommend a book to anyone struggling with this that I think really has forgiveness pegged. The book is Forgive to Live by Dr. Dick Tibbits, and it is significant because he has been studying the literal physiological changes that occur in the body as a result of forgiveness. He basically trains people to learn how to forgive and teaches them how it is beneficial to their health. It's worth checking out, and like the book says, it just might save your life. Check it out at www.ForgivetoLive.net.

[Garry]

It's hard to know what unconditional forgiveness means because so often we are told TO forgive but not HOW to forgive

Totally agree with Alex.
thanks for the link