5 Minutes at the End of the Day.
"let not the sun go down on your anger".
In other words, finish your daily business before you hit the door or log-out.
Specifically, this applies to relationship dynamics in the Bible, that if one is angry with someone else, it should be forgiven before the sun sets at the end of the day. Presenting yet another tough task from the Bible, one that seems often nigh impossible in a world where so many people may seem self-centered, outright.
"if you have aught against your brother, forgive him"
The secret of forgiveness is twofold. Firstly, its not easy: we may have to fight every emotion in our person. It would seem awful, and maybe unethical to forgive many lapses, counter-intuitive. It involves releasing our claim on the position of the wronged person. And that leads to the second aspect of forgiveness:
Unforgiveness is a burden.
It's adversarial, and it puts a shadow over a person's heart. And its easy enough to wallow in self-pity, but we have to get ourselves moving by force of will sometimes; we sometimes have to look our own behavior in its face, and intentionally audit and then alter the worst of our value judgements. With intentionality.
Be ye circumspect.
The end of that run is forgiveness, of course, served all around. We might forgive ourselves for weakness or pettiness, or vengefulness, and then take the yet harder work of forgiving whomever wrong us.
No comments:
Post a Comment