I am writing this because I have been searching for something that makes sense. I keep finding crap and I know I am not alone in this search. I don't claim to have the absolute answers. I just want you to know there is a way forward. I am also a survivor. I am also a Christian. I also have a hard time coming to terms with what forgiveness means in this context.
We were hurt unreasonably. Damaged in a way that is illegal and unjust. It is something that wracks us for years. But as Christians we can't ignore forgiveness. So what does this mean for us? Is there a resolution? If God is worth the title, our faith can't possibly require that we chip away yet more of our soul to pretend at something we can't obtain. This is simply more abuse. Are we forced then, like so many, to abandon our faith? To pretend God isn't a presence in our lives? To toss out the beautiful, teachings of Jesus over this? No we are not, though the vast majority of Christian press on the subject would lead you to believe otherwise.
If you were abused by your parents and are looking for a Christian perspective on foregiveness, you have likely found two camps.
One from modern psychology frames foregiveness as an internal process of moving past bitterness. It has little to do with the abuser. It's all about me healing and letting go. This is great. But it doesn't fit the Biblical or even common notion of forgiveness being about the other person. If we loan money to a friend who never pays us back, and we decide it isn't worth fighting over...if we forgive the debt in the truest sense, that is entirely about the other party. Sure I have decided not to be bothered by it, but I could just as easily have gone to small claims court or smashed his car window and decided not to be bothered by that either.
This forgiveness of the other person's debt is exactly the meaning of the Greek word used in the New Testament. So we can't really ignore that aspect. Which leads us to the other camp. This camp says that we have to forgive in that sense. They dance around how hard it may be in various ways and to give them credit, few say we have to endure more abuse. But for all the explicating, they essentially come down to, "sucks, but you were forgiven, so gotta do it." The worst versions blame the victim and attempt to guilt us into it, citing verses about us not being forgiven if we don't forgive. Newsflash this is exactly what my abusive parents said to gaslight me into thinking I deserved to eat my own vomit. In case you still don't get it, this is categorically and absolutely the wrong move. If you are one of those authors and you think you can use this approach with us, you are sadly mistaken. Might as well lock the church door in our face. You must have never experienced what we did (thank God for that) but then you have ZERO room to tell us anything. Nope, just shut it. Seriously, I want to rip your smug lips off your mouth...that's only half an exaggeration, unfortunately...welcome to hell buddy, it's where my parents dumped me.
If, on the other hand, you are writing that SH** because you have suffered and are deluding yourself by trying to convince others, I'm truly sorry more abuse has been heaped on you, and I hope you find a path to freedom by reading on.
So where can we go? I have found pieces of a solution, at least enough to serve as indicators of a forgotten path, in the writings of George MacDonald. Seriously, thank God for him. I'm going to paraphrase as best I can because 19th century Scottish English is not the easiest thing for most people to read. But if you can, go to the source. First, let's understand God. If this being exists, he has to be the highest form of whatever we can conceive, right? We can't be more or better than anything worth the name God, so if we can conceive of something better, God must encompass that to an infinite degree.
We know that love is better than hate. That peace is better than stress. God must too. So when God compares faith to being childlike, it must be because God is himself childlike. Imagine what that means. And if you can't, go hang out with a few healthy children and see. They exist in the moment. They love easily. They forgive readily. Empathize naturally. But they also perceive wicked intent almost instantly and once harmed, are shy to return to it. God is no less, and infinitely more! He's not a cruel task master and nothing at all like the warped parents that ruined us.
If God is also all-knowing, he must know our hearts and our struggles. He isn't going to be harsh or demanding. He will understand our limitations and scars better than we ourselves can. So if we can't bring ourselves to anything, He will accept it, sympathize, and gently work us toward healing, if it takes millenia.
He is not rushed for time. In fact, time does not even bind him. I'm not saying simply that he can go back and forward in time. That's a mistaken understanding of time in the first place, like saying a shadow can poke you. God exists outside of the linear construct we understand as time. And since he is all-powerful, his purpose can not be thwarted. It will be accomplished. And he desires that none will perish. That's it, done deal. So give yourself time, all the time in the universe, and beyond. God will be right beside you no matter how long it takes, because in reality, neither the past nor future exist. One is only memory. The other expectation. The pure reality that quantum physicists can attest to is that the only state that exists is an ever present state of NOW!
Of course, this will no doubt lead us to think, why did we have to suffer in the first place. This is a valid question and one that Uncle George can also help us with. But let's save that one and stay on track. For our current purposes, we can just know that God is just. This scary word is what I would argue to be the single biggest hangup for most Christians. But only because we have such a bent understanding of justice. It isn't just for God to allow evil to continue. It isn't just for God to let the guilty go free. It isn't just to punish an innocent for the wrongs of others, no matter how willingly that innocent may argue to take the punishment. All of that substitutionary BS is exactly that.
God is just, and that justice demands that no wrong goes unrighted. Again, we can get to why the wrongs exist in the first place later. For now, we know they do. But knowing a just God won't let them go is extremely freeing for abuse victims like us. God says vengence is his. Not that he's going to let them go scott free. No, they will pay, every penny. Remember the story of the debtors? The one who doesn't do right is required to pay the last penny of what he owes. Why? Because if God is perfect, we must also be. Rest assured, there is a perfect plan in place to not only bring absolute justice to the wrongs done to us, but to do it in such a way that those very abusers will come to us of their own free will and beg to be allowed to make it right. I'm not saying that will happen in this life here on this earth. But it WILL happen. It IS happening. It MUST because God is perfectly just and perfectly loving.
Now if you've done any soul searching enough to be reading this, you know yourself that you struggle to avoid perpetuating the wrongs that were done to you. Abused become abusers to a large degree. And if not that, at very least, you've screwed up many things due to your damage. You wouldn't be a Christian if you didn't know this to be true. So think of what this means. We also have to be made perfect. But in that innocent childlike way. So do our abusers. They were likely abused, right? That in NO WAY excuses what they did. But it does EXPLAIN some of it. They are wrecked too.
And here is where we can reach a true forgiveness. Simply acknowledging that they are wrecked and that God will give us all both justice and fair play. I think it's that simple.
Not that I have come anywherre near achieving it. But I am starting to see it, like the hazy outline of the coast viewed from the top of cloud-covered mountain. It's out there in the distance and if I can follow this trickle, it will likely lead to a stream, and then a river, and eventually float me out to that open ocean of freedom.
So as for that trickle, what does it look like? I honestly don't know. It might be different for each of us. I know that it can't in any way be helpful for me to ignore the wrong done to me. Pretending I'm not hurt, or that it's fine in any way does an injustice to the abuser and to myself. That isn't love, it's enabling. So I won't be going anywhere near them. Because, yeah, they make me effing enraged and sick to my stomach and anxious and tearful, and all that stuff you know as well. But also because they need to feel that thorn prick deep from what they did. It might be the very thing that leads to their salvation. And if not, it's one more wound they made for themselves.
I do sincerely hope they will come to justice and healing, not for themselves, but so I can rest knowing the harm was not in vain. I will do my best to bear up and absorb the wrong, like Jesus did. Like him, I may cry hard, I may not understand. But I'm on this path for a reason. I see myself in him and him in me. I didn't deserve what happened to me. It hurt. It was evil and it messed me up. But it ends here. I will not replicate it. I will not be consumed by bitterness. If Jesus can beat death, then I can beat this. I will keep working on my therapy and prove that this doesn't own me. They don't own me. They don't own you. We are so much more than the pain. Every last drop of that pain is being transformed into something stronger than adamantium, purer than crystal clear glass. It's something most people can't even see. But we can see it in each other. And God can tell. You are his honored and loved child. You will be perfected, no matter what was done to you and no matter what you can or can't do because of it. That's no threat. It's a promise.
And I do really hope my abusers will be perfected as well. That their wrong will be erased in all the sorrow and shame and pain they feel because of it. Like Jonah, I hope they end up being such a force for good inspite of their best efforts to mess stuff up. What better payback is there? Then the debt will be paid! Not in some get out of jail free card or hokey self-delusion that I don't care anymore, but in true repentance and humble restitution. This is the path I think forgiveness lies on.
