ENDURING FORGIVENESS

I like to think of myself as a loving person, caring and nurturing to my family. I’ll admit out-loud that I’m not as patient as I should be...and probably not as gracious. Some of the time (but definitely not all) I get the forgiveness thing right.  

I mean, I can't tell you how many times when my husband has apologized to me that I've raced across our living room, vaulting over the back of the couch in that much of a rush to forgive him and reconcile. Like, literally, I can't, because it's never happened. And I'll bet it’s a funny image for us to think of in terms of our relationships in everyday life. 

And yet, every time I read the story of the Prodigal Son, I’m overwhelmed with the image of forgiveness in the father.  

He doesn't stand waiting at the house, knowing the son would arrive eventually. He doesn't catch a glimpse of his son and then go and wait, fuming, for the kid to get home so he could give him a lecture. He doesn't sneak out the back, or order his servants to lie and tell the kid that his father isn't home.

At the first glimpse of the prodigal son, he runs. The child lost to sin and needing forgiveness, the one he could rightfully choose to be angry with, he is overjoyed to see. The son who is acknowledging folly, whose every weary foot scuffle whispers "sorry...sorry...sorry..." on the dusty ground.

Combine that with what the Bible says about how MANY times to offer this type of godly forgiveness and it’s a stunning image. Just picture if the story of the prodigal went on, and the son left and returned again and again, hurting and leaving and then coming back begging to his father, and every time his father met him at a run.  Every. Single. Time. 

I can’t even imagine. I’d be tired. I’d be sick and tired. I’d be done. I literally have said before, to my shame, “Well, it’s hard to keep forgiving this because it keeps happening!”

But imagine the restoration we could bring about, the life and love we could bring, if every single time someone asks for our forgiveness, even the repeat offenders,

We don't hesitate.

We don’t remind them how many times this has happened before.
We don't hold out for our bruised emotions to wear off or for the other person to "realize" what they've done.
or maybe, if we're honest, to punish them by withholding our affection and acceptance for a while.

What if instead we actually erase the past when someone admits a trespass against us? What if we are swift to release blame and celebrate reconciliation? What if, the instant we see them returning to us, we meet them at a run? And what if we keep running toward them in love, every time they return to us with apology. Our spirits would mirror the spirit of God, his enduring forgiveness and love, as he instantly meets us in every apology at a run.