I know of no more powerful word.
I know, too, of none more profound.
And I’m not sure it’s a word we really know very well. I mean, intellectually, perhaps, we think we comprehend it, but yet we keep crafting creative reasons why it isn’t necessary, isn’t deserved, and would best be intentionally withheld. Hence, maybe we know what it means, but we have minimized the power it unprecedentedly holds.
Many words have been written and spoken since the horrifying assassination of Charlie Kirk two weeks ago. Let me just say many who write and speak now clearly didn’t know him very well. I’ll rephrase. When there’s a person we aren’t in the regular habit of listening to, learning from or conversing with, it’s easy to contrive concrete opinion based more on the incomplete collection of snippets and soundbites as opposed to the totality of context and conversation. Charlie would have offered those with both like and contrary opinion generous grace. He interacted with all. He also believed grace is always available to us all.
Yet with the plethora of words echoed over the last few weeks, one word in one sentence reverberated loudest and arguably most powerfully. It was spoken by his weeping widow at the memorial. She said in regard to the man who murdered her husband…
“I forgive him.”
Erika Kirk continued… “I forgive him, because it was what Christ did, and is what Charlie would do. The answer to hate is not hate. The answer we know from the gospel is love, and always love. Love for our enemies and love for those who persecute us.”
Erika, in her pain, in her grief, in her absolutely unimaginable heartache, has chosen to forgive a man who wronged her, who did something deeply immoral, whose evil and cruelty is unquestionable. His sin cannot be undone. And yet she chooses to forgive.
Why?
To forgive is a conscious decision. It’s a choice to let go of the resentment, anger and desire for vengeance against the person who hurt you.
Again, there is no question they hurt you. There is no question the assassin in Utah hurt Charlie Kirk and his family and the millions who loved and respected him across the globe. So why forgive?
Many have suggested it’s less about the forgiven and more about the forgiver, as the granting of forgiveness has the power to give us peace; it’s freeing. It’s what frees us up from the anger, bitterness and resentment that rots us from the inside out.
Still more encourage us to forgive because it reflects God’s own gracious character. He is a God that consistently promotes and even implores forgiveness. Like him, it’s important that we remember that forgiveness doesn’t exonerate the perpetrator from all earthly consequence, but it removes us from any attempt at control and instead trusts that God will bring justice in his time. It means trusting in God more than me.
Let us also briefly acknowledge that to forgive someone is not saying, “Hey, it’s ok; all my anger is immediately gone.” We don’t have to deny how we feel. But forgiveness is a profound recognition of how God treats each of us in our imperfection; that’s the message of Jesus. If God’s not going to hold my sins against me, then I will not do that to another either.
If I choose to hold sins against an equally imperfect other, then I will never be able to love you well. God commands us to love… not just to love those who agree with me or who don’t hold an opinion I’ve cast as oppression or those easiest for me to talk to. That’s what Erika Kirk was saying on Sunday. The answer is always love. Love is not selective.
So if our answer isn’t always love, what is it?
That’s the scary part; the opposite of love is hate. The answer to hate is clearly not more hate. The answer is learning to love… even when it’s hard.
Genuinely…
AR