My son Andrew is eight years old. He is the same age as
Martin William Richard, the young victim of the pressure cooker bombs that
exploded during the
Boston Marathon earlier this week. Bombs that tore into the crowds who gathered to cheer on family and friends. Bombs that have left us, once again, searching for answers and counting up victims. It was a race that started with a moment of silence for the victims of the Sandyhook Elementary School shooting, and ended in another
massacre that requires memorializing of its own. Like you, I am exhausted by
the darkness. I am tired of the violence. I am emotionally and spiritually
drained. And many days I am simply angry.
I am angry at senseless crimes and unspeakable evil leveled
at the innocent and unarmed. And I am angry that in the midst of many peoples’
pain, the ones they have loved the most often become political pawns for agendas, laws, and policies. It is hard at times for me to remember these
victims are human beings, not causes or statements. Their lives are not
serendipitous tools in the hands of religious apologists who want to argue
about evil and morality. They are not lobbyists for gun control. Martin Richard
was an eight year old boy. He was a son, and a brother. He was a child, who is now
famous for his creation of a handmade sign that reads, “No more hurting
people.”
In honor of Martin Richard, I wanted to share a unique, and
I trust, much needed reminder that the light shines in the darkness, can still shone in the darkness and, try as
it may, the darkness has not overcome it. Nor will it ever. With so much talk
about vengeance, revenge, and justice swelling in my own heart, I took some
time to re-read the following story today. Whenever I need to be reminded about the power of the gospel, I turn to a wise friend and mentor who has taught me countless truths in the last few years. This is the story of Corrie ten Boom, holocaust survivor, Christian, and victim who learned how to forgive. I trust it might do your own heart well this
morning too.
__________________________________________________________________
“It was in a church in Munich that I
saw him—a balding, heavyset man in a gray overcoat, a brown felt hat clutched
between his hands. People were filing out of the basement room where I had just
spoken, moving along the rows of wooden chairs to the door at the rear. It was
1947 and I had come from Holland to defeated Germany with the message that God
forgives. It was the truth they needed most to hear in that bitter, bombed-out
land, and I gave them my favorite mental picture. Maybe because the sea is
never far from a Hollander’s mind, I liked to think that that’s where forgiven
sins were thrown. ‘When we confess our sins,’ I said, ‘God casts them into the
deepest ocean, gone forever. …’
“The solemn faces stared back at me,
not quite daring to believe. There were never questions after a talk in Germany
in 1947. People stood up in silence, in silence collected their wraps, in
silence left the room. And that’s when I saw him, working his way forward
against the others. One moment I saw the overcoat and the brown hat; the next,
a blue uniform and a visored cap with its skull and crossbones. It came back
with a rush: the huge room with its harsh overhead lights; the pathetic pile of
dresses and shoes in the center of the floor; the shame of walking naked past
this man. I could see my sister’s frail form ahead of me, ribs sharp beneath
the parchment skin. Betsie, how thin you were!
[Betsie and I had been arrested for
concealing Jews in our home during the Nazi occupation of Holland; this man had
been a guard at Ravensbruck concentration camp where we were sent.]
“Now he was in front of me, hand thrust
out: ‘A fine message, Fräulein! How good it is to know that, as you say, all
our sins are at the bottom of the sea!’
“And I, who had spoken so glibly of
forgiveness, fumbled in my pocketbook rather than take that hand. He would not
remember me, of course—how could he remember one prisoner among those thousands
of women?
“But I remembered him and the leather
crop swinging from his belt. I was face-to-face with one of my captors and my
blood seemed to freeze.
You mentioned Ravensbruck in your
talk,’ he was saying, ‘I was a guard there.’ No, he did not remember me.
‘But since that time,’ he went on, ‘I
have become a Christian. I know that God has forgiven me for the cruel things I
did there, but I would like to hear it from your lips as well. Fräulein,’ again
the hand came out—’will you forgive me?’
“And I stood there—I whose sins had
again and again to be forgiven—and could not forgive. Betsie had died in that
place—could he erase her slow terrible death simply for the asking?
“It could not have been many seconds
that he stood there—hand held out—but to me it seemed hours as I wrestled with
the most difficult thing I had ever had to do.
“For I had to do it—I knew that. The
message that God forgives has a prior condition: that we forgive those who have
injured us. ‘If you do not forgive men their trespasses,’ Jesus says, ‘neither
will your Father in heaven forgive your trespasses.’
“I knew it not only as a commandment of
God, but as a daily experience. Since the end of the war I had had a home in
Holland for victims of Nazi brutality. Those who were able to forgive their
former enemies were able also to return to the outside world and rebuild their lives,
no matter what the physical scars. Those who nursed their bitterness remained
invalids. It was as simple and as horrible as that.
“And still I stood there with the
coldness clutching my heart. But forgiveness is not an emotion—I knew that too.
Forgiveness is an act of the will, and the will can function regardless of the
temperature of the heart. ‘… Help!’ I prayed silently. ‘I can lift my hand. I
can do that much. You supply the feeling.’
“And so woodenly, mechanically, I
thrust my hand into the one stretched out to me. And as I did, an incredible
thing took place. The current started in my shoulder, raced down my arm, sprang
into our joined hands. And then this healing warmth seemed to flood my whole
being, bringing tears to my eyes.
“ ‘I forgive you, brother!’ I cried.
‘With all my heart!’
“For a long moment we grasped each
other’s hands, the former guard and the former prisoner. I had never known
God’s love so intensely, as I did then”
Excerpted
from “I’m Still Learning to Forgive” by Corrie ten Boom.
