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Not every culture or every person embraces the Golden Rule, to treat others the way we want to be treated. Many ethnic traditions encourage taking advantage when possible, getting ahead of the next person in the queue, grabbing opportunities or goods without earning the prize through personal effort.
Often the most vulnerable in a culture like women, children, disabled citizens, poor and powerless people are unable to receive justice to alleviate their suffering. Even in corporate or educated settings, things happen that are not right, not loving, not fair.
What restores the needed balance in the world? In our private lives?
Retribution/revenge…the eye for an eye view? Or forgiveness…giving up the right to be angry AND leaving the results to Almighty God? (Rom 12:19)
When I was fired from my principal position at the International School of Kabul after six years, believe me, retribution was much more on my mind than forgiveness. I could not fathom in the heat of the crisis that I was bearing all the blame for the leadership issues between myself and my boss. Desperate prayers and cries for God to bring down holy judgement and advocate for my situation were frequent during the early days of the trauma.
It didn’t happen. I was sent home in personal humiliation and professional disappointment. The months and even years that followed required my active involvement to restore the balance of justice in my heart and mind. Counseling, debriefing, meditation, rest, reflection, and intentional review of my own actions that played out in the failure took emotional energy and time. Forgiveness was the golden key to unlock my hard heart and be able to see God at work.
In the process, God’s grace granted me freedom to leave things up to Him and to believe the scales would be better balanced by His sovereign perspective. But really, it became less about payback and more about moving forward in joy and wholeheartedness. God’s love and just character restored my balance and what happened to others was His business, not mine.
What situation has captured your desire for revenge, where the thought of forgiveness eludes you at present? What is one step you know you need to take to balance your desire for justice?
While perfectly human to want to see offenders experience punishment or payback, God lovingly stated several times in his Word that we cannot move forward with him in such a condition. We are locked in a prison of our own making and forgiveness is the key to freedom. While I haven’t had another severe trauma like my exit from Afghanistan, I continue to have regular challenges to walk away from unbalanced justice situations (in my opinion). I check my heart, ask help to want to forgive, then forgive and release the ending of the story to God.