Recently, I asked a Christian that I know, “how should you love someone who has hurt you but doesn’t repent (either doesn’t want to, or you are not accessible to them)?” Without missing a beat, he responded, “forgive them.”
I asked a follow-up question, “Why do you say forgive them? What principle or Bible teaching do you draw from to say that?”
He responded, “Do you want me to hold a grudge?”
This line of thinking is pervasive and reveals a fundamental flaw in thinking about forgiveness.
People assume that if forgiveness hasn’t taken place (for whatever reason), the person who was hurt (the victim) must be holding a grudge, harboring bitterness, or being vengeful. That assumption is not true and doesn’t align with true, historic biblical forgiveness.
If you don’t love people unconditionally, you will hold grudges and become bitter and vengeful.
If you don’t see yourself through the lens of humility that realizes that you are also as prone to evil as anybody else, you will become vengeful and bitter.
If you don’t realize that the only reason you are not hurting others as you have been hurt maybe because of God’s grace, then you might become vengeful.
You might become vengeful and sit in a place of judgment and execution of punishment because you cannot fathom yourself ever being able to do the same things.
Yet, we are not as good in our selves as we think we are.
Also, the biblical position is that vengeance belongs to the Lord. The Bible says, “‘Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,’ says the Lord”(Rom 12:19). Just as Jesus taught that looking at a woman with lust amounts to adultery and being angry without cause amounts to murder, it follows that being intractably angry and bitter towards someone who has hurt us amounts to seeking revenge against them. And vengeance is something God jealously guards for himself.
Seeing sinners through the lens of restorative justice is helping to address some of these failures. We look at the sinner and love and pity them because it could be us. We look at the sin and hate it. We realize that we wrestle not against flesh and blood but against principalities and powers that are greater than all of us. If it weren’t for the grace of God, none of us would make it.
Here is what a popular Christian institution’s counseling brochure said about forgiveness. Warning, I don’t agree with some of the key parts. The brochure wrote:
“Forgiveness is a conscious, deliberate decision to release feelings of resentment or a desire for revenge against someone who has hurt you. Forgiveness is often given to someone who does not want or deserve your forgiveness. Forgiveness means that, regardless of whether the offender deserves or desires to be forgiven, you are ready to release the desire for revenge or for bad things to come to the person who hurt you and to move on with your life. The offender does not have to accept your forgiveness, apologize, or admit that they hurt you for forgiveness to take place. Forgiveness is ultimately about YOU.”
Absolutely not! Biblical forgiveness is NOT about the offended but about the offender. Biblical forgiveness is about helping bring relief and help to the offender. It is always done as a response to repentance at the heart level. Forgiveness is an act of grace. Grace is never about serving the interests of the one giving it but about helping the one being given grace.
Forgiveness, as is often defined in psychology today and by many preachers and teachers who have borrowed popular social science concepts on the issue, in my opinion, strays from the historical definition of forgiveness. While forgiveness has been practiced in both secular and religious circles for thousands of years, spiritual traditions like the Judeo-Christian tradition give us some of the best records of the historical view of forgiveness. I believe that the historical, biblical view of forgiveness is much richer and more effective than what is being promulgated today in the social sciences and preached from popular pulpits.
At the root of how forgiveness is approached today is the belief that we have a right to vengeance, we have a right to hold grudges, and that when another tramples our persons and our property and rights, it is an offense against us that we have a right to get redressed.
What if we don’t have a right to revenge in the first place? What if we don’t have a right ever to hate another human being? What if our rights are limited to hating the sin but not the sinner? What if given the circumstances, we would be no different than the ones who have hurt us? Even when they harm us “intentionally,” what if they do so from their brokenness?
What if we were to view the world through the lens that we have been loved and forgiven more than anyone who has ever hurt us could need to be loved and forgiven and have been required to love them in spite of their sins?
We are often taught that forgiveness is something we do for ourselves. A lot of people say, “forgiveness is a gift you give to yourself, not the other person. Forgiveness frees you from bitterness to live your life.” That’s quite self-centered. What if forgiveness was something we do for the other person so they can get healed and had nothing to do with our healing or our ability to give up holding grudges?
Unlike what some people say, forgiveness is not a gift you give to yourself. It’s a gift you gift to the person who has hurt you, a gift that may cost you dearly to give your “enemy.” Yet, it’s a gift we must learn to give because we are not better than those we need to forgive.
When it comes to dealing with someone who has hurt you and has not repented if you are not forgiving him because they haven’t repented, it doesn’t automatically follow that you are or will be bitter, vengeful, holding grudges, or unforgiving.
Something Jesus taught in his powerful sermon on the mount is very instructive here.
“You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:43-48).
Notice in this scripture that hating your enemy comes with its attendant bitterness, grudge-holding, and a desire for revenge. The more life-giving response that Jesus recommends in place of hating your enemy is to “love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” Guess what? When Jesus was on the cross, he did just that. He practiced what he preached. He prayed for his murderers, saying, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34). Stephen also prayed a similar prayer when they were stoning him. It is very important to point out that these prayers are not acts of forgiveness. They are acts of loving and praying for those who are persecuting you as Jesus taught and modeled.
The antidote or cure for bitterness and holding grudges is to learn to love the other person. Love covers a multitude of sins. Paul of Tarsus wrote one of the best descriptions of love.
“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails” (1 Corinthians 13:4-8).
REAL love: How do you love someone who is not repentant?
“REAL love” and “REAL forgiveness” are mnemonics that I have created for both loving people who are unrepentant and forgiving those who are repentant, respectively.
REAL stands for:
R-Review the hurt. Make sure you see things as they indeed are.
E-Empathize with them and accept them. Put yourself in their shoes. Empathizing doesn’t mean that you endorse the behavior. It merely means you see things from their perspective and understand the circumstances they may have been facing when the offense occurred. Hurt people hurt people.
A-Admit your own depravity. Admit that you are no better than the other person; You are no different at the core. You are of the same stock; you share the same creator and devil. Given the same circumstances, you might have turned out the same way. If not for the grace of God, you will be doing the same things.
L-Let go of your desire for revenge, anger, etc. and any bitterness you may be holding. You shouldn’t have it in the first place. Letting go is not some favor you are doing for the person who hurt you. You shouldn’t be holding bitterness in the first place. You should hate the sin and love the sinner.
“REAL love” reviews the hurt, empathizes with the offender, admits our own depravity, let’s go of any bitterness or desire for revenge, and focuses on unconditionally loving the offender, praying for their transformation, and genuinely desiring good to happen to them.
REAL love is the kind of love that allows you to love an enemy. Remember, there is not a single Bible verse that says, “Forgive your enemy.” Instead, the Bible says repeatedly to “love your enemy” and pray for those who persecute you.
**REAL love allows for restitution because that is part of the healing and growth process of the one who causes the hurt, not as a kind of punishment or revenge.
Dr. Everett Worthington, a psychologist and forgiveness expert, developed a similar acrostic, REACH, for helping people REACH forgiveness. I think the spirit of Dr. Worthington’s approach is different than mine in that I believe forgiveness is done only in the context of repentance and for the benefit of the sinner. Love, on the other hand, is something that must be done at all times.
REAL love is especially necessary when someone has hurt you. In fact, only in those situations does REAL love shine like a light in the darkness. It’s easy to love someone nice to you. But REAL love involves loving those who have hurt you; it involves loving an enemy. It means loving people who have hurt you and want to do some more or don’t even acknowledge that they did so. In fact, they may blame you. REAL love is the kind of love Jesus had towards the people who were crucifying him; it is the kind of love Stephen had towards those who were stoning him to death.
REAL love precedes REAL forgiveness and continues after it.
REAL forgiveness is given when repentance happens. Real forgiveness is something you do on behalf of God for the other person. From a Christian perspective, forgiveness is a priestly duty we get to do. When we forgive someone, we do so on God’s behalf, and God forgives them. If they don’t come to us with their repentance, we turn them over to the One under whose authority and on whose behalf we forgive, that is God. That’s what Jesus and Stephen did.
**Rushing to forgive an unrepentant sinner robs us of the opportunity to “love your enemy” and grow through the process. And love is the greatest value in the Bible. Instead of learning to love in difficult circumstances, to satisfy our own needs, we rush to offer a pseudo-forgiveness that is only meant at serving our own needs and emotions and cares nothing about the other person. REAL forgiveness is all about the person who has sinned. It’s about helping them be able to grow and move forward from the hurt they have caused.
Most people who embrace pseudo-forgiveness are quick to differentiate between forgiving someone and reconciling the relationship. They realize that forgiving unrepentant sinners would pose a cognitive and practical challenge if that meant restoration of relationship followed suit. So they separate restoration of relationship from forgiveness. And their forgiveness becomes very self-centered, about the forgiver. The Bible teaches quite the opposite, forgiveness is a favor that is done to the one who has sinned and provides no benefit to the one forgiving, at least that’s how God views forgiveness and teaches that we should do the same.
In the Bible, forgiveness and the restoration of relationships are always coupled. There is not a single instance where they are separated. The relationship may change, taking into consideration any weaknesses that are revealed by the events that caused the hurt. Yet, as much as possible, a relationship guided by wisdom ensues, one in which there is true goodwill and healthy desires for the wellbeing of each other.
How do you love someone who has hurt you but is not repentant?
Show that person REAL love. Don’t rush to give pseudo, self-centered forgiveness. Remember that genuine forgiveness is a fruit of love; It flows out of pure love. So you will never go wrong if you focus on loving first. In fact, anything that is not done out of love is sin (Rom 14:23; Gal 5:6; Rom 13:8-10; Gal 5:14; Gal 5:22). If you forgive someone not because you have first loved them but because you want to keep yourself from bitterness that will ruin your life, then you are actually sinning. The motivation for forgiveness must be love for the other person. REAL love must finish its work and love the person and be willing, praying, and eager to forgive and restore the other person as soon as they repent. When you have REAL love for a person, there is no bitterness or anger or hatred towards them. Anger and hatred of the sin, yes. But not anger or hatred toward the sinner. REAL love cannot live in the same heart as bitterness. When REAL love comes in, bitterness goes out.
The conflict caused by the hurt provides opportunities for constructive transformation and growth on both sides. For the person hurt, an unrepentant person provides them with an opportunity to practice REAL love an grow to be like Christ. Seen from a conflict transformation perspective, it’s a real gift; an opportunity to grow in love. As already mentioned above, anyone can love those who love them or are nice to them. Most people can love someone who has hurt them but is profusely and genuinely sorry to the point that they are sure they will never hurt them again. But it’s hard to love the people who are unrepentant. And in that difficulty lies the gift, the opportunity to practice REAL love that knows the evil within the heart of man and still loves man anyway. And that is the God kind of love that knows that every inclination of a person’s heart is evil, yet he still loved man so much that he (Jesus) gave his life for their salvation (Gen 6:5; John 3:16). Rightly seen, we would not want to get rid of the opportunities that the conflict created by unrepentant sin provides us in spite of the fact that it truly hurts. That hurt would be the growing pains of REAL love. We wouldn’t put an end to it even if we could but would pray and let God who knows everything to work on the heart of the unrepentant person to bring him/her to repentance. We would neither seek to create these painful situations or put an artificial end to them as through forgiving unrepentant people so that we can “move on with our lives.” REAL love has a forgiving heart, is always willing to forgive and wants the other person to repent because of God, not so much because of what they have done to them. Because they know that God will judge sin.
For the person who is unrepentant, the Holy Spirit uses the weight of a person’s sins to work on their conscience and convict them to repent and change. In Psalm 32:3-5, King David reports an experience that is very instructive here. He says,
“3When I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. 4For day and night your hand was heavy on me; my strength was sapped as in the heat of summer. 5Then I acknowledged my sin to you and did not cover up my iniquity. I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord.” And you forgave the guilt of my sin.”
Do you notice that? When David kept silent and refused to repent and confess, God’s hand was heavy on him until he confessed. We are a nation of priests, and Jesus is our high priest. Forgiveness is a priestly duty we do on behalf of others to set others free from their sin. Jesus said, “If you forgive anyone’s sins, their sins are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven (John 20:23). As ambassadors of heaven and as priests of the mighty God, forgiving others is a duty we discharge on behalf of His Majesty, the King. Because sin against any of the subjects of the Kingdom of heaven are sins against the throne, only on behalf of His Majesty the King of the Heavens are we able to forgive sins, even ones perpetrated against us. As such, we must forgive just as the King does when we discharge the duties of the King. In matters of forgiveness, the King does not have one standard for Himself and one standard for his servants. All who discharge forgiveness on his behalf must do so as he would do. God does not forgive unrepentant sinners, and neither should his representatives. God gives his son to pay for the sins of unrepentant sinners so that they can repent and be forgiven. But without repentance, their sins can’t be forgiven even though God has already paid for their sins with his son’s blood.
Going back to the example of King David. Forgiving the offender prematurely when the Spirit is working on them and gently holding fire to their feet to repent and stop hurting others is in some way trying to release them from this fire before they have learned the lesson the Spirit is teaching them. It hurts instead of helps the offender. It’s like freeing a child that is being lovingly disciplined from the weight of the discipline before they have learned the lessons the discipline was aimed at teaching. A good parent patiently waits for the child to learn so that they can quickly terminate the discipline. Like the father of the prodigal son, you wait eagerly for the child to come to their senses and repent. Them when they come home, you run to embrace them before they have said a word because you can see repentance in their eyes. The father of the prodigal son would not have done right to send his servants to go rescue the son from his difficulties before he had repented. Yet, the father was hoping and praying that someday the son would repent. And that day, he would throw a big party to celebrate. The father wasn’t sitting there bitter from what the son had done to him and squandered half his inheritance. REAL love didn’t allow that. Instead, REAL love made is heart ready and eager for REAL forgiveness.
