(The following quote was printed anonymously. Thanks to the author, whomever it may be.)
“If you would increase your happiness and prolong your life, forget your neighbor’s faults. Forget all the slander you have ever heard. Forget the temptations. Forget the fault finding, and give a little thought to the cause which provoked it. Forget the peculiarities of your friends, and only remember the good points which make you fond of them. Forget all personal quarrels or histories you may have heard by accident, and which if repeated, would seem a thousand times worse than they are. Blot out as far as possible all the disagreeable of life; they will come, but will only grow larger when you remember them, and the constant thought of the acts of meanness, or worse still, malice, will only tend to make you more familiar with them. Obliterate everything disagreeable from yesterday; write upon today’s clean sheet those things lovely and lovable.”
(Leaves of Gold, pg. 100)
Many years ago I read an account of missionaries who were bringing the gospel to indigenous people groups in arctic regions. With one group the missionaries discovered they had no native word for “forgiveness.” They coined a compound word that literally meant to “choose to no longer remember.” Though I can’t find a source to attribute the anecdote, I share it nevertheless because it gives us a beautiful picture of how forgiveness functions within us.
I am sensing a “Philippians 4:8 theme” thus far in Lent. A good friend recently shared with me an Instagram post pointing out that modern neuroscience is proving the value of what Philippians 4:8 teaches. We might pursue that at another time, but it does serve to illustrate how this rather undistinguished verse of scripture keeps being called to our attention. The anonymous word of wisdom shared above resonates well with that verse. We should choose what to dwell on, and just as importantly what NOT to dwell on (forgive the sentence-ending preposition).
Consider what it means to put something out of reach, and the value of doing so. When something is within reach, our cell phone for instance, we can easily access it out of habit or impulse. Put it away in a drawer somewhere and you will not be reaching for it every five minutes. Why do we take teams of people to retreat centers rather than meeting in our normal spaces? To reduce the temptations of being distracted by other things in life. We put our team “out of reach.” Now consider what the Lord does with our sin. He puts it out of reach. “As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us” (Psalm 103:12). In His mercy, God makes our sin out of reach.
As far as the east is from the west: that’s a long way. Is there forgiveness you are withholding, allowing hurtful memories to remain just within reach? Perhaps it is time to remove them from the east to west.
See you along the Winding Path.
The Winding Path 