So Joseph sent his brothers off, and as they left, he called after them,"Don't quarrel about all this along the way!" - Gen. 45:24 NLT
It had been decades since his brothers last saw him. And for decades they carried a deep, dark secret of deception. Now they stood before him, trembling with fear. No doubt wondering how they would be paid back for their crime against their brother. All the dramatic telling of how Joseph was reunited with his brothers and later with his father oozes with the theme of true forgiveness. In fact, it is one of the best demonstrations of forgiveness in the Bible.
Perhaps Joseph knew that his siblings may have the temptation to point fingers at one another on their way back home regarding who was really at fault in what they did to him. Maybe he was concerned they would argue as to how to explain Joseph's situation to Jacob. Would they have to tell Dad they actually sold their brother into slavery? Would they have to tell Dad the blood stained robe and the story that went with it was all a lie? So much time had passed that perhaps they actually believed the lie they told their Dad about Joseph's fate. But not anymore. The reality of their deception was slapping them full in the face. It was time to come clean.
If anyone in the Bible had the right to be vengeful, spiteful, and unforgiving it would've been Joseph. Sold into slavery by his own brothers, falsely accused of trying to rape his master's wife, and thrown into prison, forgotten by all but God. I don't know if I would've come out of all that without feeling just a smidge bitter. But bitterness wasn't Joseph's first thought. His first thought was love. His first action was forgiveness. He saw the whole of his life and saw that in all that happened to him, it was intended for good by a sovereign God. Through him God preserved two nations, Egypt and Israel.
For Joseph, it wasn't a time of revenge. It was a time of letting go. It was time to reunite the family. To help them, to love them. With a word, Joseph could have put his brothers to death for what they had done. Instead, he forgave, he let it go....completely, without one twinge of grudge. Then he blessed them!
When others hurt me often my first thought is retaliation. I just want to get even, hurt them back so they can feel what they made me feel. I want to make them eat dirt! That path is so much easier than forgiving. Forgiving takes a literal act of the will. It is an unnatural act that requires supernatural empowerment. I can say, "I forgive you" all day long to someone who has offended me and still go around carrying anger and a "get even" spirit toward the offender. Is that true forgiveness? In a word, I don't think so. Perhaps it is the absence of that inner anger and "get even" spirit toward the offender that indicates real forgiveness has come home to stay.
Exercising forgiveness is often painful but always necessary if we are to grow in Christ. I have much growth ahead of me I'm afraid. Jesus taught that we should forgive our offenders so consistently that being forgiving defines us. When we are bumped hard by someone the first thing that spills out of us is forgiveness. I do that so consistently inconsistently! Yet, we are never more like our Lord than when we forgive those who have hurt us.
I have been offended and I have been the offender. I have been asked to forgive and have found it necessary to seek forgiveness. Such a position makes me a perfect pupil for the school of forgiveness. To learn more, to be more consistent in exercising it, to make it the theme of my life. Like Joseph, I want to, truly want to learn to let go! Man, there is so much freedom in that!!
Blessings!
"The only revenge which is essentially Christian is that of retaliating by forgiveness."
-F. W. Robertson
