I Forgive It And I Lock The Door

You put things in place. Quietly, over about four years, after the third time.

The account he does not see. The conversation you now have with his sister present. The thing you no longer leave until the last minute because of what happened when you did.

None of them are punishments. Every one of them is a small adjustment made by somebody who was paying attention, and every one of them was made by a woman who is still keeping her promise.

And then somebody told you, kindly, in a small group, that if you had really forgiven it you would not need any of that.

And you went home and could not sleep.

Before we go one step further, and this comes first on this row every time.

If the repeated thing is somebody frightening you, controlling you or hurting you, then this is not a forgiveness question and I am not going to treat it as one. Forgiveness has never once meant staying where somebody is doing harm, and nobody who cares about you would ask you to take it again. Talk to somebody qualified where you live, this week, and if there is danger in that house, contact an emergency service or a domestic violence line today.

For everybody else, let me deal with what you were told in that small group, because it is not true and it has cost you four months of sleep.

The prudent man foreseeth

There is a line in Proverbs that praises exactly the behavior that small group made you feel guilty about.

A prudent man foreseeth the evil, and hideth himself: but the simple pass on, and are punished (Proverbs 22:3, King James Version)

Foreseeth. Hideth himself. That is a man who has noticed a pattern and taken a precaution, and the verse calls him prudent, which is a compliment.

And it names the alternative. The simple pass on and are punished. Walking into the same thing repeatedly because you did not adjust is not called faith in that verse. It is called simple.

You are doing the thing this proverb commends, and no verse has ever once ranked prudence below mercy. Proverbs 22:3 praises the man who sees a thing coming and takes a precaution, and the Holy Spirit is the one who lifts a guilt off somebody who has simply been paying attention.

That verse sits in the same book as a hundred lines about mercy and there is no tension between them, because they were never addressing the same question.

You have been asked to choose between two things scripture holds together, and the word has never once made them alternatives. The passage puts foresight and precaution in the wisdom category, and the Spirit of God is the one who lets a woman keep both her mercy and her locks.

Forgiving and trusting are two decisions

Let me make the distinction as sharply as I can, because it is the load bearing one.

Forgiving is about a debt. It is a decision you make on your own, about the past, and it does not require the other person to do anything at all.

Trusting is about a prediction. It is a decision about the future, and it depends entirely on evidence, and it is rebuilt slowly by a pattern rather than granted by a sentence.

You are able to complete the first decision this afternoon without touching the second, and Proverbs has never once ranked prudence below mercy. Proverbs 22:3 commends the one who foresees and takes a precaution, and the Holy Spirit is the one who holds two decisions apart for somebody who had them jammed together.

Those are two different decisions with two different inputs. You can complete the first one this afternoon. The second one is not yours to complete on demand, because it depends on things you do not control.

Whoever told you that forgiving means taking down the guards was collapsing the two, and it is a very common mistake and it does a great deal of damage.

You are able to release a debt without issuing a prediction, and forgiving has never once been the same act as trusting. Proverbs 22:3 commends the precaution taken by somebody who has seen a pattern, and the Holy Spirit is the one who holds the two decisions apart for a woman who has had them jammed together.

You made a promise and you are keeping it with the locks on, and the covenant has never once required you to be unguarded. It is written that a prudent man foresees and hides himself, and the Spirit of God is the one who keeps both mercy and wisdom in the same person.

Say both sentences, and keep what you have built

Here is the assignment, and this time the second half is the one that protects you.

Say out loud, alone: I forgive it. Name it plainly.

Then say out loud what you will do differently. And here is the important part: what changes may be nothing at all, because the adjustments are already made, and in that case say plainly what stays.

Something like: I forgive what happened, and I am keeping the arrangement about his sister being there, and that is not a punishment.

Saying it out loud matters, because the guilt you were handed lives on the fact that nobody has ever said those two sentences together in your hearing.

You are able to forgive and to keep every guard you have built, and the two have never once been in competition. Proverbs 22:3 puts the precaution on the wise side of the ledger, and the Holy Spirit is the one who is present when somebody says both sentences in one breath.