We’ve heard most of the old clichés about revenge: “Revenge is a dish best served cold.”; “Revenge is sweet — sweeter than flowing honey.”; and “What goes around, comes around.”  We’ve also heard those clichés about forgiveness that encourage us: “Forgive and forget.”; “Let bygones be bygones.”; and “To err is human; to forgive — divine.”  And all of those comments can be used to suit whatever occasion a person feels is appropriate to their state of mind.  It can become a calming or satisfying justification for their actions or it can be used to fuel the fire of their anger.  But while they become common justifications, they also lack the empathy that generates mercy, and at the very least, a motivation for forgiveness that comes from the heart.

         Someone once said, “There is no revenge so complete as forgiveness.”  If revenge is to be sought, then the revenge that seeks forgiveness seems to be an appropriate type of revenge that is inspired from within the heart.  And it comes as close to the heart inspired forgiveness that Christ encourages us to offer to others.

         We’re always able to forgive in our heads — to forget from time to time when we’ve been wronged.  But forgiveness from the heart removes the thought of the wrong against us from our heads and opens the door of mercy in our hearts.  It lets in understanding, grace, and the Holy Spirit of God as motivating forces for us to forgive.  It also frees us and those who have wronged us from the prison of resentment, pain, and injustice.  Then, forgiveness becomes a form of justice in and of itself.  Ultimately that is what heart inspired forgiveness is.  It’s a God inspired system of justice that sets free the initiator of the sin as well as the person who was sinned against so that they may both be free to love each other as God loves us all.

• What would encourage you to forgive someone from your heart other than the fear of not being forgiven by God?
• Why is heart inspired forgiveness is more complete than forgiveness that is spoken but not fully meant?

Todays Prayer

Today’s Prayer —
Merciful God, grant me the ability to forgive others with a mercy inspired from my heart. Teach me the liberating power that forgiveness brings when I am able to forgive others and myself.

         Professional athletes are famous for their branding.  Those athletes who are considered ‘superstars’ are paid a lot of money by the sponsoring agency for sporting a particular brand.  Steph Curry of the Golden State Warriors has been known for his connection to Underarmour sportswear.  Nike paid Michael Jordan a significant amount of money for sporting the Nike swoosh symbol on almost everything he wore, but especially his shoes.  There are other athletes who cash in on contracts with clothing companies to wear their hats, shoes, golf gloves, play with their tennis rackets which connects them with the company that brands them.

         Paul said to the Roman and Colossian churches — and to us as well — that, as God’s chosen people, we are supposed to clothe ourselves with Christ.  In other words, we are to dress head to toe in Christ’s wardrobe.  Since we represent Christ’s brand, we’re to clothe ourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience.  And above all, clothe ourselves with love.  Clothing ourselves with Christ is not something we do when we enter the church on Sunday morning.  It’s a garment that we wear — a living garment of attitude, respect, honor, and love that we put on everyday telling those who see us that Christ is the one who has sponsored us, so we’re wearing his brand.  That’s the ideal role and goal for those of us who are awake, paying our debt of love to those who don’t know about our Christ.  We must remember that Christ paid a significant price for us to be a part of his brand.  Shouldn’t we wear the clothing of Christ as proudly as professional athlete’s wear their sponsor’s garments?  I doubt that they paid nearly the price to acquire their athlete’s support as Christ paid for ours.  Jesus paid it all!

• How do you work to wear and sport the wardrobe of Christ in your life?
• What areas of your life are still underdevelopment as you awaken to what God requires of you?

Todays Prayer

Today’s Prayer —
Loving God, while others choose their wardrobe based on the latest fashions, help me to “wake up and stay woke” to my responsibility to clothe myself in Your Spirit and love — a wardrobe that will never go out of style.

         A story shared by writer Clare Sheridan, a journalist for the New York World, once interviewed Mussolini, the Italian dictator:

What [she] remembered particularly was Mussolini’s parting advice on what it took to succeed in life. “Above all, keep your heart a desert!” the dictator told her.[1]

I can only presume that Mussolini was sharing what he thought were words of wisdom.  But how wise is it to consider one’s heart a barren place where the scarcest of resources are available; where it’s difficult to support life, but is often understood as a place of struggle, a place difficult to live in because people often face intense heat, little water, scarce food, and isolation.  And if we are to take Mussolini at his word, then we must admit that there is nothing meek about his wisdom.  It is the exact opposite.  It is both assertive and overbearing, seeking to care for no one’s heart but his own.  It is filled with selfish ambition and lacks those gifts and graces necessary to live in harmony with others.

         For a person to awaken to the wisdom and mercy of God, they must acknowledge that wisdom from above is as James states it: first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere.  If one refuses to accept life and wisdom in the green oasis of God’s grace, then they will remain asleep in the desert, perhaps without so much as a companion to share their eventual misery.

         God’s invitation for us to ‘wake up and stay woke’ is an invitation for us to live within an oasis of community where there is love, mercy, understanding, and the perpetual sharing of God’s love sincerely and unselfishly.  It is the life and wisdom that God calls us to when we wake up to the presence of God among us in Jesus Christ.

• Where have you noticed yourself or others living as if their hearts were in a desert?
• How do you believe your life as an awakened person in Christ may have worked to draw you or them out of the desert into the oasis of Christ’s love?
• When you consider the contrast of the desert and the oasis, how does ‘being led by still waters’ now add meaning to David’s Psalm?

[1] Citation: James R. Mellow, Hemingway: A Life Without Consequences (Perseus, 1994), p. 202

Todays Prayer

Today’s Prayer —
Gracious God, thank You for the gift of being awakened by You. Empower me to live within Your wisdom sharing a life of peace, gentleness, reason, mercy and sincere love with others.