Luke 23 32 - 37

 Luke 23 32 - 37

In the liturgy there's a prayer that says, “Thou are the same Lord whose property is always to have mercy...” We sometimes imagine our Lord dispensing forgiveness from heaven like a clerk giving out forms. He sits behind the desk and hands out forgiveness to everyone who happens to line up to ask. Jesus's very character and nature is to have mercy and that role is more than a clerk handing out forms. The Romans were not regretting what they were doing, they were bored with their task and indifferent. They were not staring up at Jesus in wonder and pondering the gravity of the moment. They were playing a game for distraction.

This moment is an uncomfortable one for us if we would be Jesus's disciples. Forgiveness is the one thing if the offender is remorseful, repentant, and apologetic. The soldiers were none of these things. We can have positive emotional feedback if someone comes to us and says, “I was wrong, please forgive me”. But that is not the nature of Christ’s forgiveness. To forgive the one who does the evil and then revels in the evil is the nature of Christ-like forgiveness. The nature of His forgiveness is different not just in quantity but in its very character and quality.  That forgiveness may be rejected by the offender but the Savior pleads that it be extended.

Jesus never justifies the sin but He always wants to see the sinner justified. He absorbs into Himself the pain and the misery of the sin while the sinner is set free. This is part of what it means to bear the cross as a disciple. To plead for those who do evil, even to us, especially to us. 

“Lord to those who delight in doing us harm, forgive them they know not what they do. AMEN”