Confession of a Contemptible Christian: Part 3: Forgiveness
I went to three high schools. Not something I would recommend.
The first transfer took me from the town where I grew up to a town five times that size in the middle of my freshman year – possibly the worst time to transfer schools.
Still, I remember being willing to leave the home I grew up in, the beloved river we lived along side of, my horse, and my dog, everything, to have a fresh start with my peers.
While I was always pretty good at getting along with people I had a hard time making real friends. I had a singular “best friend” since birth who was born 2 days before me to my mother’s close friend. After he moved away and we lost touch I didn’t really experience any other true friendship.
Coming from a small town and being dropped into a comparatively large high school mid year not knowing anyone was tough. It was hard to just sort out the day, much less meet people and make friends. Life looked lonelier than ever.
Then, while visiting a new church with my family, I met one of the pastor’s kids who went to my high school. He was hilarious, a strong Christian, my size, and into a lot of the same things I was. We became fast friends. For the first time in a very long time I felt the sort of brotherhood that makes a man feel far less alone in this world.
He helped me navigate my new school and introduced me to a lot of great people as he was well liked by everyone. We spent most of our time together – going to parties and church events to meet new people (girls). He even traveled with my family to go back and finish moving out of our old house. We shared a genuine friendship.
Quickly freshman year was ending. As excitement for the first summer in my new lakeside town grew, my only friend came to tell me that he was moving away – and a few days later he was gone, leaving me to fend for myself. I can remember the dejection I felt.
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Only, he did not move away. He was sent away to juvenile detention for molesting the children in the church nursery.
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Shock, violent disgust, betrayal, vehement anger, confusion. The thoughts and emotions that tore through my 15-year-old psyche were extreme. The looks, the questions, the assumptions. The conversations I had to have as his closest friend were nightmares. I had no idea. Not the slightest clue. There was nothing I could have done. There was nothing I could do.
It was a lot to cope with. I had already begun to grow a bit of a cold heart. Sometime around here I began to grow numb.
It made me so furious. I had already thrown more than a few punches by this point in life. No doubt I would have beaten him down on sight.
I never saw him again. I never spoke to him again. I never even prayed for him.
It was simply too much to accept.
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Christians often shoot their wounded. The reality is – I abandoned him. I discovered that in my own judgment, there was a line of sin someone could cross which would lead me to wash my hands of them. I called him friend, he was my Christian brother, and I deserted him. His sin immediately defined who he was in relation to me and I discarded the rest of him with it. I could not see past it. What if Christ treated us this way?
I had no right to withhold my presence in his life. I wouldn’t say I held back forgiveness, I was able to get there, but forgiveness, like all of Christian life and practice is far more than mere mental assertion – it requires action and presence.
The right thing to have done would have been to love him anyway – to write to him, to not let him be exiled and alone with his guilt and punishment, to be there for him if even from a distance, to remind him about the God he fears and the Jesus who loves him, and most importantly to pray for him.
Even if a friendship becomes impossible that does not free us from our Christian duty to one another. I gave up on him as a person in an instant.
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I’d like to end this entry with the same contrast as before (here and here)…
For me, most of the “don’ts” have been on lock-down my entire life. I’ve never struggled with the usual suspects that we so often associate with “being Christian” – sexual immorality, drunkenness, etc. (Rom 13:13, Gal 5:19-20). I’ve found those “temptations” to be easily avoided or disciplined away. I’ve been strong at keeping my tongue tamed (James 1:26, James 3:2). No one has ever heard me so much as swear in public (and only one person ever has in private). My relationships have always been on point and by all accounts I’ve been a “good” man.
I’ve unwaveringly represented myself as a believer to my peers and I’ve been looked to as a “mature” Christian for as long as I can remember. I’ve stood up for my faith and for others at every turn. When it comes to Bible knowledge and theological expertise I have consistently been top of the class.
Faithfulness in those matters of personal piety – I count them as nothing – they fall as pointless, worthless, and incomparable to the ways I have failed in what it truly looks like to follow Jesus.
It was simply too much to accept.
This is how I continue to learn what the Gospel is and what it really means to be a follower of Jesus. This is my confession of a contemptible Christian.
