Pentecost 14 - Year A

Stories of great drama today – we hear of Joseph’s reunion with his brothers, we witness the confrontation of Jesus with the Canaanite woman, and we struggle with enormity of Paul’s discernment of salvation for all, Gentiles and Israel, in his letter to the Christian church in Rome.

The story of Joseph, son of Jacob who is named Israel, is one of THE great stories of the Hebrew Scriptures.  Great because of its dramatic action and the extreme emotional turmoil throughout the story.  I mean, if 20th century musical creators pick up a biblical story for popular entertainment, we know it’s big!  “Joseph and his Technicolour Dreamcoat” was a great hit in the 1970’s and onwards.  It is also great because of God’s story in this story.

You would have to say though that Joseph’s brothers leave “Home and Away’ for dead really in human beings in extreme drama; these brothers are really jealous and resentful of their father’s love of Joseph, his child of his old age.  They are particularly upset at Joseph’s dreams, of how it seems he will have authority over them. And so when an opportunity arises,  they plot to kill him, their own brother, but almost as dramatically they throw him into the pit and then sell him to passing traders who take Joseph into Egypt.  And then they tell their father that Joseph has met his death by a wild animal, and, see Dad, here’s the blood on that precious coat you gave him.  

We catch up with story again today in equally dramatic circumstances.  Joseph’s brothers stand before him in the time of drought, and Joseph is calling all the tricks because he is now the Pharoah’s right hand man.  It is in the passage we hear today that Joseph reveals himself to his brothers; that he is indeed alive, that he bears no hatred or revenge, that it has been indeed all part of God’s working, and that they are to be reconciled.  There is Joseph’s anguish, there is the distress, dismay and speechlessness of his brothers, there is explanation and weeping and finally weeping together and talking together.  As we have already commented, the full gamut of human emotion is laid before us – except anger and revenge.  They are not present when we would fully expect them to be there, even if in acknowledgement that they have been part of the story and been dealt with.

The other key element that I reckon is NOT part of this story is – forgiveness.  This is what I want us to ponder today because it is a much bandied around thing in Christian circles.  It seems we are meant to lead the way in this; and it seems to me we can be beguiled by the world’s sense of what forgiveness means, rather than God’s gift of reconciliation.

It is reconciliation on offer in the great story of Joseph and his brothers.  We tread here in the tension of God creating circumstances to ensure that God’s promises are held to ensure the future of Israel, and God in relationship with all people.  This story is about Joseph’s relationship with God – that it is in God’s justice that Joseph can indeed be compassionate and reconciliatory.  Joseph’s amazing compassion models God’s grace for the people of Israel, and secures the future. 

This is a story of God’s redemptive action in the story of God’s people, and Joseph has been given the insight, through his dreams and dialogue with God, to realise the big picture of God.  In that realisation comes the knowing that all things are working towards God’s purpose.  In the knowing comes Joseph acting out, and living out, the truth that only God can forgive and heal human guilt. 

At the heart of this story, therefore, is the reconciling power of God with the human condition.  Joseph does not have to, nor can he, forgive his brothers because he, Joseph, realises they are all part of a redemptive action in which forgiveness has taken place.  This may seem before its time, I hear you say – surely that happened in the action of Christ on the cross.  Certainly the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus, Son of God, revealed this eternal love of God beyond doubt.  Very importantly though, we need to accept that the action of the cross was part of the “in the beginning” stories – that God is the same God of Genesis and the Gospels.  God therefore has always been a God of redemptive action.  Being part of the God story means we are part of a movement where humanity will be fully reconciled, fully one with God.

And forgiveness is not part of that story; it is not a necessary part of the story.  God did not create humanity to forgive humanity.  The definition of forgive is “to give up resentment against or the desire to punish”.  God has never resented us; God might throw up God’s hands in despair at the human condition, the sinfulness of humanity.  But God has never desired to punish what God made in love.  And keeps loving.

However, we do need to deal with this issue of forgiveness because it hangs over the model of Christendom with guilt and “thou shalt do”.  Over the years I have been with people, and with small groups, who struggle continuously with ‘who should I forgive?’ and ‘I really feel I can’t forgive them for what they have done so I must be a terrible person’ and ‘how can I forgive them when they haven’t even acknowledged wrong doing or asked for forgiveness.’  We have been brainwashed in some cases with the “turn the other cheek” syndrome until all sense of human dignity and worth is indeed washed away.  In many cases, Christians are made to feel the lesser humans because they must be in the wrong because they always need forgiveness.

Perhaps some of these reflections strike a chord…..

Let me share with you something I found from a book called “The Art of Forgiving” by Lewis Smedes 1996.   He makes six simple statements of what forgiveness is not:

• Forgiving someone who did us wrong does not mean that we toleratethe wrong that was done.
• Forgiving does not mean that we want to forget what happened.
• Forgiving does not mean that we excuse the person who did it.
• Forgiving does not mean that we take the edge off the evil done to us.
• Forgiving does not mean that we surrender our right to justice.
• Forgiving does not mean that we invite someone who hurt us once to hurt us again.

It seems to me – and I agree with those simple statements – that there is no way we can do forgiveness.  In other words, it’s not our job nor our right.  As the Joseph story reveals, only God can do the real thing of forgiving and healing human guilt. 

However, we are in the business of reconciliation.  Christ’s supreme action on the cross made sure of that – do you see what I mean?  His action of perfect reconciliation means we can enter that realm also …. it is our business to be reconciled with people around us on behalf of Christ, that is His action in the world.

At Wednesday Eucharist this week we had the challenging gospel reading of Christ’s words in Matthew of what to do when someone sins against you.  And his teaching is that you have to confront the person, in an appropriate caring way, with the fault.  At the heart of this teaching is the responsibility we must all take on improving, reconciling the human condition.  Listen to this:  “Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”  We are part of the divine workforce my friends; our actions in our daily lives, in how we deal with conflict and injustice, affect the making of heaven, God’s kingdom – everywhere where God is. 

Joseph got this; he knew he was part of the divine factory of reconciliation.  His brothers did not.  Even at the end of Genesis, when Jacob their father died, the brothers got all nervous again about Joseph bearing a grudge.  And Joseph wept.  It seems it was all he could do – and it reminds us of Jesus often weeping with compassion as if to say, “they still don’t get it, the greatness of God’s love and mercy.”

Some of you have heard me claim that we should say the absolution before the confession, because we are already forgiven, it’s not what we need to focus on.    That’s God’s business.  I am not abdicating the removal of the confession from our lives – we need always the reminder that we are part of actions of reconciliation between ourselves and our neighbours, between ourselves and God.  And like Joseph’s brothers, we often still don’t “get it”. 

But this is what I am claiming about forgiveness – get over it.  Don’t get hung up with who you should forgive, or how you should forgive, or the guilt drives about not being able to do it in a “Christian way”.  On the other hand, do not deny the huge hurts people can do to us, and people we love, and indeed to the world,  in acts of unkindness and actions of injustice.  We have to take these on though in the capacity of the human condition – that it has always been so and will always be so, and that we are part of it.

However, our responsibility is to discern God’s gift of reconciliation in the situation, and activate it – the reconciliation we can, and must, bring to such issues. Jesus did it with the Canaanite woman; and Paul reminds us that such reconciliation is available for all, and open to all to practice.   It is not a matter of being kind, or soft, or turning away to forget.  It is also not a matter of being judgemental or sacrificial in that judgement.  We must pray over the matter, preferably with other Christians, and we must ask God to bless us with reconciling wisdom.

And with courage.  This is tough stuff, being on God’s reconciling team.  But it is the right thing to do; in Christ’s name.  Amen.