Perfect Forgiveness

          Today is Reformation Sunday. And though there were many issues that drove Martin Luther and the Protestant Reformation, no issue was more important than Luther’s need for us to feel loved and forgiven by God. So this Sunday’s not a bad time to think about guilt and forgiveness through the lens of Scripture and our faith.

          Garrison Keillor, one of my favorite theologians, tells this story. He says, “Larry  . . .  was saved twelve times in the Lutheran church, an all-time record. Between 1953 and 1961, he threw himself weeping and contrite on God’s throne of grace on twelve separate occasions–and this in a Lutheran church that wasn’t evangelical, had no altar call, no organist playing ‘Just As I Am Without One Plea’ while a choir hummed and a guy with shiny hair took hold of your heartstrings and played you like a cheap guitar–this is the Lutheran church, not a bunch of hillbillies–these are Scandinavians, and they repent in the same way that they sin: discreetly, tastefully, at the proper time, and bring a Jell-O salad for afterward . . .  Twelve times. Even we fundamentalists got tired of him.” (Garrison Keillor, Leaving Home, 189-190.)

            So how do you and I deal with guilt? 

          I think many in our world deal with guilt by invoking a studied indifference to any authority beyond ourselves. “It’s my life. I can do as I choose. Nobody can tell me what to do.” Yeah. Uh huh. I think people often talk a good talk, but down deep we still feel guilty.

          Other folks attend churches where, every Sunday, the pastor comes down front and says to the congregation, “Every eye closed. Every head bowed. As the choir sings, ask yourself: Are you saved? Are you sure you’re saved? If there’s any doubt in your mind, any doubt whatsoever, come down front, come down to the altar of grace and recommit your life to Jesus. Come down and recommit before it’s too late.” This is well intentioned, no doubt. This helps many people, we’re certain. (As a matter of fact, I once had an altar call experience in my life.) But what’s the real message here? Forgiveness of guilt is finally dependent not on what God has done in Christ but upon us, what we do or do not do. When all is said and done, forgiveness is all up to us.

          Still other folks deny that they even feel guilty. “Guilty? No. Guilty of what? I’m a pretty nice person. I’ve only done one or two really bad things in my life. Don’t try to make me feel guilty.”

          But the old minister in one of Marilynne Robinson’s novels thinks to himself, “There is never just one transgression. There is a wound in the flesh of human life that scars when it heals and often enough seems never to heal at all.” (Marilynne Robinson, Gilead, 122.) Guilt tears a wound in our life, a wound turned into a scar for some, and never healed at all for others, a wound that never stops bleeding.

          Many years ago, in another church I served, I remember visiting an elderly woman, in her 90s. She was a sweet person with a soft voice, impeccable manners, and a practitioner of warm hospitality. Often during visits she served tea and some sort of fancy cookies. I loved hearing about her long life, places she had lived, things she had done. There was only one thing–she could not let go of guilt over something she had done. I never found out exactly what it was; I can only guess it was a transgression from younger days. But no matter what I said, she could never seem to feel that God had truly forgiven her. I think she went to her grave still worried and feeling guilty.

          Apparently, the writer of the Book of Hebrews is preaching to a church that’s also struggling with guilt. The people want and need to feel forgiven, but something is getting in the way. So the writer composes this letter, actually more like a sermon, to help them with their guilt and with other issues they face.

          First, it’s vital that we understand the purpose of the writer’s sermon. Some scholars believe the preacher is speaking to Jewish converts to the Christian faith who’ve become disillusioned with their new faith and are tempted to return to Judaism. Thus, we hear one side of an argument, and the argument is that Christianity is better than Judaism. Some scholars think proving Christianity’s superiority is the purpose of the sermon. And that is a misguided and dangerous purpose in a post-Holocaust world.

          But another scholar suggests a different interpretation. He says, “What is far more likely is that the preacher of Hebrews uses talk of Levitical priests and Old Testament sacrifices metaphorically, not as descriptions of Judaism per se but as symbols of destructive theological attitudes present in the congregation, distorted ways of understanding Christianity that  . . . threaten their faith and the authentic understanding of the gospel. As such, the preacher is not describing where he is afraid the congregation may go but how he fears they already think, feel, and believe.” (Thomas G. Long, “Bold in the Presence of God: Atonement in Hebrews,” Interpretation, Jan. 1998, 56-57.)

          So with the understanding of Hebrews as a critique not of Judaism but of harmful Christian theology we can view the preacher’s argument more clearly. He says, “[Christ] holds his priesthood permanently, because he continues forever. So he’s able for all time to save those who approach God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them.” (Or it may be translated, “So he’s able completely to save those who approach God through him.”)

          Do we really hear the good news in this promise? Unlike priests who live and die, come and go, Christ is an interceding priest for us forever. Christ is a priest who saves us not partially but completely, perfectly. And in case the word “save” sticks in our 21^st century craw, Christ’s saving of us is a saving forgiveness of sins and a saving for serving God with our lives. Salvation, at its Hebrew root, carries the sense of being made roomy and broad. And as professor David Buttrick puts it, day by day we are a “being-saved” people. (David Buttrick, Homiletic: Moves and Structures, 459.)

          How does Christ do this? The preacher to the Hebrews overwhelms us with an avalanche of adjectives to describe Christ, our high priest. He is holy, innocent, utterly pure, distinct from sinners, exalted above all. Unlike other high priests who have to offer sacrifices over and over, for themselves, then for others, Christ has offered himself in sacrifice just once. And that is enough. Christ’s one sacrifice for the world is enough. Perfect. Complete.

          I don’t know about you, but sometimes I forget that. I find myself feeling “sort of” forgiven. I find myself thinking, “I’ll be okay if only I can do things better, if I can avoid these bad habits, set aside these sins I keep committing.” Do you ever think that way or feel that way? I hope not.

          The message of Hebrews and the gospel is that our sins are not partially forgiven, sort of released, kind of dismissed. No. Our sins are always, completely, perfectly forgiven. So everything in our life is transformed. We respond to God not out of fear but out of gratitude. We try to follow the living Christ not out of drudgery but out of joy. We live each day not in purposeless confusion but in glad discipleship of the One who is always interceding for us.

          Anne Lamott is a successful Presbyterian writer known for several fine books. Her writing is deeply faithful, thought-provoking, and wickedly funny. But frankly Lamott’s life has been messy and things only changed for her when she came to see and experience God in a new way. In her book, Traveling Mercies, Lamott tells about a time when she was close to killing herself. She’d been doing drugs and having affairs with married men. Her father had recently died. She was an alcoholic drowning in booze and sorrow. One night in desperation she called a local minister, Bill, for help. At first he asked her to postpone the meeting until the next morning. But then he realized the depth of her pain and agreed to meet with her that night. She went and poured out her story to him. Years later she asked the priest what he had said and done to help her. And he answered, “I thought the trick was to help you extricate yourself enough so you could breathe again. You said your prayers weren’t working anymore, and I could see that in your desperation you were trying to save yourself: So I said you should stop praying for a while, and let me pray for you. And right away, you seemed to settle down inside.” 

          Lamott says, “He was about the first Christian I ever met whom I could stand to be in the same room with. Most Christians seemed almost hostile in their belief that they were saved and you weren’t. Bill said it bothered him too, but you had to listen to what was underneath their words. What did it mean to be saved, I asked, although I knew the word smacked of Elmer Gantry for both of us. 

          ‘You don’t need to think about this, he said. 

          ‘Just tell me.

          ‘I guess it’s like discovering you’re on the shelf of a pawnshop, dusty and forgotten and maybe not worth very much. But Jesus comes in and tells the pawnbroker, ‘I’ll take her place on the shelf. Let her go outside again.’” (Anne Lamott, Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith, 42-43.)

          How are you and I doing with God? Are we living in fear? Are we exhausted trying to save ourselves? We don’t have to be. Christ, our high priest is always interceding for us, always providing God’s complete, perfect forgiveness. We can let our sins and failures go. We can live in peace with God. We can approach life and death with confidence. After all, we’re forgiven–perfectly. Amen.