A Healthy Spiritual Heart Forgives

 

    A teacher asked the children in her Sun­day School class, “If I sold my house and my car, had a big garage sale and gave all my money to the church, would I get into heaven?” “NO!” the children all answered. “If I cleaned the church every day, mowed the yard, and kept everything neat and tidy, would I get into heaven?” Again, the answer was “NO!” “Well,” she continued, “then how can I get to heaven?” In the back of the room, a five-year-old boy shouted out, “You gotta be dead!”

    Our doctors want us to be healthy and so they ask, “Let me listen to your heart.” But who helps you with a spiritual heart condition? Often, the spiritual heart is hurting more than we ever let on. Christians often see Spiritual deficiencies in others, but not in themselves. Our spiritual health depends on what we are willing to accept Spiritually (Luke 9:46-48). The One listening to our spiritual heart knows all about us and we must be ready and willing to accept His diagnosis and His recommended corrective action. I take comfort in knowing that the Great Physician is monitoring my spiritual heart’s health.

    The Old Testament provides a record of many memorable stories that teach us valuable life lessons. However, our use of Old Testament is sometimes limited to those familiar stories that we heard as children. Stories about creation, Abraham, Moses, David and Goliath, and Daniel in the lion's den. In limiting ourselves to these old familiar stories, we might be robing ourselves of many rich stories that God intended for us to know – a sort of reading between the lines for better understanding.

    For instance, do you remember the Old Testament story of Eliam? Eliam is a rather obscure character of the Old Testament and often overlooked. In fact, the name is only mentioned twice. This is the story of one of those two men.

    [2 Samuel 11] Eliam was the father of a little girl. Like all fathers, he loved his daughter and watched her grow into a beautiful young lady. The day finally came when Eliam gave his daughter’s hand to a young man to be his wife. Eliam’s daughter and son-in-law were making a life together when tragedy befell them. One day, when Eliam’s son-in-law was away at work, a man who had quite a bit of power in the region, sent men to Eliam’s son-in-law and daughter’s house. These men entered her home, took her away, brought her to the man of power, and he had sexual relations with her. Not only that, but this man of power also had Eliam’s son-in-law murdered.

    For the record, Eliam’s son-in-law was Uriah. His daughter was Bathsheba. And the man of power was King David. Ah! Now you remember the story. It was just told from a unique perspective, through the eyes of Eliam. We know and love King David in spite of his murderous and adulterous actions. We “brush off” his mistakes and count him as one of our heroes. I have some questions: Do you think Eliam viewed David as a hero? Through the eyes of Eliam, how do you suppose the man who murdered his son-in-law, and stole away his daughter was viewed? Do you think it might have been harder for Eliam to forgive David than it was for us? Surely, and that brings me to my point.

    We can talk about forgiveness all day long and know all the correct answers, but we may not appreciate how much work this spiritual discipline requires. Forgiveness is easy until you really need to forgive someone. Loving our enemies is easy until you really have an enemy of your own. One should not get over-confident in one’s ability and willingness to forgive. One must continue to work and mature in this spiritual discipline. And when one thinks they have arrived, go back and look through the eyes of Eliam. Stay healthy.