Gun’s Quote-of-the-Week:
“It’s the hardest thing to give away
And the last thing on your mind today
It always goes to those that don’t deserve
It’s the opposite of how you feel
When the pain they caused is just too real
It takes everything you have just to say the word…
Forgiveness…
It’ll clear the bitterness away
It can even set a prisoner free
There is no end to what its power can do
So, let it go and be amazed
By what you see through eyes of grace
The prisoner that it really frees is you
Forgiveness, Forgiveness”
-Matthew West
Nelson Mandela was laid to rest this week.
I watched the first Hunger Games movie on Friday.
…Now what in the world could those two things possibly have
to do with one another?
Nelson Mandela spent thirty-one years in prison. He was
charged with rising up against an unjust government that oppressed its own
people. For this he would miss the funerals of his mother and his own son as he
was not permitted to attend them while he was imprisoned. When the South
African apartheid fell and Mandela was released, he very easily could have
staged a revolt against the people that oppressed him and his cause for so many
years. He had the support of governments around the world; Leaders from Europe
to the USA called on South Africa to
release its Greatest Son from the unjust sentence he was serving in the name of
justice. To ask them to assist in punishing the oppressors would have been
nothing more than a favor to ask.
Instead, he forgave them. There were no battles, no more
fights. As a matter of fact, and perhaps most stunningly, there was no
retribution. Nelson Mandela would win a Nobel Peace Price for walking out of
prison and never holding a grudge against his captors. He would instead become
the President of a nation in dire need of healing from decades of racial
hostility. His attitude of forgiveness would heal that nation.
Up until Friday, I knew nothing about the Hunger Games. I
had never read the book, never seen the movie and only knew that there was a
female protagonist and that she was an archer. I derived that much from seeing
the movie’s poster.
#SpoilerAlert
After watching the film, I was mesmerized. Set in a future
Earth, factions of people would rise up against an oppressive government. Their
cause would fail. As retribution for their sins, the government would force the
districts which rose up against it to commit one male and female between the
ages of 12-18 to The Hunger Games in which they would fight to the death until
only one victor remained. Such games were used as amusement for the capital
city, broadcast over airwaves and holding interviews and gambling over the
contestants. Such exercises would be used to remind the districts of the
consequences of rivaling the government. It was a means of keeping the
districts oppressed.
What stark contrast. What literal extreme of the best and
worst of humanity. With one reaction, a nation is reborn out of a terrible past
of war, violence, oppression and racism. In another, the perpetual bleeding
that results from retribution leads to the death of hundreds of the world’s
most innocent. While you would rightly say, “Oh, Gun, that story is just
fiction,” is it?
How many people go about the world ruining their souls and
the souls of others by refusing to give forgiveness – or worse, demanding that
they pay for something that they have done? Do we not have the thousands of
years’ worth of violence in the Middle East ?
Do we not live in a nation with the highest percentage of its population in
prison? Are children not torn apart by the fractions of their divorced parents?
We are in the midst of a season where we are about to
celebrate the birth of the Ultimate Forgiver. Think about that. This king born
on Christmas Day would not rule the world by overthrowing the oppressive Caesar
at the time. If Christ rose up against Caesar, it would have worked. Instead he
would heal people, feed them, open their eyes, then die, asking God to forgive
his murderers “…for they don’t know what they do.” You know what? That King won
something greater than the world. He won the Next World. The only thing we have
to do to join Him is to do the same thing He did. Heal. Forgive. Love. Not
seeking revenge or maybe even justice against your enemy, but love him.
Nelson Mandela is a fine example of a man who did just that.
In this time of year, let his example help you know in your heart what
Christmas is really all about.
…and that’s why it’s a Gun’s Quote!
