The Overwhelming Gift of Forgiveness
I was watching Joel Osteen’s television show a couple of Sunday’s ago and he was talking about forgiveness. During his presentation, he quoted from Mark 16:7, in which the women standing near Christ’s empty tomb on Easter morning were told by an angel to, “Go, tell His disciples, and Peter.” Osteen’s sermon then centered in on the fact that Jesus, through the angel, wanted to let Peter know that he had been forgiven for denying 3 times that he knew Jesus.
If that weren’t enough…a couple of hours later, I am sitting in my pew at Mass, and the priest gives his homily on the exact same subject! Both Osteen and my priest pointed out the significance of Peter being mentioned by name.
I was certainly always aware of the story of the empty tomb, and of the angel’s appearance to the women…but I wasn’t aware of this specific mention of Peter. Maybe one of the reasons I wasn’t familiar with the mention of Peter specifically, was it is only in Mark’s account of the Resurrection. It is not in the other gospels of Matthew, Luke, or John.
As I reflected on both sermons, I started to get a tear in my eye. I don’t know what is wrong with me anymore…I seem to tear up at just about everything…but back to the topic of this blog. I tried to place myself in Peter’s sandals. He had trained under Jesus, he had watched as Jesus preached to the people, how Jesus had healed the sick, how He had raised people from the dead. The night of Christ’s arrest, Peter had told Jesus that he would stand by Him…and yet, that night, before the sun would rise in the morning…he would deny that he knew Christ a total of 3 times.
I reflected on how many times I had failed God. All the times I denied God…all the times I was a poor friend.
I then contemplated on how Christ must have felt…Peter had been His best friend. Christ had invested a great deal of time and energy in Peter, only to have Peter…at the time Christ needed him the most…Peter had run away in fear of his life.
I thought of how many times I had been disappointed by others in my life…and how instead of offering forgiveness, I had held a grudge…how I had wanted revenge.
What is the cornerstone of this story is, by Christ forgiving Peter, Peter is able to completely change direction…and instead of hiding, becomes the rock upon which Christ builds His church.
As humans each of us is destined to make thousands of mistakes, so we are left with just two options…one is OFFERING forgiveness, and the other is, ACCEPTING forgiveness. It takes our better angels within us to do either of these things. Perhaps, we need to only look the friendship between Jesus and Peter to see that much good can come from OFFERING, then ACCEPTING forgiveness.
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