Dec 16: God is All-Forgiving

Joseph Anton Koch: Landscape with Noah Offering a Sacrifice of Gratitude

Thursday of the Third Week of Advent
Reading I: Is 54:1-10

“This is like the days of Noah to me: Just as I swore that the waters of Noah would never again go over the earth, so I have sworn that I will not be angry with you and will not rebuke you. For the mountains may depart and the hills be removed, but my steadfast love shall not depart from you, and my covenant of peace shall not be removed, says the LORD, who has compassion on you (NRSV, Is 54:9-10).”

So often, Father, over the centuries and indeed in the lives of most of us, we have sensed that you have become angry with us . . . because of our sinfulness. Not only have you turned away from us, removing your favor from us, indeed, you have unleashed your wrath upon us in the form of the worst of calamities. Your people remember and have recorded in sacred writ many of the times when we have been the object of your just anger.

Nevertheless, Lord, often to our amazement, you are always relenting in rage. Whenever we turn back to you and beg forgiveness, we are inevitably pardoned and welcomed back into your favor.

Lord God, you reveal yourself in your one spoken Word to all of us, yet how difficult it is for us fully to grasp your revelation. In Jesus so much of what you say to us has become clearer. Jesus tells us the story of a wayward son who squanders the inheritance begged from his father who is still alive. In his sinfulness, the son can only think of the father as having disowned him. Penitent, the son returns home to beg his father’s forgiveness. But, ever since the son’s departure, the father has done nothing but scan the horizon waiting for his son’s return. When he finally sees the son coming home, he rushes out to greet him, ignoring the son’s rehearsed words begging pardon. The father embraces his son and kisses him and orders the best robe brought out and a ring for his finger. The fatted calf is killed and the celebration begins.

Jesus is telling us that the Father, his Father and ours, is always forgiving, is never angry with us, and showers his favor on us in every situation if only we would accept it.

Lord God, the worst evil in all of history, was the killing of your only begotten Son, the Lord Jesus, whom you sent into the world to demonstrate your great love for us. In response to our banishment of your incarnate Son from the world, you did not turn away from us in anger, and pour down your wrath upon us. No, instead your power in Jesus raised him from the dead as the sign of resurrection promised to all who accept it and you made clear to us that your Spirit is always and in every situation offered to us.

Lord God, you are absolute Love, always forgiving, always offering your life to us. May we understand more fully that your promise, which Noah came to understand only after the deluge, is a promise made to all, even from the beginning. Help us to see more clearly that, as there is no place for anger in your life, so we also must reject anger from ours. Empower us, Lord, to go out in loving forgiveness to all of those who have injured us and to seek forgiveness from those whom we have injured.

Through Christ our Lord. Amen.