My growing appreciation of the F-word

Photo credit: redpepperland.tumblr.com

I can’t believe there was a time when I was averse to saying the F-word! What was I thinking? I was so naive, so stubborn, and so blind to the power  my tongue wielded. I am the wiser now.

Oh, the F-word is forgive by the way. I guess I had you choking in shock at the thought of me becoming a foul-mouthed tyrant. You wish. Consider it April fool’s day come early.

Seriously though, this F-word, forgive, and essentially the phrase, “I forgive you” can sometimes be regarded in the same measure as an expletive given how frugally it is used. People would rather be caught dead than utter the F-word.

When did being right become such a prized asset that it trumped friendship? When did an apology, the bend-on-your –knees kind, become so esteemed that the absence of it birthed hostility, silent treatment and bitterness in its stead?

Ah wait! Of course, weakness. No-one wants to be seen as weak, no-one would like be thought of a doormat that everyone can trample on at will. “He did what?!!! Mimi siwezi fanywa hivyo na nikubali, siwezimsamehe!” Just like that, for fear of being viewed as weak, you defiantly hold your ground and persist with the silent treatment until the situation is rectified or you get an apology. And when it doesn’t come, using anger as a slab, you erect a large wall of bitterness around your heart that neither wants the offender in nor lets kindness out towards that person.

Photo credit: www.ruachonline.com

Our perception is so skewed, we are sure we are only locking the other person out; the sad truth is we also lock ourselves in. That’s emotion for you. That’s what feelings do, overriding our judgement, clouding it, enabling us to see but a partial view of the whole picture.

It obscures the truth and permits the entry of a lie, that a person is defined by a single act of wrongdoing. That 1 lie, that 1 act of injustice, wrongdoing, intentional or unintentional, is sufficient proof that they are evil and incorrigible now and forevermore. There and then a grudge is formed.

It starts out small, but its appetite to feed off anything, true and untrue, means it will grow exponentially to obesity with your heart unable to stay afloat amidst all the weight of the bitterness. 

As a result, not only do you feel disdain towards the person or organization that hurt you, the hurt is so pronounced that it negates the love inside resulting in a heart that spews out only toxic bitterness even to those closest to you like family and friends. Unfortunately, for crimes they didn’t commit, they will still bear the brunt of your grieving heart as they hear you complain about your offender for the umpteenth time.

Photo credit: www.richlymiddleclass.com

This doesn’t augur well, in a world full of people who by nature are selfish and individualistic, not to mention, broken and hurt as well. It is inevitable, therefore, that you will be wronged by someone. It’s as if your heart is the titanic, setting off on its voyage amongst a sea of people to love but destined to hit an iceberg that will sink into the depths, where it will remain frozen in the cold.

There is a way out, though. Thank God that God is a way-maker. It’s called forgiveness, which is given through that F-word I was talking about. It’s a word I have become accustomed to saying whether in actual speech or in my heart. At first, it didn’t come easy or cheap but I came to despise the prison I had locked myself in. I came to realize that treasuring being right about somebody who was wrong was no treasure at all.

Instead I found it to be an overbearing tax that ate away into my gladness, joy, peace and sapped me of my strength. I couldn’t understand how bitterness towards one person could cripple other facets of my life. I didn’t realize that my bitterness could change me for the worse, that it could hamper my growth and development as a person, stifling my creativity and full expression of my inner self.

Hurt people hurt people. I know. I cringe how we transfer  negativity to others who have done nothing to cause it, if anything were actually trying to help us feel better. It reaches such a point that we drain them of their joy with our constant moaning, whining of past injustice, heartbreak that they thought it wise to distance themselves from us.

No more, I resolved. I let it go. I broke down that wall of bitterness. It didn’t mean I became a doormat or that my self-worth was diminished, it meant that I was free again, that I was my old, cheerful self again. No-longer was my mind saturated with feelings of hate, pain, ideas for revenge, my mind was at peace, empty with the capacity to see the big picture, to imagine, to innovate, to be inspired to action rather than being weighed down to inactivity by negativity.

I know what you’re thinking. “That seems well and good, but your situation isn’t half as bad as mine, you have no idea how I feel, the pain, the injustice, and the hurt”. You’re right about that, I don’t know how you feel. I know you have it worse.

Probably you’re the guy who worked diligently at an organization, giving them your time, years of diligent work only to be shown the exit door with as much as a thank you for all your years of service. Probably you could be the son or daughter who was abandoned by your father, who left you and mum to fend for yourselves as he opted for the other woman.

You could be the lady who found out that your boyfriend, fiancé was cheating on you with your best friend or sister after giving him your heart and helping him succeed in his career from the bottom.

Probably you were sodomized, probably you were raped, probably you sought help from the authorities and they blamed you for it, asking insensitive questions like, “What were you doing there at that time? What were you dressed in? How does a man get raped? Maybe your friends or family knew the offender but chose to stay mum.

You could be the guy who saw your business partner steal your idea, prototype and take it as his own after you gave him your trust. Maybe, you tried to empower a lady or gentleman by giving them a job, training them, equipping them with skills, only for them to steal from you or turn their back on you and join another organization for better pay or another household, because they felt as a house help you were offering them too little.

How do you forgive these people? Just how? They are inconsiderate, selfish, corrupt, malicious......insert any adjective with negative connotations. I know they did wrong, I know they caused pain but just forgive them. Let go.  You’re not justifying their actions by letting go, they messed up, but by letting go, you are ridding your heart of malice, bitterness.

If you’re heart was a laptop, holding a grudge is a virus, clean your machine by letting go and deleting those feelings of hatred, bitterness which may seem harmless to your computer but are in fact slowing it down, causing it to hang once in a while. Clean it by freeing it through uttering the F-word. It’s easier said than done, I know. For me, it easier done than I said because I follow Jesus example.

Jesus hates sin. Jesus hates wrong doing, Jesus hates the injustice. Surprise, we all are sinful, we all are wrong doers, and it distances us from him. This is quite the conundrum considering that Jesus loves us, you and me but hates sin. How could he get sin out of us, how could he make us clean? The way maker made a way, a way that I will never quite understand.

He decided, as much as I am God, I am all-powerful, I can move mountains and the winds with just one wave of the hand, let me go to earth as a man, a mortal man, let go of my immortality, omniscience and settle for being a man with two weak legs and hands, who bleeds so that I can show them who God looks like because they just don’t seek after God and they could never know me if I didn’t reveal myself to them.

Off he goes, to earth, not only does he share about God, life transforming teachings, he does miracles, lots of them. He feeds thousands of people, he frees people from demons, he heals people from leprosy, life-long illnesses, and he even raises others from the dead.

How does he get repaid for his kindness and self-sacrifice? He gets betrayed by one of his disciples for just 30 pieces of silver. Then, a guy who once touted himself as his bff, denies ever knowing the man three times!!! He is  flogged, stripped of his clothes, given a crown of thorns to wear on his head. A criminal who murdered guys also going by the same name of Jesus, other name Barabbas,  is set free, whereas the other Jesus, who did NOTHING wrong is sentenced to death! As he lays on the cross in excruciating pain, just about to die, while people he came to save mock him, he asks God to forgive them.(Luke 23:34)

Really Jesus, Really?!! Those guys don’t deserve forgiveness in fact they not only accepted responsibility for his crucifixion, they were ok with their children being held responsible as as well, yet you want them to be forgiven!!! That was how much he loved us, how big his heart was for us and if God can forgive like that, who am I not to? After all that surely seventy times seven seems a small no of times to forgive.

Photo credit: chimbachamba.blogspot.com

Forgiving is hard for us without Jesus but since I accepted Jesus as my Lord and saviour, he gave me a helper to do this, his Holy Spirit. A spirit of power, love and self-discipline. It is the spirit that gives me the strength not only to overcome temptation but to forgive those who hurt me despite how big the hurt is. “ I can do everything who him who gives me strength”(Philippians 4:8) for me means, I can forgive the supposedly unforgivable, I can let go even when it makes common sense not to, I can free my heart of the pain, I can let go expecting an apology or pleas for forgiveness.

I used to think when Isaiah talked about Jesus setting the captives free(Isaiah 42:7) was that he was setting us free from enslaving sinful habits. I now realize he also releases us from captivity that we consign ourselves to, the prison of bitterness that incarcerates us when we hold on to malice, hate and bitterness. In the F-word, he has given us a key to get us out, with his help, we can forgive those who wrong us and allow our hearts to be free.

Another shot at glory

Photo credit: sunnybankchurch.com.au

If a cat has nine lives, Manutd fans must wonder how many lives Louis Van Gaal has? All the talk was that he was on his way out, that Mourinho was his likely successor. Tabloids ran the headline, Louis van ‘Gone’! In truth it is very much Louis van ‘still here’ probably till the end of the season at the very least. Manchester United may have won the derby on Sunday but the United boss has more to do if he is to win over critics.  To most, it beggars belief that the Dutchman is still manager of Manutd. An embarrassing group stage exit in the Champion’s league, a host of ponderous displays in the premiership such as losses to Bournemouth, Norwich, Sunderland, Stoke, Westbrom have seen fans turn on the manager. A galling defeat to Mitch..mid..micha.., argh!!! Whatever that Danish team is called, was just yet another moment when the team hit an all-time low.

For all the progress that came last season, Manutd have regressed and sometimes it has been difficult to establish whether the United under Van Gaal is better than the one under Moyes. Their performances have been nothing to wax lyrical about. Former players turned pundits such as Paul Scholes and Rio Ferdinand, have been hypercritical in their assessment of Louis Van Gaal’s charges. Criticism has come in plenty with United being labelled; boring, soporific, one-dimensional, languid, lethargic, pedestrian, unimaginative; not quite the description that Louis Van Gaal would have of his fabled ‘philosophy’.

Too often, to the onlooker, Manunited not only lack a philosophy but an identity or when they have had one, it has been with negative connotations.  The team has been floundering, fluctuating between average and extremely bad  with a vast number of players playing well below the required levels. Much of that has been attributed to the manager given his insistence to play football his way and not by the way of the crowd. Moreover, after been given the funds to spend on new players, the manager spent it alright but not in the way fans would have hoped. The fact that he let players leave such as Chicharito, Van Persie, Nani, Evans,Rafael, Fletcher citing that United had depth seems laughable given the team has been severly depleted following an injury crisis and has had to turn to a host of youngsters, not that Marcus Rashford will be complaining.

Thus, the manager is highly culpable for United’s failings this term. The players have been underwhelming, but Louis Van Gaal cannot abdicate responsibility for such a woeful season thus far. In an era where managers take the fall, Van Gaal’s sacking seemed imminent.Except, for reasons unbeknownst to us, it just hasn’t happened.

Surely, the writing was on the wall after a woeful defeat to Stoke, nope, he stayed on. Surely the defeat to Midtjylland, (I got it right this time!)a team that had not played competitive football for months prior to that infamous first leg, would send him out the exit door. Wrong again. The United hierarchy stuck to their man. Time and time again, the Dutchman has been given another chance to reverse his side’s fortunes following a miserable display. Managers like Jose Mourinho and Rafa Benitez who have not enjoyed a similar fate must be watching on in envy. “Why does he get so many reprieves?”, they wonder. So do I. So do many Manutd fans who access goal.com, after another crushing defeat, expecting to see the headline in bold; OFFICIAL: LOUIS VAN GAAL SACKED; but alas; it never happens.

LVG lives the charmed life, we think. Why don’t I get pardoned like that. Why don’t I get another chance even after I fall short again and again. Well you do. In fact, you get an even bigger dose.

We always say we’re never perfect, and we delight in our humanity for that because it’s the perfect excuse when we mess up. Imperfection however, does not excuse us all the time. Sometimes we make mistakes because of our pride; sometimes we let our guard down. Sometimes it’s ignorance, other times it's a willful desire despite knowing we are wrong. When we eventually fall short of God’s holiness or goodness, surely he should punish us. Surely he should condemn us and give us what we deserve.

How many times do you fall back to your poison? How many times do you sin knowingly, in defiance to the Holy Spirit’s pleading not to sacrifice your convictions and values? How many times do you flat out ignore what scripture has to say, or correction and counsel from a person of wisdom only to end up wishing you had taken it? Too plenty to even count.

The devil gleefully rubs it in, “ A Christian doesn’t have sex outside marriage, a Christian doesn’t get wasted, a Christian doesn’t masturbate, a Christian doesn’t pay a bribe, You’re no child of God! How often, when we are stuck in the malaise of being a slave to sin such as drunkenness, addiction, pornograghy, lust, people cast pitiful glances at you, and wonder why God hasn’t put you out of your misery. You won’t improve, you won’t change, you will always be the hypocrite who keeps backsliding. You will always never measure up. 

In human thinking, if as a church we are christ’s bride, we should have been jilted at the altar  but we haven’t been. We cheat on him, again, and again but he forgives us again and again, He gives us another chance and another and another.....like Peter said he is patient with us, not wanting anyone to perish but everyone to come to repentance.(2 Peter 3:8-9).  He forgives us way more than the 70 times seven.(Matthew 18:21-22)

How fortunate we are, how privileged we serve a God so merciful to excuse us from the punishment we deserve that is eternal death but gracious to give us eternal life we scarcely deserve through Jesus his son. As we celebrate Easter, we will remember his ultimate sacrifice on the cross. We will be reminded of how God put himself to death so as that our sins couldn’t. We will be reminded why we get so many pardons, not because we deserve it but because God paid the full penalty for our mistakes on the cross.

Like Van Gaal, you seldom have to be concerned about the chants, “You’re getting sacked in the morning”. You seldom have to worry that God will give up on you. He doesn’t, he faithfully gives you another chance, and another and if you don’t have much reason to celebrate this Easter, remember God is still in the business of giving you second chances in spite of your past mistakes because of what Jesus endured on the cross.

By all means, do feel sorry that you messed up but don't dwell on past failure that you stop living in the present. Thank God for that second, third, a thousandth shot at glory and take it.  I will never tire in saying what Nelson Mandela said, " I'm not a saint, i'm just a sinner who keeps trying." That's largely due to the fact that God keeps on giving me second chances.