Simply clear or clearly simple.

Matthew 6:14

For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. 15 But if you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.

Last night Trudy and I watched a new movie, Amish Grace, on the Life Time Movie Network. I do not usually watch movies on the channel as I find them saccharine and sappy and overly sentimental. But I had read the book, Amish Grace, and wanted to revisit the story. This is a true story about the killing of 5 Amish girls at the Nickel Mines School and how the Amish parents and community dealt with that tragedy. The book was a serious work written by three scholars from Christian colleges. The book had a profound impact on me and in part was one of the catalyst for my Lenten study this year. This book is one I recommend to anyone who has ever struggled with the practice of forgiveness.

The movie attempted to portray this struggle through the eyes of one of the families whose daughter was killed and their difficulty with forgiveness. A brief synopsis: A neighbor of the Amish families walked into the school and shot 10 girls, after letting the boys go. He wanted to anger God because his own daughter died. He then committed suicide. Almost immediately the Amish forgave him and came to the aid of his wife and children. They attended his funeral, and sent gifts to his children. They met with his wife to tell her that they harbored no ill feeling towards her or her children. This act of grace astonished the community, as most of those outside the Amish community have little understanding of their faith.

What draws me to this story is that the Sermon on the Mount is one the central pillars of the Amish faith. Every year they set aside time to study, reflect on and pray about the lessons of the sermon. Like many great ideas the sermon is simply written (or more correctly spoken). Simply is not simple. The Gettysburg address is simply written, but profound and deep. Simply mean clear, plain words with an unambiguous meaning but that cause you to think. Simple writing is writing that has no depth, does not stir though contemplation. The Matthew 6:14-15 verse is a clearly stated direction. Forgive and you will be forgiven. Do not forgive and you will not be forgiven.

When I was teaching 7th and 8th graders they were always questioning simple rules. They were always looking for the loopholes, the grey areas, and the boundaries. They wanted to know if I really meant what I said. They thrived on ambiguity as it gave them an excuse for not complying, a way out. But they really wanted clear boundaries, it made them feel secure. Teachers with foggy boundaries always had more discipline problems than those who were clear. God is always clear, but sometime we have a hard time hearing that. We are so busy looking for a way out.

Simply written expectations do not mean they are easy. Anyone who has struggled with the untimely death of someone close can tell you that. Often we want a simple explanation of why it happened. We want to know that it was reasonable. We may want justice, we want a chaotic world to make sense, or we want to undo the undoable. Forgiveness is the path through trauma to peace. It is a narrow road. It must practice continually. Forgiveness is not a one time act. We may have, as one Amish mother said, Forgive and in an hour, forgive again.

Forgiveness is really for us, the victim. Truly done, it gives the anger and hurt to God. It trusts God to be Just and Loving. I have spent my entire adult life struggling with Forgiveness. My first wife Kathy died in bed next to me. Every day I have to work at Forgiveness. Why she died and I lived is not a question that I can ever answer. It has taken years find any Peace. The Amish Grace story resonates with me because I have walked in their shoes. In a world that often seems to make no sense, God clearly makes sense.