One of my favorite ways to exercise is to take long walks. Spending time outdoors relaxes and refreshes me. Walks have also become part of an ongoing spiritual practice that first emerged during my thirteen-month internship in rural Kansas; an experience that taught me to look for, and then expect to find, God in the ordinary, the mundane, and the hidden. Often, I simply enjoy spending time in the beauty and majesty of God’s majestic creation. Sometimes, particularly when I have spent time praying and thinking deeply about a biblical text, an image or a well-worn phrase, or a creative insight will surface during my walks. But sometimes, more often I suppose than I would like, nothing happens; particularly when I find myself challenged to bring my own voice to bear on the situation at hand or to take to heart Jesus’ calls to love and to seek the forgiveness of those whom I have wronged. To let go of the chains of anger, resentment, and hurt that have accumulated over the years.
Deep wounds.
Many of them long-scarred.
Others revealing the fresh scabs of recent hurts.
Then, one day while struggling to work through a particularly difficult text, IT hit me. Not an idea, but a thing. A brown rock jutting out of the gravel road during one of my daily walks. A beautiful brown stone. One that, once freed from its resting place by my walking stick, fit in my hand like a glove. It was a stone meant for me. A stone meant to remind me of my own sin; of how easy it is to cast stones and point out other people’s faults and failures instead of taking time to size up my own shortcomings. It was a stone also meant to remind me of how easy it can be to hurl insults and pointed barbs intended to knock others down a few pegs in order to make myself feel better and to mask my own insecurities and fears by inflicting pain on others; often those I care about the most, the people I love.
Actions that make it hard to forgive.
Actions that also make it hard to seek the forgiveness of those we hurt.
My brown stone, representative of my own sin, now occupies a prominent place on my desk, reminding me, “Let anyone among you without sin cast the first stone” (John 8:7). Sitting there as a silent sentinel of sorts and warning me not to sling barbs or point out others’ flaws and indiscretions. Reminding me to forgive and seek forgiveness of those I have wronged. In so doing, my ever-present study companion also beckons me to take seriously Jesus’ call to discipleship and example of all-inclusive love, mercy, and forgiveness.
Ultimately, the church is the community of the forgiven; beggars all standing in Christ’s breadline with outstretched hands; an image which points to the reality that we cannot, try as we might, save ourselves. We are, like it not, finite and limited creatures who are ransomed, redeemed, and forgiven by God. And having been reconciled to a God who extends grace upon grace, we cannot help but be transformed, even if in our stubbornness and stupidity we still find ourselves challenged not to judge, to forgive, and love as Christ loves us. And then, when my own frustrations and disappointments threaten to overwhelm me I recite the Lord’s Prayer and carefully ponder the words, “and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” It is a prayer spoken by Christ-followers throughout the ages. And having taken to heart the message conveyed, I am reminded to drop the stone in my hand. To stop throwing stones and to ask God to replace my own stone heart with a heart full of compassion and love; helping me to forgive others with a self-giving love flowing from the very heart of God, a love reflecting the reality of God’s own steadfast love for us.
Walking to Golgotha 