Forgiveness, the Compelling Story of Joseph

Forgiveness is one big part of life that is so shabbily handled in different spectrum of the society depending on the philosophy, education as well as the spiritual leaning of the people involved. In the Church forgiveness is more like a mandate: people are compelled to forgive without actually going through the process of healing and thus people remain hurt but cover it with cloak of spirituality while they suffer in silence or becomes irascible to situations that affects humanity.
Some people even deem forgiveness to mean that one should actually forget a certain event in life as if forgiveness is a type of surgical operation (lobotomy) performed on someone’s brain. I have gone through a certain situation in life that for six years I was not sure I had forgiven the person that caused it. Anytime I recollect the situation, it aches me so much that I cry. My Christian faith suffered and I was just clinging on to God by the tiniest of hope. It was of recent that I knew I loved the person so much but I was living in the denial that I did not love the person and that was one of my greatest undoing. Forgiveness is never easy except one has not been deeply hurt by someone one really cares for, someone one looks up to or someone one really holds in high esteem. I have hurt people in time past and it was at that period I really understood what they went through or are going through for my sake.

One of the compelling stories of forgiveness in the bible apart from God sending Jesus to die for mankind despite that we were the one that offended, is the story of Joseph. Joseph was sold to slavery by his brothers because he was deemed arrogant because of his dreams which cumulated into envy (Genesis 37:5-11). Their father (Jacob) did not help matters; he showed favouritism towards Joseph (Genesis 37:1-2). Joseph was sold into the uncertainty of slavery which led him to prison and he spent a maximum time of thirteen years in slavery and prison (Genesis 41:46). I don’t know what happened to Joseph from the time of being released from prison, the time he became a ruler to the time his brothers came for food in Egypt. Despite having attained a very important position in Egypt, he never visited his father and brother (Maximum of nine years; seven years of plenty and two years of famine. Genesis 45:6). When he had his first born, the agony of betrayal was still in him as he named the boy Manasseh; meaning the Lord has made me to forget my sorrows and my father’s house (Genesis 41:51). It was indeed God that gave him fortitude to forgive his brothers by placing him in high position in Egypt. What if his whole life had been ruined by his brother’s plot? The intention of his brothers was to see those his lofty dreams vanish and his posterity forever forgotten amongst mortal. When we are deeply hurt by people, it is only God that can put it in our heart to forgive and it is only Him that can compensate for those lost years just as he did in the case of Joseph. Sometimes one’s life could forever be irreparably altered.

I finished secondary school just at the very age Joseph was sold to slavery (The last age of Joseph before being sold to slavery was 17). Those years were the years I used in preparing for my life. I went to University and despite all the Nigerian issues; ASUU and NASU strike, Abiola crisis (June 12), my name was omitted from NYSC twice, wrote JAMB twice before gaining admission etc. I still had almost half a decade to start my career before clocking the age of thirty. I can’t just imaging replacing those years of fighting for my life and future and the few years I spent in building my corporate career with prison terms. That was what happened to Joseph courtesy of his brothers.

Because we hurt God and he still gave the sacrifice for our since that was why Jesus said that God should forgive our trespasses as we forgive those whose trespass against us. It was not just a law or commandment; it was a call for us to remember the supreme price paid for our redemption and thus forgive those who hurt us so badly. Forgiving people takes time because the healing process from such hurt takes time. The people that really hurt us are those we love dearly. We can take a decision to forgive but it always follows a process: a process determined by the healing of one’s heart. We should learn to pour our heart as we can, vent the hurt, share with people what we feel like doing because sometimes we wish we could get back at those people, we wish we could pay them back in their own coin and sometimes we wish them dead. Share with people how devalued we felt by the other person’s action. They are processes that we need to go through, sometimes with the aid of supportive people; people who have been hurt but have been healed, people who understand what it means to be hurt, wounded, used, abandoned, dumped, betrayed and trampled upon. A friend once told me that her boyfriend did not only break her heart but that the guy pieced it.

Forgiving people and accepting them back into our lives are two things which are totally different. Joseph had to make sure his brothers were incapable of repeating their evil act of betrayal before accepting them back into his life and before declaring that it was God’s plan to send him ahead of them. Jesus said, 'be gentle as dove but be wise as serpent'. The process to forgive begins with the decision and accepting the damage the person and hurt had done. That is just the beginning and from there through prayers and counseling and with time, the heart heals. Meeting good people especially when we have been surrounded by haters before helps the healing process. People who will love us, accept our faults and make us see why we do not need to hold on to the past or memory because most time we transfer the aggression of the past to now; present friendship, relations, business partnership etc.

Peace