Father, Forgive Them

Ash Wednesday
St. John's Lutheran Church, Alexandria, VA
Luke 23:33-34

CrossWords: “Father, Forgive Them”
adapted from the Concordia Seminary Press Lenten series by Dr. David Peter

And when they came to the place that is called The Skull, there they crucified him, and the criminals, one on his right and one on his left. And Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” (Luke 23:33-34, ESV)

Corrie Ten Boom was a Christian Dutch woman who was incarcerated during World War II in a Nazi concentration camp. She was imprisoned by the Nazis because her family had sought to hide and protect Jewish people during the Holocaust. In other words, she was imprisoned for doing what was morally and ethically right. I read her autobiographical book The Hiding Place back when I was in high school; it was also made into a film in the 1970’s.

Corrie’s experience in the Nazi concentration camp was nothing short of horrific. She was put into forced labor and made to work for the smallest amount of already-spoiled food. The living conditions in the camp were atrocious and inhumane. Starvation and disease spread rapidly among the prisoners. She was subjected to all kinds of humiliation and degradation. The terrible treatment she received from the prison guards was especially difficult. They mocked and used the prisoners for their own pleasure. Corrie and her sister Betsy were forced to pass naked through a delousing shower, and all the while the male prison guards leered at them.

Blessedly, Corrie survived this imprisonment. At the end of the war, Allies liberated her concentration camp and she was set free. Sadly, none of her family members survived the brutal and inhumane conditions of incarceration by the Nazis.

After the war, Corrie Ten Boom became a popular speaker. She addressed Christian gatherings and conferences in Europe and North America, relating her experiences and sharing how her faith gave her strength to persevere. During one speaking tour, she especially emphasized the need to forgive. She commended forgiveness as the means to bring healing from the scars of war.

Typically after her speaking presentations members of the audience would come forward to talk to her. One night she was speaking in Munich, Germany. After her talk a man approached her to greet her. He extended an outstretched hand to her and said, “Ja, Fraulein! It is wonderful that Jesus forgives us all our sins, just as you say!”

Corrie was about to grasp his hand when she stopped short. Immediately she recognized the man’s face: it was the face of one of the prison guards who had abused her. She remembered it as it was in the past—leering, lecherous, mocking. Her hand was now frozen in midair. She had lectured on forgiveness, but now stood face to face with a guard who had committed atrocities against her.

Could she forgive the likes of this man? Could you forgive someone like that?

Today is Ash Wednesday. It is the beginning of the season of Lent. Lent is a penitential season, meaning that it is a time for repentance and forgiveness. It is all about forgiveness. But it is difficult to imagine forgiving someone who has so shamed and brutalized you.

Nevertheless, there is no one who was more betrayed and brutalized than Jesus. He was rejected by his people. His own followers deserted him. One of his closest associates betrayed him. His best friend denied having anything to do with him. He was tried in an illegal kangaroo court by religious clergy who then proceeded to pummel him with their fists. He was taken to the Roman governor who declared that he had done nothing worthy of punishment; even still, Pilate had him delivered over to be scourged and executed.

Jesus became the target of a huge array of verbal abuse. The chief priests and elders scoffed at him, accusing him of being a false prophet and blasphemer. The Roman soldiers mocked him by dressing him up in pretend royal garb. They pressed a crown of thorns upon his head and placed a reed in his hands as a scepter. Then they bowed before him and pretended to do homage to him, only to laugh and strike him with the reed. Even as he hung on the cross, the priests and the people reviled him.

And more than all that, Jesus was the target of intense physical abuse. If you’ve seen the movie The Passion of the Christ, you’ve witnessed how awful that could be. Jesus was beaten black and blue with fists and rods. His scourging delivered lacerations from a cat-o-nine-tails with pieces of sharp bone and metal embedded at the ends of the cords. This left ribbons of bloody skin and muscle on his back. His wrists and feet were fastened to the cross beams with iron stakes. He hung naked and bloodied before the eyes of all who passed by, gasping for each dying breath.

Yet, in the midst of these atrocities and horrors, some of the first words which proceeded from Jesus’s mouth as he hung from that cross was a prayer. It was a prayer to his heavenly Father. It was a prayer for his persecutors. Simply, and graciously, Jesus prayed: “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34).

How could he have done this? How could he ask for forgiveness for those who had so abused him? How could he forgive the likes of Peter who denied him, of Pilate who unjustly condemned him to death, and of the soldiers who had so brutalized him? How could he seek absolution for the priests who had instigated his arrest, for the crowds who had turned against him, and for those who mocked him at the base of the cross? How?

He could do this because this is what he had come to do. This was the reason he had come into the world. He had come to give his life as a ransom for many (Mark 10:45). It was necessary that Christ suffer these things (Luke 24:26). It was necessary so that he might make atonement for sin, to pay the price for the iniquities of all. It was necessary so that he might bring forgiveness to the world. Jesus himself declared the purpose behind it all: “Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance and forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations” (Luke 24:46-47). He did it all to bring forgiveness.

For whom is this forgiveness? Jesus declared from the cross, “Father, forgive them!” But who is them? Definitely “them” includes those who were directly involved in his crucifixion. “Them” included the religious priests and elders who instigated the arrest, the crowds who called for Jesus’s crucifixion, the Roman governor and soldiers who carried out his execution. “Them” included Judas the traitor, Peter the denier, and all the disciples who abandoned Christ in the hour of his peril.

But more than that, “them” includes you! It includes me! “Them” is us, because we also are complicit in the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. The sins of all humanity sent Jesus to the cross. It is our sins for which he came to die. It is our iniquities that Jesus bore on Calvary’s tree. Every sinful thought you have ever had demands punishment. Every act of greed you have engaged in needs payment. Every selfish intention calls for a penalty. Your sins make you deserving of death. But Jesus has come to be your substitute. He hangs on the cross for you! He pleads for your forgiveness!

By his death on the cross he has won that forgiveness. As he hung on the cross, Jesus pleaded for our forgiveness. But he also earned that forgiveness. He accomplished your forgiveness by bearing its full weight on the cross. The Apostle Paul writes, “And you, who were dead in your trespasses … God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross” (Colossians 2:13-14). Even as he speaks this word from the cross, “Father, forgive them,” he is making that forgiveness possible.

This forgiveness is for you! Yet, though Christ earned forgiveness for the whole world— for all people of all time—not everyone receives it. Not everybody wants it. For it is only through repentance that one can receive God’s forgiveness. It is only through acknowledging our sinfulness and being contrite for our sins that we receive the gift of forgiveness won by Jesus. There’s no evidence that Caiaphas the high priest repented. It’s unlikely that Pontius Pilate was contrite over the death of Christ. I doubt that most of the Roman soldiers who carried out the crucifixion ever acknowledged their grave transgression. Accordingly, they did not receive the forgiveness that Christ earned for them and offered them.

But some people did receive that forgiveness. The thief crucified next to Jesus confessed his guilt and was given the promise of paradise (Luke 23:40-43). Peter repented of his denials and was reinstated by Christ as an apostle (Luke 22:61-62, John 21:15-17). A crowd of 3000 souls, who were identified as collaborating in Jesus’s crucifixion, repented and were baptized on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2:36-41). Even many of the priests “became obedient to the faith” in Jesus as the Savior (Acts 6:7). In each case, they repented of their sin and received the gracious gift of forgiveness.

Today is Ash Wednesday. It begins the penitential season of Lent. It is a season of penitence, of repentance. That’s because we acknowledge that only through repentance can we receive God’s forgiveness. But we can be assured of his forgiveness, purchased by the shed blood of Christ, offered to those who acknowledge their sin. God promises this. 1 John 1:8-9 makes that clear: “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” So today, come before God in true penitence and receive his full forgiveness!

But not only do we receive forgiveness, we give forgiveness. We offer absolution to those who have wronged us. The Spirit of Christ within us empowers us to forgive others, even as we have been forgiven.

Corrie Ten Boom stood face to face with her former captor. But now the situation had changed. The man in front of her was penitent, trusting in the grace of Jesus Christ. Yet Corrie’s hand was frozen. She could not bring herself to reach out and clasp the hand of one who had previously shamed her. So she prayed. She didn’t pray: “Father, forgive him.” She prayed: “Lord, forgive me! Forgive me because I can’t forgive!” And as she prayed, she sensed anew God’s forgiveness to her. Her arm relaxed, and she reached out and clasped the hand of the man who earlier had oppressed her. She forgave, because she had been forgiven.

That is what Ash Wednesday is all about—forgiveness. That is what Lent is all about— forgiveness. That is what the cross is all about—forgiveness. Let that be what we are all about as well—forgiveness!

Amen.