Africa Advent: Forgiveness

Forgiveness isn’t easy.

I sat in a shack in the middle of a township in Johannesburg listening to Joseph explain his story of forgiveness. In the darkest shadows of the night, men came and killed Joseph’s father when he was just a boy. Joseph stood near by hiding because his father told him to run. The killers took off and Joseph approached his father’s lifeless body. His life completely changed.

My heart swelled and my eyes burned. “I forgive them. I want them to know… It would be the happiest day of my life if I could meet my father’s killers and forgive them face-to-face.”

He paused for a long time.

The Gospel is about forgiveness. How could we not? “If you don’t forgive. You are no better than the person who is killing.”

Joseph reminded me of another Joseph from the bible. Young. Forgiving. Faithful. Enduring.

***

“As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today.” (Genesis 50:20)

And through the preservation of Joseph’s people came One who’d make all the sad things come untrue. He wouldn’t just forgive the wrongs of present, but of future and past and it wouldn’t be just a few people, it’d be the world.

*Photos by Heather K. Moss