When I was a freshman in high school, another
student at my school tried to stab me.
I honestly
can’t say that I understand why “Sharon” wanted to hurt me. I really didn’t
know her, but I knew that she struggled in school, and I knew that she hung
around a pretty tough group of girls who seemed to enjoy bullying others. Now,
granted, I was pretty much the quintessential nerd kid – and nerd kids seem to
be a magnet for bullies. But I’d had no particular encounters with “Sharon”
that would have provoked her to want to hurt me.
On a
Friday in April, “Sharon” came to school with a large kitchen knife hidden in
her books. And as I walked down the hallway with a friend between classes, oblivious
to what was happening, she tried to stab me. God’s grace – and the quick action
of a couple of upper classmen boys who saw the knife just before it would
otherwise have been plunged into my back – spared me that day. Her angry, expletive-filled
tirade as the boys wrestled the knife from her only confused me more and fed my
sense of bitterness and hurt that she could want to harm me.
I have
no idea what happened to “Sharon.” She was suspended from school for the
remainder of that school year, and given that she was already struggling and not
allowed to take final exams, she was held back the following school year. The
next fall, I saw her in the hallways from time to time, but admittedly still
frightened, I steered clear of her; after a while, I never saw her again. My
guess was that, like too many other students who have learning challenges and who
lack solid support, she just gave up. As for me, I’d wanted to transfer to
another school, as frightening as the whole episode had been, but my mother
wasn’t similarly inclined to abandon the school’s stellar academic program. I
stayed, I continued to thrive, and in time, I pretty much shrugged the whole
thing off.
As I’ve
grown older, I have wondered: What might have happened if, after Sharon had
come back to school, I had walked up to her, and just said hi? Or invited her
to eat lunch with me and my friends? Or simply told her, “I know you don’t like
me, and I’m really not mad about what happened.” Might anything have been
different? Might knowing that one kid whom she’d bullied saw value in her and was
willing to show kindness to her have made a difference in her life – or mine?
But I did nothing, because, truth be told, not only was I still frightened, I
hadn’t forgiven her for wanting to hurt me, and for taking my sense of safety
away. I had allowed fear, anger and hurt to infect me, and nothing could break
through the coat of armor that I had forged for protection.
On our
best days, forgiving those who have wronged us can be a hard thing to do. We
want those who have wronged us to pay; we want our revenge, even when we want
desperately to be able to forgive if for no other reason than to rid ourselves
of the anger and bitterness that we feel. But as important as it is for us to be
forgiving people, we may not realize how important it is for those who have
wronged us to know that they are forgiven – wholly and unconditionally – and that
we invite them into reconciliation and new relationship.
After
a distraught Charlie Roberts took the lives of five Amish schoolgirls before
taking his own life in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania in October, 2005, his grief-stricken
family experienced an outpouring of love and support from their Amish neighbors.
As they mourned their own dead, the Amish families visited the Roberts family
to mourn with them and share their grief, and stood with them at Charlie’s
funeral. A member of the Amish community told reporters that the Amish had no
alternative: They were called to forgive just as God had forgiven them. For the
Roberts family, the forgiveness and acceptance that they experienced helped
sustain them during the dark days that they faced.
I’ll
never know if a kind word to “Sharon” would have made any difference in her
life. But I believe that it would have made a profound difference in my life to
forgive her – to be able to try to forgive another just as God forgives us all.
And, I suspect, one of the keys to healing the divisions in our world may well
be for all of us to be people who forgive one another as we are all forgiven by
God – and for all of us to experience God’s love and mercy through the
forgiveness of those we have wronged.
