Marriage, Murder & Mercy

Ingrid and I have been married 28 years and 1 day today. People ask—and they are not joking—how Ingrid could endure me all these years. The top answers offered raise further questions about the quality of her eyesight, hearing, and short and long term memory. Mostly people assume that God has given her the most amazing gift of mercy any human has ever had. True that.

Mercy triumphs over judgment. It says that in the Good Book. It says that a lot and in big ways. We as a species deserve a harsh assessment. The God of the universe sees and knows all the stuff we have hidden from the IRS and our mothers. If He were merely “fair,” we’d all have to go to hell. That is the only rational judgment He could make. But, He holds mercy higher. When we like sheep have gone astray, the Good Shepherd comes and finds us, throws us on His shoulders and carries away from the wolves to green pastures and still waters, and stands post with His rod and staff to protect us. He is the God of the second chance—and third, fourth, fifth…

Ingrid reflects the image of this good God to me every day and in every way. We work together and most days usually find a moment or two of tension (or three or four…). We have an office in our home, and we tell people the reason we don’t allow guns in our home is that we would have a workplace shooting by Tuesday of every week. Other people watch the news on Friday and ponder how some guy could walk in and kill a bunch of his ex-co-workers. Not me and Ingrid. We get that. What Ingrid and I don’t get is how he made it all the way to Friday. Bad joke, but if you have been married a long time you get Ruth Graham’s answer to the interviewer when asked if she and Billy ever considered divorce: “Divorce? Never. Murder? Often.”

We have a marriage tradition that we have practiced for 28 years. On our first anniversary I gave Ingrid two glasses and carafe with four words engraved on it so that we would check in on these crucial things every year: Love, Faith, Promise, Forgiveness. The importance of the first three needs no explanation. These are the big three that the Love Chapter says will stand forever essential: “And now these three will always be with us: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love” (1 Corinthians 13:13). Love—the practice of giving and living tender care—is the greatest thing, and that is what I need the most work on.

Ingrid identified forgiveness as her biggest challenge this year. In fact, she said she was so mad this week that she spent about a half hour at one point trying on the thought that she would not forgive me for my repeated wrongdoing. Couldn’t do it. Too much mercy in that girl. Too much Jesus in that girl. Jesus said that we should be forever forgiving and forbearing of one another—not just in marriage, but in every relationship. In fact, he made that the one condition of getting God’s forgiveness: punishment is promised “unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart” (Matthew 18:39). Ingrid gets it: because God has forgiven her 70 X 7, because He has offered up the perfect sacrifice of His son on the cross, she too must reflect that kind of loving forgiveness to others. Good fortune for me, I say. She runs the soup kitchen for mercy around here—and I am standing in line for some mercy soup every day.

Yes, you read correctly. I just wrote that God’s forgiveness is conditional. But before you Reformed Reformers run me out on a rail, look again. It was in quotation marks. Jesus said it, not me. It is right there in the Good Book. Mercy triumphs over judgment IF—and only if—you and I offer that same merciful attitude toward others. Read it for yourself: Matthew 18. This is the most unread chapter of the Bible in American Christianity. That’s a little scary. So many people think because they prayed the prayer they got the eternal fire insurance policy that can never be cancelled. They will be so sorely surprised when they stand before the Lord and try to explain why they called him “Lord” and sounded so religious but did not do what he said to do so clearly.

Yet, still, there is so much mercy about the place. “The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases, his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness” (Lamentations 3:22-23). God even designed “evening and morning—the first day” with the plan to give us daily do-over! Mercy is built into the morning. Do you feel it? God knew we would need mercy that much and that often. I know I do—ask Ingrid. But morning comes, and there we find the God of the second chance waiting with arms of grace one more time. Before the foundations of the world, the God of love provided a way back for those who would get so lost. That passage goes on to say, “‘The LORD is my portion,’ says my soul, ‘therefore I will hope in him.’ The LORD is good to those who wait for him, to the soul that seeks him” (Lamentations 3:24-25).

Mercy triumphs over judgment—and prevents murder in the home office. Thank God!

My darkness turns to light

My daughter pointed out the other day that news anchors are giving out the suicide hotline number when they give economic reports. A few days later, a gruesome father-family murder-suicide in a nearby neighborhood hit the news. This guy lost half of everything in the stock downturn, and the other half in real estate speculation, and now was facing the embarrassment of his bankruptcy becoming public. The neighbors were totally gob smacked by the trauma.

Why did he kill himself? No one knows for sure, but it is not hard to speculate about at least three dark forces that drove this "normal" man to do such a horrendous thing: (1) he had all his hope and security in his money/portfolio/holdings--take those away and his hope and security were gone. But, there had to be more: (2) he must have blamed himself for the loss--he invested, he speculated, he got his wife to sign the mortgages, he felt like he had totally failed. That must have been tied into one more thing: (3) he must have been very proud (even boasted?) about all his stuff. Take away hope and security, fasten blame without excuse, and bring humiliation and there you have a painful condition that drinking the cocktail of suicide is thought to fix. So sad, and yet so easily understood.

There is something I wish I could have shared with the man before he took this permanent solution to temporary problems. It comes from the Hebrew Scriptures: "You, O Lord, keep my lamp burning; my God turns my darkness into light" (Psalm 18:28). There are three things this brief quote speaks deeply to me when I have dark days with despairing thoughts:

1. I am not the source of my survival or security. There is Another who provides the "oil" for "my lamp." To the proud, prayer is a quaint, psychological pacifier. To those who know, a great and mighty Hand is found in low places of humility and humiliation. God does not reveal Himself to the proud, but speaks in a still, small voice to those brought low (what the ancients called the "Divine Incognito"). "You, O Lord--not I--keep my lamp burning." There will always be enough.

2. God is about the business of bringing light out of darkness. It is one of the first things the Bible says God is good at. In the creation story's version of the Big Bang theory, God looks at the chaotic darkness and says, "Let there be light." And, like that, there was light. He is still good at this. With just a word, Jesus was found saying to disease, blindness and moral lostness, "Be healed." Snap. Like that. Done. Many say it can't be done. I'm not one. I am here to tell you there is a God who turns my darkness to light. Not just light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel kind of light, but light outside and in, flooding my day and night: hope in place of despair, purpose in place of lostness, and a real sense of future and security in the place of uncertainty and anxiety.

3. "My darkness." The part I am most thankful about is that God does not just save victims and the downcast and outsiders, but He saves people like me who are a victim of their own moral fault and poor decision-making. When the darkness I find myself in is the result of my own doing--when it is really MY darkness--even and especially there the God of mercy and compassion brings grace, mercy and forgiveness. He turns the very things I have brought upon myself INTO LIGHT. He is so good at this darkness-to-light thing--and so full of mercy--that He takes my own self-inflicted suffering and turns it into character and wisdom and comfort for others.

When I feel lost and laid low, that is when the heart-cry of Mary in her humiliation means the most to me: "My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my savior! ... His mercy extends to those who fear him, from generation to generation. He has performed mighty deeds with his arm; he has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts. He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble" (Luke 1:46, 50-52). The proud can't find God at all, and resent Him. No wonder, since the Bible says God opposes the proud. Life is hard enough--who needs God against you? But, it also says, "He gives grace to the humble."

You, O Lord, keep my lamp burning. My God turns MY darkness into light.