The Seventh Sunday after the Epiphany-Year C

7th Sunday after the Epiphany-Year C February 20, 2022 When I was in middle school, we lived in an ante-bellum home in downtown Canton right next door to the Catholic church. For years, we didn’t have a key that worked in the door lock, so we just didn’t lock our back door when we left the house. We would often leave each other notes pinned to the straight back of the chair that you saw when you opened the door to the house—notes like, “Debra (that’s my mom), I left the cash on top of your jewelry box. Love, Steve (my dad). One day, someone broke into our house. They took the cash, mom’s and my jewelry, tvs, vcrs, and my leather-bound bible with my name embossed on it, among many other things. We did all the things you’re supposed to do; we filed a police report, we got the lock fixed and started locking our door; my dad started frequenting the pawn shops in Canton, and he recovered some of the electronics. We thought we were safe once we started locking the door. But then they broke in again-forcing entry into our home and taking more stuff. Eventually, the police caught them- they were two teenagers-and we went on with our lives, although I never really felt safe in the house after that. Years go by, and my dad was serving on staff at Kairos, an Episcopal spiritual renewal retreat that is similar to Cursillo or Happening but takes place in prison. Late in the weekend, a young man came up to my dad. He said, “You probably don’t remember me, but I’ve met you before. The last time I saw you, I was handcuffed in the Canton Police Department; I’m the one that broke into your house. I’m so sorry. Will you, please, forgive me?” “Jesus said, "I say to you that listen, Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also; and from anyone who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt. Give to everyone who begs from you; and if anyone takes away your goods, do not ask for them again. Do to others as you would have them do to you.” Our Old Testament reading for today gives us another glimpse of what it means to forgive those who have wronged you. We pick up in the middle of the Joseph story—one of my childhood favorites, thanks to an early encounter with Andrew Lloyd Weber’s musical Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. This is toward the end of Joseph’s story. You will recall that Joseph was most beloved by Jacob his father of all his brothers, and he had the gift of interpreting dreams which had been given to him by God. What Joseph did not have, at that point in the story, was wisdom or humility, and he proceeded to tell his already jealous brothers that he had a dream which showed him that he would be raised up higher than all of them and that they would eventually worship him. So the brothers did what most jealous siblings would do. The sold him into slavery in Egypt. While serving as a slave there, Joseph was falsely accused by his master’s wife and thrown into prison. And that could have been the end of it all right there. But while Joseph was in jail, it came to Pharaoh’s attention that Joseph could interpret dreams, and since Pharaoh had been experiencing a rash of troubling dreams, he called upon Joseph to interpret them. Joseph divined that Pharaoh’s dreams meant that Egypt was about to have 7 years of plenty followed by 7 years of famine, and he instructed Pharaoh to start collecting the food and resources from the years of plenty to see them through the years of famine. As a result, Pharaoh releases Joseph from prison and elevates Joseph to a position of trust in his court. Our reading for today picks up two years into the 7 years of famine, when Jacob’s sons have come to Egypt to seek assistance because they are all starving in Canna. Joseph revels himself to his brothers in our passage for today, and rather than offering them some well- deserved retribution, Joseph humbly forgives them and tells them how their actions, though meant for evil, have been a part of God’s plan to bring about good for all of them. It’s an astonishing moment when we think about all that has happened to Joseph and how he had been so haughty in relationship with his brothers before. And there is only one explanation for how Joseph could have reacted the way that he did. That is that both he and his brothers have been transformed by God’s grace. I’ve been thinking about forgiveness in light of all this—the story of my dad forgiving the man who robbed us and of Joseph and his brothers’ reconciliation. One thing that helped me this week was listening to a podcast on forgiveness. Here’s what they said in the podcast: “Forgiveness is not reconciliation. Forgiveness sets us up for reconciliation if God opens up for that opportunity and if the other person is willing and all that. But forgiveness doesn’t require anybody else. It’s something that we do as a spiritual practice within our own relationship with God that can open us up to other things, but it sets a realistic expectation for what forgiveness is and what it isn’t.” i God, through the Holy Spirit, is the one who begins the work of forgiveness in us. We can pray and ask God to help us be open to receive that work; and it doesn’t require any other person in order for us to forgive. Reconciliation is what comes when the other person is willing to participate in our forgiveness journey, or when, like Joseph’s brothers, the Holy Spirit has been active in transforming other lives as well. Your invitation this week is to think about an area of your life in which you’d like to be forgiven or to offer forgiveness to someone else. Begin praying to the Holy Spirit to open your heart that you may be ready for the work God will do in and through you. i. https://transformingcenter.org/2021/08/season-13-episode-8-invitation-to-forgive/