In a famous BBC interview, he recalled the last words between himself and his dying daughter: she held my hand tightly and gripped me as hard as she could. She said, “Daddy, I love you very much.” Those were her exact words to me and those were her last words I ever heard her say. But I bear no ill will. I bear no grudge. Dirty sort of talk is never going to bring her back to life. She was a great wee lassie. She loved her profession. She was a pet. She’s dead. She’s in heaven and we shall meet again. I will pray for these men tonight and every night.’ Gordon Wilson was an ordinary man, but one who displayed the extraordinary power of forgiveness.
Gordon drew on his deep Christian faith to find it in his heart to forgive. The act of incredible forgiveness is inspiring but also overwhelming. While very few of us will be tested to the same extent, the reservoir of grace that Gordon drew upon is the same as the one we must draw on to forgive and let go of resentments, anger, and upset which can blight our lives. Pray and read the parable today. Read it slowly. Ponder every word. Ask yourself: how can I apply this parable to my life today?
One of the most striking things about the parable – and perhaps this is the part of our fallen condition – is the servant’s lack of insight into the depth of his own debt. He is guilty of shallowness, superficiality, and blindness. This lack of self-awareness and self-knowledge means that he doesn’t correlate the cancelling of his debt with the one now owed him. The master in the parable, who represents God the Father, says as much: ‘Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant as I had on you?
No one is saying forgiveness is easy: it isn’t. No one is saying forgiveness isn’t sometimes seemingly impossible: at times it feels like that. What today’s parable teaches us is what we can only truly forgive when we grasp the extent to which we have been forgiven – for in being forgiven we can forgive.
