Lent for the Record Keeper

@audreycfrank

My roots are in the Appalachian Mountains of the Eastern United States, where cultures blended from Scotland, Ireland, England and Germany to brave the rugged landscape and force it into submission. Farmers and shepherds made the mountains their home and brought with them customs and traditions of the Old Country. One of the most stubborn traditions is that of record-keeping, or, as it is more often called, holding a grudge.

I have watched old men die friendless, all because they refused to forgive a wrong committed against them decades before in their youth. I have heard the griping grumble of stubborn siblings who walked away from each other after a dispute, never to reconcile. 

And I have seen the most tender, powerful love blossom among those courageous enough to break tradition and do what’s necessary to keep love alive. Repentance and forgiveness are mighty to break down generational strongholds of hate.

The Appalachian Mountains are not the only place records are kept. Across an ocean and a continent, deep in a small African compound, my husband and I listened as village elders described their practice of never forgetting a wrong done. Names were never uttered again, curses were bought and assigned, fences of thick, gnarly thorn bushes were built high along property lines, all because wrong could not be forgotten.

Record-keeping is a thriving affair among humans everywhere. #repentance #forgiveness #Lent Share on X

There are those who keep records of others’ wrongs, and those who keep records of their own wrongs. Either way, hearts grow hard, grace is smothered, and bitterness ensues.

Author Rosaria Butterfield states in her book Openness Unhindered,

“Unhindered means that we are unencumbered by our failures; that is, we do not keep record of the countless times that we have failed God in sin, failed our friends in carelessness, and failed our own conscience by willfully disobeying the God who loves us. Instead of recordkeeping, we pray for the gift to repent of our sin at its foundation.”

The gift to repent of our sin at its foundation.

This is a profound concept. Repentance, a gift sought and given.

I tend to be a self record-keeper. Spinning in my failures like tires in African monsoon mud, I create a ditch from which I cannot escape. Deeper and deeper I dig, wallowing in self-focus. 

Although it is a miserable place to be, it feels somehow comforting. Comforting in that the focus is still on my self, and my base self is ravenously hungry for attention. Our selves are insatiable, always demanding more. Self does not mind if the attention is negative or positive; either will do, as long as the focus is fixed on me. Pathetic, but true.

This is sin. Focusing on our wrongs, our weaknesses, our failures, is a kind of selfishness. Our minds cannot trust God to help us and strengthen us when we are obsessed with our inability to change.

Fixating on the wrongs, the weaknesses, and the failures of others is also self-focused, though it certainly feels others-focused. It is sin. We cannot preoccupy ourselves with others’ wrongdoing while also trusting our sovereign God to bring healing, hope, and justice.

An impasse is defined in The New Oxford American Dictionary as “a situation where no progress is possible, especially because of disagreement.” When we keep our records, we are in direct disagreement with the Law of Love given us by God (see 1 Corinthians 13:4-8).

We are at an impasse. No progress is possible as long as we keep a record of wrong.

The Spirit of God invites us beyond this impasse. He beckons us to a better place, a place of action and resolution. A place of refreshing.

After Jesus’ resurrection and ascension, the Holy Spirit came upon the apostles and they declared the message of salvation boldly. Peter, in Acts 3:19, exhorted his listeners, “Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord.”

What our souls long for, the wiping out of our failures, the refreshing from the long and heavy burden of wrongdoing, comes after repentance.

I am so relieved to know I can finally get out of the mud. The secret is repentance. And on the other side of repentance is refreshing from the Lord. Refreshed perspective, refreshed relationships, refreshed hope.

Stuck holding a grudge, whether toward ourselves or others, we will never experience relief. There will be no satisfaction until we repent. When we grip our records of wrong in fists tight with control and anger, we are presuming to have more power and authority than God Himself.

We are essentially saying we know better than He does, that we had better mete out justice and judgment ourselves because He can’t be trusted to do it well enough.

Lent is a season of reflection and repentance. We need God’s gift of #repentance, His enabling, to turn from our sin at its foundation. #Lent Share on X

How can we know sin’s foundation in us if we do not ask His Spirit to search our hearts and minds?

Let us take a moment this week to ask God for this unique and necessary gift, the gift to repent of our sin at its foundation. It’s time to put away our records once and for all and trust the Lord.

Lord, move me past my failures and the failures of others. Show me my sin at its foundation and give me the gift to repent. Amen.