Ezekiel 34:18,19 - Forgiving and Forgetting

Permission is granted to reprint the following article as long as no changes are made and the byline, copyright information, and the resource box is included. Please let me know if you use this article by sending an email to dje@newedisongazette.com. Ezekiel 34:18,19 - Forgiving and Forgetting Copyright © March 13, 2021 Douglas W. Jerving. All Rights Reserved. Some thoughts based on Jeremiah 23 and Ezekiel 34. Read the above scripture passages and then tell me that the victims should forgive and forget. Forgive, yes, because that is how you move on. Forget? What do you mean by that? Do you mean stop telling others what the facts are? Cover over the crimes? Fail to warn others of the danger? Allow others to become victims because you don't want to seem vindictive? If it was you sexually assaulted, or your wife, or daughter, or son, or your sister, your mother, your cousin, your aunt, your dearest friend, or even a woman you work with, would you excuse it? Cover it up? Refuse to expose it? Testify in court if need be? How are forgiveness and forgetfulness somehow equivalent when other people's lives are jeopardized? Forgiveness is personal and vital to your own ability to move on. Forgetness means you give the unrepented criminal anonymity, enabling him to commit his crime again against another unwarned and unsuspecting victim. It perpetuates the crime by allowing the criminal to maintain secrecy. Here is an example of what I am referring. We certainly should forgive, but if we forget, it will become the next poor soul's problem. It is the responsibility of the Church, of those who say they are the Kingdom of God, to judge good and evil. No one else is going to do that! Oh! Some will say that is just Old Testament. Really? I don't see much difference. Our Lord Jesus Christ Himself utterly condemned the religious leaders of His day (Matthew 23). The Apostle Paul, author of 2/3 of the epistles to the early church, called the high priest of Jerusalem a whitewashed wall. Think about that. The implication from the Older Testament is that he was a wall that was pissed on by passers-by. (David threatened to cut off, i.e., castrate or kill, everyone that pisses against the wall.) The high priest, Paul implied, was a painted over piss wall. Paul goes on to say of a former comrade "Demas has forsaken me, having loved this present world." And then regarding the Judeo- Christian sect on the island of Crete he says "One of themselves, even a prophet of their own, said, the Cretians are alway liars, evil beasts, slow bellies. This witness is true." In Galatians ch.1 Paul pronounces a curse (not forgiveness and certainly not forgetness) on so-called Christians who deny his teaching: "But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. As we said before, so say I now again, if any man preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed." Many other similar passages can be found in St. Paul's writing, clearly indicating to us that we are correct in condemning rather than excusing and forgetting the false prophets and teachers of our own times. Jude, the very brother of Jesus, and of James (Jacob) is highly critical of all those in the "church" who pursue their own lusts by intimidating the weaker members. One small book of one short chapter that totally incriminates all those who abuse their place of authority in the ecclesia (assembly) of God. "For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ." They are still in the Church today, but now we pat them on the head and say "That's okay. We forgive and forget." ------------------------ Doug Jerving is the publisher of the NewEdisonGazette.com. You may contact him at dje@newedisongazette.com. ================================= Return to The New Edison Gazette main site.