“Forgive me,” we say flippantly, painting on a shallow smile, when we discover we are misaligned with someone greater or more powerful—someone who might make us hurt.

We view our error lightly—just a minor inconvenience—and we hope the one offended will quickly do the same. Why do the humbling work of owning all that happened and acknowledging its impact?

But true forgiveness is a thoughtful, time-intensive mercy—never rushed if genuine; never brushed away if real. Unless we face the injury we’ve caused, we ask for restoration without repentance, a mere smoothing of ruffled surfaces.  If the needed words are “I’m sorry that I hurt you,” or “I can see how I was wrong,” speak truthfully, and find the needed healing. “Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ” (Gal 6:1-2).

And when we are the ones offended and it is our turn to forgive, we plant the seeds of our own future grudges if we pretend a painful hurt is only minor and dismissible. What goes unsaid is usually unforgiven as well. Both grace and truth are called for each time there is an injury.

Only those who know themselves forgiven by the One who was always “full of grace and truth” (John 1:14) ever truly forgive another broken soul. Only in the field of grace can reconciliation blossom.

So stay in grace. -Bill Knott