The realization that no one other than God can make anything right, and God pledges to make everything right, in Christ, by the power of his Holy Spirit.

That's why on earth here we willingly absorb our enemy's sin against us in Jesus' name as a reminder to our enemy - and to ourselves - that God in Christ is the one who is actually absorbing all sin.

As Christine Scheller notes in her fantastic post How Far Should Forgiveness Go?, Miroslav Volf, a professor at Yale, says:

I don't demand that the one who has taken my eye lose his eye or that the one who has killed my child by his negligence be killed. In fact, I don't demand that he lose anything. I forgo all retribution. In forgiving, I absorb the injury-the way I may absorb, say, the financial impact of a bad business transaction.

I absorb the sin not in myself, but in Christ, who lives in me. It's no longer I who live, after all; it's he who lives in me. And this is what I point out to my enemy in the midst of our battle against his sin.

Now let me hasten to note, for those in abusive marriage situations, for example, that absorbing the blow can only come on the other side of sharing with our enemies God's sober judgment about their sin toward us. In the case of an abusive marriage, that judgment is "It is wrong to let you continue to use me as a punching bag; therefore we must separate and find help for you."

But to abusers and all of our enemies, we do this as we share with them God's sober judgment of us - our own stories of how he set us free from the penalty of canceled sin, and how he is even now setting us - and those whom we have harmed-free from sin's power. 

Which is how we know they can be set free, too. Which we need to reassure them of even while judging them soberly in Jesus' name.

Mercy is the desired end of judgment. Meaning, we judge people in Jesus' name in order that they might see how very badly they need the mercy of Christ, which we extend to them at no cost other than their willingness to accept it and enter into the lifelong process of letting that judgment and mercy work in their lives. This doesn't preclude restitution in any sense-far from it (that's what "lifelong process of etc etc" means in the previous sentence). But it sure does preclude condemnation and haughtiness on our part. 

For more guidance in Forgiving and Reconciling, make sure to check out our free podcasts, video clips, and blog posts this month at www.ericfoley.com.

This article originally appeared in Seoul USA's Bi-Weekly Prayer Partner Update e-Newsletter.  To sign up to receive future emails, click here.