Sorry About That

"I am so sorry"...it is a phrase that is almost a cultural flagship for those people who take advantage but are never really sorry.   I don't know if the phrase means anything when so many use it to manipulate.  But I think it should mean something...and we should all have that opportunity.  And the reason is that we all have need to say it.  It should be that instead of expecting people to behave in a way that they never feel need to say this phrase, we should have a culture that accepts and encourages a freedom and openness for people to say this.  Because the reality of the world we live in is that we all have need to be able to say this to those around us. 

Being sorry is an admission of failure, an admission of less than success.  An admission that that you have fallen short of the goals you have set even for yourself.  An admission that at some point you have placed your own self ahead of someone else.   Who, in the world, can say that they don't need to learn and use the skill of saying "I am so sorry"? No, this is a world in which the "I am sorry" flows like water, but has little depth and receives little reception.  The "I am sorry" should be deep and from the heart and recognize the depth of self-righteousness that our actions have embraced.  

But the acceptance of the "I am sorry" has an equal and also difficult task....it is to recognize equal individual failure and to empathize with the one who has need of this phrase and to forgive always means to absorb the pain of the actions of the one who is sorry.    The ability to be sorry in the right way, and to forgive in the right way, if you really see it in the way that it should be...it is beyond us all.  The cry of  'Have mercy on me Son of David' is a cry of sorry that is a "I am so sorry" that the disciples walked right past. It sounds callous when read, but imagine the situation in your own daily life....the relative who always says he is sorry but never cleans up his act...the man on the corner who is always there doing his thing and being less than he should be. The co-worker who always takes advantage when he has the chance and then cries sorrow when his plans for himself fail to succeed.   None of these people can claim they should not be sorry....and yet....their pathetic cry was completely ignored by the disciples, and I would suggest, most of us would have done the same. But it was not ignored by Jesus, no it was a call that rang out to him and stopped him in his tracks, hallelujah...it pulled him immediately aside, and His heart went out to those who simply called out to Him. What a distinction and what a Saviour.

But don't worry too much if you are like the disciples and not like Jesus. Because that is the whole point of the Gospel. We won't ever do this like He did, but we can appreciate and be thankful and we can use this phrase to the hilt with him, because he will respond to our cry. And believe me, when nobody else will, he will turn towards you.
"I am so sorry" doesn't have to be perfect, it just has to be received by someone who can actually do the business of forgiveness, who is willing and able to absorb the cost.  Something we collectively don't do very well...and we should be sorry for that. But when we fail at this, and we all will, we should be reminded that we all cry for that forgiveness that we don't deserve. And only one person actually gives it in spite of our less than adequate cries of 'I am sorry'.