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Something terrible happened to me:
I want justice,
I want someone to blame,
I want punishment for that person.
But what does that give me?
What does that give that other person?
I came here to do a job,
that person is here to do a job.
We have done it.
I came here to learn a lesson,
I volunteered for this learning,
a lesson that will free
both that person and me.
Justice is vengeance.
It is anger waiting to be vented;
it is an eye for an eye,
a tooth for a tooth.
Justice is the angry reflection
of that vengeance.
I will be purified,
then freed,
with grace, not justice.
Justice is anger, hiding behind righteousness:
I know that now.
Grace: something given freely,
not earned.
Grace: peace offered with compassion,
not given for retribution.
Grace: something given,
not driven.
Grace: something accepted,
without need or reason.
I have needed to be forgiven.
So I must forgive,
even for the smallest of things:
without forgiveness, there is no grace;
without forgiveness,
I carry the ball and chain forever.
I burden myself with heaviness and pain.
It is within my power to give,
and to receive, forgiveness.
It is within my power to give,
without condition, forgiveness.
Forgiveness without reason, without reason,
the understanding that that could have been me.
Grace: acceptance, without reason.
Grace, without condition.
Grace: love.
© Janet Mitchell, January 2012. All Rights Reserved.
Sep01elizabeth ecsikron Thank you so much for your support and encouragement! Much love to you Angela!
beautifully written.
Thank you for reading. Please be patient with me as I get back on my feet and get my eyes back on reading these wonderful blogs and on writing, again!
Thanks for the “like” on “Justice?”
Hope you come back to read again. FYI, I’ll be out of the action for a few weeks while I address some medical problems, so please don’t give up on me!! d:^) Janet
It is with great pleasure that I hand off the Candle Lighter Award to you!
Please see this post for details:
http://steponacrack.wordpress.com/2012/01/14/candle-lighter-award/
Peace, Jen
Oh my goodness! Thank you! I am, as you probably read, having some medical issues, and just now I see your post. I’m embarrassed for not keeping up, and honored. I will look at the Candle Lighter Award post you send me, and thank you again, Jen. I’m so thankful and honored. (And, hopefully, once I recouperate, I will not have lost all of these wonderful readers and bloggers that I’ve only begun to know.) Thanks again, and I apologize for the delay in responding to you.
Very moving. I was in tears. You get right to the core of things, Janet. This was an important piece.
Thank you!
Holy moley. This is very powerful. I wish you Peace and Power on this journey. May it be a short one….
XXX Jen
Thanks, Jen. And thanks for visiting my post so regularly!
Wow. This is huge. I really, really hope you are okay. I agree, forgiving gets stuck in me, too. But it is true, it takes grace to forgive. It’s easier to forgive someone you love – but a stranger who damaged; or even a family member you don’t actually love … very very hard.
Take care
Thanks for visiting and taking the time to comment on my post.
Best to you :^)
Forgiving is hard…yet very rewarding…
It’s the best. Thanks for reading and commenting!
May you find the grace you need to forgive.
That wasn’t me, it was a composite person who I was portraying going through that dilemna. I’ve seen, as I’m sure you have, people carry that chain and ball of resentment and need for vengeance around with them their entire lives !! And it ruins lives. There is peace and release with forgiveness, and that requires grace. Thanks for reading and commenting.