Text: Matthew 5:21-26
"Hurricane Katrina formed over the Bahamas on August 23, 2005, and crossed southern Florida as a moderate Category 1 hurricane before strengthening rapidly in the Gulf of Mexico and becoming one of the strongest hurricanes ever recorded in the Gulf. The storm weakened considerably before making its second landfall as a Category 3 storm on the morning of August 29 in southeast Louisiana.
"It is possible that Katrina was the largest hurricane of its strength to approach the United States in recorded history; its sheer size caused devastation over 100 miles from the center. The storm surge caused major or catastrophic damage along the coastlines of Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama, including the cities of Mobile, Alabama, Biloxi and Gulfport, Mississippi, and Slidell, Louisiana. Levees separating Lake Pontchartrain from New Orleans, Louisiana were breached by the surge, ultimately flooding roughly 80% of the city and many areas of neighboring parishes. Severe wind damage was reported well inland. Katrina is estimated to be responsible for $75 billion (2005 US dollars) in damages, making it the costliest hurricane in U.S. history. The storm has killed at least 1,604 people, making it the deadliest U.S. hurricane since the 1928 Okeechobee Hurricane." (wikipedia)
I vividly remember the televised images of the damage and the tragic aftermath. I was amazed to see so many buildings totally blown away by the powerful wind. And then came the flooding. Piles of rubble still line the streets of many areas of New Orleans.
The damage occurred in a very small amount of time, but the restoration will take years. It has been nine months since the hurricane, and the rebuilding is just getting started. Our mission team will be going there in June to do our little part in trying to bring New Orleans back to life.
This hurricane can be an apt analogy to the damage that takes place in our lives as a result of addictions and other life controlling issues. When our lives spin out of control, we can cause a wake of destruction that seems the match of a hurricane. And just as with the hurricane, restoration can take a long, long time. The real work takes place in the rebuilding after the disaster.
We have been studying the Twelve Steps to Recovery. So let me review the steps we have covered so far.
1) We admitted we were powerless over the effects of our separation from God and that our lives had become unmanageable.
2) We came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
3) We made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood him.
4) We made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5) We admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
6) We were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
7) We humbly asked God to remove our shortcomings.
8) We made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
And now I turn to Step Nine which says, "Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others."
Just as the country is focusing a great amount of money and energy in trying to rebuild the Gulf Coast, we have to focus on rebuilding our lives. That rebuilding starts with making right some wrongs. Step Nine involves restoration, reconciliation, and restitution.
The good news is that things can be made right. There's a wonderful passage in the Bible from Ezekiel 33:15-16, which says, "If the wicked restore the pledge, give back what they have taken by robbery, and walk in the statutes of life, committing no iniquity—they shall surely live, they shall not die. None of the sins that they have committed shall be remembered against them; they have done what is lawful and right, they shall surely live."
Making amends is never easy, and we have a natural hesitancy to make amends. We have all heard people say, "Let sleeping dogs lie." "Live and let live." "No need to pick at a sore." In fact, conventional wisdom would encourage us NOT to make amends. But I suspect most of our reasons for not making amends have more to do with our pride than with real wisdom. Usually, our real reason is that we don't want to admit that we were wrong. Further, it means that we don't want to take responsibility for the damage we have done.
Can you imagine anyone saying those things about the hurricane? Imagine someone saying, "There is no need to rebuild the Gulf Coast. Let sleeping dogs lie. Going down their on mission trips is just picking at a sore. Let's just forget that that whole incident ever happened and just get on with our lives."
Or imagine the doctor says you have a skin cancer. If it remains, it will soon get into your blood stream and spread, leading to your inevitable death. If he removes it now, you will be fine. Can you imagine replying, "Just let sleeping dogs lie."
Such talk about the hurricane is obviously not right, but we are quick to believe those sayings when it comes to broken relationships. While there are situations where that may be the best advice, I would suggest that it is seldom wise to let broken relationships stay broken.
It takes sheer courage to go back to someone on our list and confess our wrong doings and commit ourselves to reconciliation. But that is most often the right thing to do. Jesus counseled the same thing in Matthew 18:15, where he suggested going to talk one-to-one with the one who has sinned against us.
Jesus even said that we can't be right with God when we have a festering, broken relationship with other people. He said, "So when you are offering your gift at the altar, if you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift."
Once again, there are two distinct parts to this step:
1) "Made direct amends to such people wherever possible"
2) "Except when to do so would injure them or others."
First, let's look at making direct amends to such people wherever possible.
1 Peter 4:8-10 says, "Above all, maintain constant love for one another, for love covers a multitude of sins. Be hospitable to one another without complaining. Like good stewards of the manifold grace of God, serve one another with whatever gift each of you has received."
I love that line, "Love covers a multitude of sins." Step Nine involves making personal or indirect contact with those we have harmed. Love makes us try to repair, to the best of our ability, the damage that has been done.
We may begin this step by reviewing our list made in Step Eight. There we attempted to make an exhaustive list of the people we had harmed. Now we approach each one with gentleness, sensitivity, and understanding.
For some people on our list, this will require a face-to-face meeting. We may begin by explaining that we are in a program that requires that we make amends for our wrong doings. We admit the degree of our wrongs. Then we ask for forgiveness and extend forgiveness. Most of all, we accept responsibility.
Here is where we have to spend much time in prayer and meditation to prepare ourselves for this difficult task. We have to depend on God to give us the strength, the courage and the grace to accomplish this step in the right way. We then prepare a schedule listing the persons to contact, what we will say and how we will say it. This step requires great tactfulness, which can only come from God.
My recovering friend told me that this was a very difficult step for him. He had to focus on his end, on what he needed to do, and not on the other person's reactions. He said, "They may laugh or make fun of me, but I must focus on what I have to do."
Then he told me about going back to the town where he had been arrested on several occasions for public drunkenness. There was one particular policeman who had arrested him. And my friend recalls that he treated this policeman terribly. He remembered that he had called him cruel names and that on one occasion, he had spat in the man's face. Step Nine required that he make a special trip back to that town and find the policeman.
He arrived at the police station and asked for this man. When he came, my friend recounted the terrible things he had done and asked for forgiveness. Then he thanked the policeman, and told him that he had saved his life by arresting him. Both men were in tears before this reconciliation was over.
My friend concluded, "When you are done with this step, your fears fall from you. You can walk the streets again and look people in the eye."
Making amends is a way of paying off old debts. In Romans 13:8, Paul writes, "Owe no one anything, except to love one another; for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law." When we have wronged someone, we are in debt to them. Working Step Nine in a spirit of love pays off those old debts, and gives us freedom. It gives us the freedom to have right relationships.
But sometimes the attempt to make amends only creates more damage. Step Nine recognizes this realty by ending, "except when to do so would injure them or others."
There are situations that prevent us from making direct personal contact. Sometimes the person we have harmed is deceased or otherwise unavailable to us. Sometimes attempts at restoration really will make matters worse.
Perhaps this is the reason we remember those conventional wisdom sayings such as "Let sleeping dogs lie." There is a certain wisdom there. Sometimes that is the right thing to do. Sometimes attempts at restoration only aggravate the damage. There are times when it really is best to leave matters alone so that we don't make them worse. But this requires real insight and wisdom from God. We must analyze the harm they would suffer if complete disclosure was made, and we have to avoid bringing harm to third parties.
But we still have to accept responsibility and make amends on our end. In such cases, amends may be accomplished by prayer or by writing a letter as if we were communicating with the absent person. It is often a good exercise to write a letter to that person and then not mail it.
Sometimes, we can make amends by performing a kindness for someone else we may not even know, but who is connected in some way to the person we have harmed.
While making his list, one alcoholic remembered that he had stolen a hamster ten years earlier. When he got to Step Nine, he knew he had to take responsibility for that action. He went back to the pet store, only to discover that it had different owners. He had no idea how to find the owners of ten years ago. So he gave the new owner enough money for a hamster, and asked the new owner to hold it until the next kid came to buy a hamster. When this kid approached the register to pay, the owner was to explain that someone had already paid for his hamster.
The real difficulty here is knowing when we are just being cowardly and refusing to accept responsibility for the damage we have done, and when we are wisely avoiding making the damage worse.
Step Nine says, "Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others." The real challenge is knowing when to do the first part and when to do the last.
My former pastor Don Harbuck was from Louisiana, and he loved telling a Cajun story about two guys discussing a thermos bottle. The first man explains, "Say, Boudeaux, did you see this new thing I have here?"
The other replies, "No, Robicheaux, what dat you have?"
"It's called a thermos, and it keeps hot things hot. You put hot coffee in and it stays hot."
"Nooo, you don't mean it."
"But that's not all, it also keeps cold things cold. You put in a cold Pepsi and it stays cold."
"Say, Robicheaux, dats the most amazing thing I ever saw. But I have just one question."
"What's your question, Boudeaux?"
"I just wants to know, 'How do it know when to which?'"
We will know when to which only through prayer. Making amends is costly business, and sometimes tricky. But God can give us the judgment, courage, and stamina we need to accomplish this task.