18/08/2025
Hi all.
The following is a long read, but I would ask that you take time to read and, if possible, watch the videos I refer to.
Some of you may remember that I recently showed an excerpt of Danny Abdallah speaking at the National Prayer Breakfast as he shared about the power of forgiveness – Danny and Leila, along with their surviving children, have chosen to forgive the driver who hit and killed three of their children along with their cousin. In fact, the family pray for him and have chosen to embrace him and his parents in a profound act of grace and forgiveness. Through this Samuel has become a follower of Jesus and, as the Chaplain in the prison said, is a living miracle testifying to the transforming power of Jesus Christ in a person’s life.
Last night channel 7’s Spotlight programme showed a conversation with the driver of the car, Samuel Davidson, who is serving a 20 year sentence in maximum security prison. There was much to consider as Samuel shared his deep remorse and culpability in his actions that day.
But what was most stark – and has seemed to raise the most response online – was the face-to-face meeting (not the first one, but the first publicly shown IN prison) between Samuel and Danny where they called each other “brother” as they prayed together, shared Communion together and spoke of the depth and difficulty of forgiveness.
I’d encourage you to take the time to watch both the National Prayer Breakfast speech (both Danny & Leila share): https://youtu.be/maqIZ4CjgwQ?t=3330 and the Spotlight programme: https://7plus.com.au/7news-spotlight
Here’s my point: Forgiveness and grace are easy to talk about, and we are quick to seek them for ourselves. But it is much harder to intentionally choose to forgive someone who has wronged & hurt us (sometimes deeply). The Abdallah’s have shown what Christ-centred forgiveness and grace looks like in ways I have to confess I don’t think I show.
Perhaps even more challenging for me (I actually hope for all of us) is that we so easily hold onto grievances that are insignificant and almost petty – a wrong word spoken in the wrong time, an action (taken or not taken) that leaves us feeling hurt and let down (hopefully you get the idea!) – that we allow to fester and poison our families, our friendships and our communities of faith.
In comparison with the Abdallah’s, the things that I refuse to forgive (of others and myself) seem quite small, yet I still hang on to them to my detriment and to the detriment of those I love.
I am in no way trying to make light of the pain and grief that we can, and do, inflict on one another – the Abdallah’s remind us that their grief continues and will for the rest of their lives. But what they have chosen to do is to not allow the unforgiveness and desire for retribution to define who they are as they recognise that the only outcome of doing so is despair and destruction.
I believe that our communities desperately need to see and experience places of deep forgiveness and grace. That is the place that the Christian church is intended to have – not perfect, but seeking to be “more like Jesus” every day! When we hold onto unforgiveness we extinguish the light of hope that only Jesus can offer and we lose our reason for being.
So:
• Who (and what) do you need to forgive?
• Who do you need to seek forgiveness from?
It’s desperately difficult, but we will never be whole until we choose to forgive as Jesus forgives us.
Paul wrote to the church in Colossae:
Make allowance for each other’s faults and forgive anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others. (Colossians 3:13, NLT)
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