What if grace is something that we impart on behalf of God— not just something God imparts?

— for the past few years or so I’ve studied PTSD + Moral Injury (guilt + shame). A lot of people we think are struggling with the first actual carry the second.

Here’s what’s odd— sacred and secular practicioners all agree the 2nd group needs to hear the words “You’re forgiven. You’re accepted. It’s the past.”

And others even need the words “I love you.”

Who has such authority to gift these words?

It depends on the person who needs it. It might be:

A pastor, a priest, or a rabbi
A former coach
An officer or soldier someone served with- or even people who served that they don’t know personally
Someone else they perceive as an authority
It must be someone they believe, sense, or feel has the authority to impart forgiveness. It is at this point the healing process often begins.

If you come from a faith tradition like me, you might have just winced a bit when I suggested that coaches and soldiers and teachers and anyone else can dispense forgiveness. I know, that sounds strange.

But… during Jesus’ ministry, the Pharisees regularly scolded Him for forgiving people. In their mind, only God could do that.

In response, at the end of His time on earth, Jesus did something incredibly interesting. We find it in John 20.

After they discovered the empty tomb, the disciples hid in the Upper Room- afraid they might be killed, too. **Jesus appeared to them behind the locked doors, showing that our emotional duress (i.e., even fear itself) doesn’t hinder Him from finding us. **

John tells us He breathed the Holy Spirit upon them.

Then, He declared, “If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld” (John 20:23 ESV).

Clearly, He expanded the power of imparting forgiveness farther and wider than the religious elite of the day dreamed possible. Not only could God in Heaven forgive sins, but His Son certainly could (Mark 2:10-11). And not only could that Son forgive sins, but all the King’s sons and daughters could.

Perhaps this is why Jesus said that “all men will know you are My disciples… by the way you love one another” (see John 13:34-35).

Love communicates something nothing else can. Love is the greatest revelation possible to an unbelieving or desperately-wanting-to-believe world. Love creates sacred space where much-needed healing happens.

(And, remember, sacred and secular professionals alike agree that freedom is found in forgiveness.)