From a blog originally posted on October 9, 2016

I grew up in rural northern Indiana, where there was a fairly large Amish population. I admired them for their hard work, skills as cooks, craftsmen and farmers, and their tolerance of all the tourists that buzzed around them like bees. I admired the way they let faith help them live their Christian lives. This admiration was strengthened by an article I discovered recently.

On October 2, 2006 in Nickel Mines, PA (near Lancaster) Charles Roberts walked into an Amish one-room schoolhouse and shot 10 little girls, killing five. He then killed himself. His parents thought they would have to move from the small community because of the horror wrought by their son. However, a few hours later an Amish man arrived saying that the Amish community in general, and the parents of the girls in particular, didn’t feel any ill will towards the Roberts. They did not blame them for the deaths. Rather, they viewed the Roberts as grieving parents.

At the funeral of Charles Roberts, about half the mourners were Amish. Thirty of them formed a wall to screen the family from the prying media. In ten years since the shooting, the Amish community has accepted the Roberts, almost as part of their fellowship. When Mrs. Roberts was fighting breast cancer, one of the girls who survived the shooting came and cleaned her house. Some Amish men built a sun room onto the Roberts’ home. The Roberts have felt blessed because of the love of their Amish neighbors and have put up a plaque naming the new sunroom “Forgiven.”

Why do the Amish forgive? It’s an individual and automatic decision. A father of one of the girls said, “Forgiveness means giving up the right to revenge.” To the Amish, forgiveness is a religious obligation. They say the strongest reason is given in the Lord’s Prayer: “Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.” That is, part of repentance is forgiving others. We should emulate the Amish and let our faith put forgiveness on automatic pilot. We should then continue to forgive, again like the Amish. Recall that Jesus told Peter to forgive seventy-seven times (i.e. times without number).

Read Matthew 18:21-35, and remember: God loves YOU unconditionally.

Jim