Revenge Fuel

Welcome to Scattered Moments, and this one is called Revenge Fuel. If you are looking for a ransom, I can tell you I don't have money, but what I do have are a very particular set of skills. Heyman had everything going for him. He had the promotion, he had the title, he was the guy on the board everybody wanted to cozy up to because he had the money, he had the influence, a large family, and enough political clout to make most people in the kingdom nervous. If Heyman had a LinkedIn profile, his profile would probably be kind of exhausting. Heyman, senior advisor to the king, strategic leader, influencer, visionary. And everybody bowed down when he walked by. Well, almost everybody. There was this one guy. There's always one guy, right? Mordecai. Mordecai apparently didn't get them. Every day Heyman would walk through the king's gate and the people would bow, heads would lower. All those plotits and kudos, and there sat Mordecai. No bow, no salute, no good morning, Heyman, nothing. And so that's what drove Haman absolutely crazy. That's what makes the story almost humorous, if it weren't so tragic. Haman had thousands of people honoring him, but he couldn't enjoy any of it because one guy wouldn't cooperate. In Esther 5, Heyman goes home and gives his family basically a TED talk. I'm rich, I'm important, the king likes me, I've been promoted, the queen invited me to dinner, things are going fantastic. And then he says, in essence, but none of it matters as long as I see that Mordecai sitting at the king's gate. There it is. The seed of revenge. One person has offended me, and suddenly that person becomes larger than every blessing in my life. So Haman does what angry people have been doing for thousands of years. He develops a scheme. He orchestrates. Except Haman doesn't send a nasty text. He doesn't fire off an angry tweet. He doesn't post one of those vague social media messages that says, funny how some people eventually show their true colors. No, Haman built a gallow, a very large gallow, because apparently when Haman held a grudge, he believed in infrastructure. The plan was simple. Mordecai would die. See what I did there? And Haman would finally feel vindicated. The offense would be settled. The world would be right again, except it didn't work that way. The gallows Haman built for Mordecai eventually became the gallows used for Haman. And that is the strange thing about revenge. We always think we're building something for the other person: a trap, a humiliation, a reckoning, a moment when everybody finally realizes that we were the ones who were right. But revenge has a strange way of turning around on the person who built it. Sometimes the gallows we construct for someone else become prisons for our own souls. There is a pernicious seed buried deep in the human heart. We see it everywhere. Movies, books, television shows, even 30-second commercials, and there's no telling how much money we've all shelled out at the box office just to see the hero finally stick it to the man. We love to see evil geniuses outsmarted by the victimized underdog. The music swells, the truth is revealed, the good guy rides off into the sunset, the innocent are vindicated, the villain lies vanquished in the wreckage of his own wicked plans, and we smile. Revenge triumphs once again. Most of our myths and legends seem to whisper the same message. Revenge is sweet. There's only one problem though. Revenge. It doesn't work. Maybe it works in Hollywood, especially if you're Harrison Ford or Liam Neeson. Maybe there really is some particular set of skills developed over a long career that can make everything right before the credit rolls. But real life doesn't have closing credits. Sure it has plenty of outtakes, but no closing credits. We have to wake up the next morning. And revenge, well, let's face it, it has a terrible aftertaste. Our culture seems to run on revenge fuel. Angry posts, public gotcha questions, political insults, family feuds, church conflict, workplace grudges, verbal combat, sometimes even physical violence. Someone hurt us, we hurt them back, they retaliate, we escalate. Around and around it goes. But here's a little bit of the fine print in the true book of wisdom. Vengeance is mine. I will repay, says the Lord. You see, vengeance belongs to God, not because injustice doesn't matter, no. It matters enormously. Not because evil should simply be ignored, and no, it shouldn't. But because God alone is righteous enough to judge without being corrupted by judgment. I'm definitely not. And sorry, neither are you. Because revenge fuel eventually gunks up the soul. We replay the insult. We rehearse the conversation, rewrite the ending, imagine what we should have said, plan what we still might do someday. And before long, the person who injured you gets to, as they say, live rent-free in your head. And it will definitely bake your noodle. Haman had everything, but because one man would not bow, everything felt like nothing. He had one guy. That may be one of the greatest dangers of resentment. One person's offense becomes larger than all of God's blessing. And so the next time I find myself marinating in some delicious little scheme of revenge, I'm going to look somewhere else. He's going to look to Calvary. Look to the one truly righteous man who had every right to condemn those who mocked him, beat him, falsely accused him, uh drove nails through his hands and hung him on a cross and listened to what he says. Father, forgive them. Jesus never compromised the truth. He never pretended evil was good. He never surrendered his identity, but neither did he allow the hatred of his enemies to determine the condition of his soul. That is strength. That is courage. That is freedom. Not the power to destroy enemies, but the strength to refuse to become like them.