The Old Sofa

My friend, Amarilis, tells me that while she was still living in her native Cuba, she went to visit her sister in Havana. Her sister was highly skilled in upholstery and had recently come by a grand old sofa. She proudly showed it to Amarilis, declaring, “You wait and see what I’m going to do to this sofa. I’ll leave it like new!” And so it was that when Amarilis went back to visit her sister some months later, she was shocked to find what looked to her like a brand-new sofa. It even smelled new! Her sister’s skillful hands had transformed the old, tattered sofa into a work of art. But during those times in Cuba, a beautiful possession like that could awaken both admiration and envy from one’s neighbors, who might be inclined to report them to the authorities.

As Amarilis and her sister were admiring the renewed sofa, someone knocked at the front door. When they opened it, there stood a government inspector! As the family stood in stunned silence, waiting to see what would happen, the inspector began to walk parsimoniously around the living room.

Every time he came to the sofa, he’d say, “My, what a beautiful sofa! It looks so new.” Amarilis and her sister traded furtive glances, just waiting for the command to remove the “new” sofa and take it away. Just then, Amarilis’s seven-year-old nephew approached the inspector and said, “Sir, the sofa you see is new, but the old one is still there, underneath!” With that, the inspector sheepishly excused himself and walked out the door. This child, in all his innocence, called out a problem that many of us adults have when it comes to forgiveness: We forgive but leave the old resentments lurking “underneath.” An upholstered forgiveness, as it were. In the parable of the two debtors in Matthew 18, the first debtor was completely forgiven of everything —no strings attached. That is how God forgives. Micah 7:18 reminds us that when God forgives, He erases our sin. He doesn’t forgive half-heartedly or keep recalling those mistakes of ours. No! Our heavenly Father forgives with His whole heart, including forgetting that at one time there was an old sofa under there!

Lourdes E. Morales-Gudmundsson