"Sometimes justice deferred is absolutely justified."
Again, the heart of mercy sees through the actions and circumstances that surround a person and sees the person as a being created by a loving God in a spirit of joyful anticipation of a magnificent, eternal, meaningful destiny.
In this context, what do we do with the offenses a person commits in our lives or within our field of vision? Mercy understands that 'hurt people hurt people'. In other words, the injury and damage caused by someone is nothing more than an indication of how they have been hurt by someone else. Mercy drives compassion to reach through those things and help to heal the subject's wounds, knowing that a whole, healed person does not injure or damage others.
But what if the offense is really bad, the injury is great and the damage is extensive and quantifiable? Shouldn't the offender be punished or make restitution? Is there no justice? Am I not entitled to receive compensation and recovery for the injuries I sustained by another? Am I not entitled to hate people for what they've done to me?
These questions are out of bounds for a merciful heart. The questions make no sense whatsoever.
When we can learn to see situations the way Mercy sees them, we will begin to understand what forgiveness is. Forgiveness is a deference of what I am entitled to, or what justice demands, for the sake of something greater, something more meaningful and more important than my compensation. Forgiveness is a setting aside of clearly wrong things in order to attain or create really right, pure, redeemed, perfect things.
So what is the the greater, more meaningful, more important, really right, pure and perfect thing that forgiveness defers to?
A transformed person. Someone who is transformed by compassion, whose wounds are healed, whose mind is renewed, whose conscience is cleansed, who has been born again and is now a new creature. Someone in whom old things are dead and all things have become new. This is the outcome that Christ made possible when he shed his blood. And this is the outcome that mercy sees from the beginning, even before the offenses and injuries take place.
And there is no down side to mercy. If someone rejects mercy and the compassion it delivers to them, their judgement is already clear. God is not mocked, and justice is not lost. If justice deferred creates something good, the deferment that mercy instigates is justified. If the good thing will not be created or redeemed, justice is still justice.
Thus unforgiveness is an issue that makes no sense in the context of mercy. This has nothing to do with the reason we should forgive. Forgiveness is in our best interest. Unforgiveness is harmful to us, and causes damage of its own, separate and apart from whatever offence was committed against us.
Nonetheless, it is good to understand how forgiveness (the deference of justice) fits into the mechanics of mercy and compassion and the transformation of people into all that they were created to be from the beginning. And it is good to be able to participate in that process intentionally by choosing mercy over justice, and forgiveness over bitterness.