Have you ever done something that you know is wrong but convince yourself that it's alright? (I bet your feeling guilty right now. So am I.) We've all done it. We tell ourselves that it's not that bad. It won't hurt anyone, right? Or maybe you just have to do it or else everything will fall apart. How desperate do we have to get to exact revenge?
I can't tell you how many times I've just let hurtful words or wrongful actions done to me stay in the back of my mind. I'll conjure it up in my mind again and again, hoping that somehow I can deliver the justice that I so longed for. Yet my intentions are anything but righteous. I want to cause as much pain as I can. (Don't look at me with that horrified expression. You've done the same thing.)
Edmond Dantes, in The Count of Monte Cristo, sets out to exact revenge on all his enemies after they dealt out injustice to him. He devotes more than half of his life to ruin those who imprisoned him and kept him from marrying his love. Also we see Count Morcef (also known as Fernand who was one of the main offenders) being exposed for his crimes. Two other men who played a large part in Edmund Dantes suffering also come to ruin from the hands of Dantes. As Alexander Dumas so quaintly stated "Moral wounds have this peculiarity - they may be hidden, but they never close; always painful, always ready to bleed when touched, they remain fresh and open in the heart"(The Count of Monte Cristo). Edmund kept living for the exact moment in time when he could repay the evil done to him onto his enemies.
We all may hide but come to find that in hiding, the wrong just festers, burrowing deep into our souls. It becomes a poison to our souls. Those choices we make can cause more damage than if we let it go and give our injustice to God, who deals justice onto the wicked. In the end, Edmund realizes (as we should) that it's not his place to exact justice on his enemies.
So next time you feel like you can't go one more minute without exacting revenge, pray about it. Ask God to take away your feelings of injustice and replace them with forgiveness. As Romans 12:19 says, "'Vengence is mine I will repay' says the Lord" (NKJV).
