I have 10 days left before I am on a plane to Atlanta, Georgia. I have been preparing to let go…I am letting go of A LOT of things– my career, holidays at home, celebrating with friends, being involved in certain projects in this next year, my favorite clothes, my comfy bed, etc. And lately, I have been holding on to something that I REALLY need to let go of. The last few years of my life have been filled with so much hurt. Yes, I have been deeply hurt by others but I have also hurt some people I really cared about. I have held on to that hurt and let it consume me in bitterness or drown me in guilt.
There are days where I don’t know how I am going to shake the overwhelming pain I find myself drowning in. There are days where I don’t know if I’ll make it through the whole day; days where I just want to hide away from the ugliness of the world.
But there is a word that I have been reading a lot about– “grace.”
The truth is, I may never be able to express how sorry I am to those I have hurt and I may never get the chance to hear the apology that I falsely believe will bring me closure. I have been clearing out some texts, e-mails, documents, clothes, etc. to prepare to leave, and I found this letter that I had e-mailed to myself in 2015.
I tried to google different parts of this letter to see if I could find where it came from. Maybe I did write it, I’m not really sure. But, as I was reading it, I just felt like some of us could benefit from the words of this letter:
I Grace You
Forgiveness. It is the hardest thing to do in the world. How do you find the courage to forgive someone who has put you down, abandoned you, deceived you, betrayed you, and hurt you?
There is a secret. That secret is simple: see the person who hurt you as God’s son or daughter—someone Jesus loved enough to hang on a Roman cross for.
When it comes to your brothers and sisters in Christ, remember that they are a child of God, a fellow worker in His kingdom, so they are still worthy and important to God. You, too are a child of God and we are here to help each other become more like Jesus. Which means we need to be more like Jesus. And in order to do that, to be more like Jesus, your attitude needs to be an example of one word: Grace.
Can anyone explain what grace means? Grace means getting and giving what we don’t deserve. Grace heals.
This does not always mean that you forget that someone has wronged you or hurt you. But the beauty of grace is forgiveness and the attitude of forgiveness says “I’m giving up my right to retaliate—my right to hurt you back”. People have probably given you many reasons to withdraw or to fight but you’re going to just let it go…let it go… You’re going to cancel that debt.
But forgiveness is more than just cancelling that debt. Real forgiveness also includes reestablishing an appropriate relationship. It doesn’t mean that you have to be foolish and stupid in repeating the same mistakes with the same person. It simply means that you are constantly willing to say “I forgive you. I grace you.”
Colossians 3:13- Bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.
Matthew 18:21-22 Then Peter came up and said to Him, “Lord how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?” Jesus said to Him, “I do not say to you seven times, but seventy times seven.”
If you have been hurt or hurt someone, you might have the beautiful opportunity to talk to that person and to reestablish a relationship or to at least give or be given grace.
Matthew 5:23 Suppose you are offering your gift at the altar. And you remember that your brother or sister has something against you. Leave your gift in front of the altar. First go and make peace with them. Then come back and offer your gift.
It is God’s design that we talk and we try to mend things but there may come a time where you don’t have the chance to talk or to mend things. Sometimes you just have to forgive 1,000 times over and you won’t hear them apologize. But that is grace. Remember that grace comes from God and He can give you the grace you need to be forgiven and to forgive.
So, today I am realizing I need to let go of my ideas of what forgiveness is because it is not just for those I have believed to have hurt me– it is for me, too. Forgiveness is grace.
What things do you have to let go of today? What is holding you back from experiencing Papa with freedom?
// It’ll clear the bitterness away // It can even set a prisoner free // There is no end to what its power can do // So let it go and be amazed by what you see through eyes of grace // The prisoner that it really frees is you //
