ouch . forgiving isn’t fun sometimes. It makes me uncomfy, does it make you uncomfy? It makes us find vulnerability and honesty within ourselves and that can really hurt. Last week we dove into the topic of forgiveness here in Gainesville. It hit hard. Our cool friend Dion got to bring the word on Forgiveness and I felt like he was reading my thoughts. You can relate to that right? When the speaker just reaches into your soul and starts to dig up the emotions that are rooted inside of you? It really felt like he opened up my heart and started plowing at my comforts.
One of the points Dion made was, God can’t remember our sin. Psalm 103:2-3, 8-12 says,
Praise the Lord, my soul, and forget not all his benefits— who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases… The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love. He will not always accuse, nor will he harbor his anger forever; he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.
Wow! It’s so cool to think that our forgiveness towards others is possible because of the price He paid. With that price He buried/forgot the sin of all those who follow Him! Ephesians 1:7 says, In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace.” so cool.
So, God forgives me. My sins are forgiven, now I walk in freedom. How does that change the way I forgive? In Matthew 6(the Lord’s prayer) it says, “forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us, “ did you read that? Read it again. The forgiveness we extend is directly connected to the grace of God. “Yeshua, do not extend grace to me when I do not extend grace to others…?? Crazy. One thing that really hit me is that FORGIVENESS IS OUR DUTY as followers of Christ. This responsibility is a blessing. Do they need my forgiveness? Nah. Yet what picture of Christ am I setting when I choose not to? Yikes.
When I choose to not forgive, I am putting this burden, this weight, on the person I’m not forgiving. When I don’t forgive, it’s me looking at them and seeing a huge ‘WRONG’ sign over their head. When I don’t forgive I am not calling people higher and being the sister and Christ I’m called to be.
But i don’t wanna… ya know?
It hecking hurts to forgive the people who aren’t sorry. It’s hard. There’s no sugar coating that it sucks. Yet, think about the freedom(what my next post is going to be about)! I know the impact, the power and the wonder of God’s grace in my life and I wanna be PUMPED about showing that Grace to others. WOW. I get to partner with Christ and share the testimony of His goodness when I show the same forgiveness He shows me. What the heck! I want to be a part of that! I want to choose forgiveness for His sake! That does not deny the emotional pain that comes with forgiving someone, but man do I delight in that pain because the Lord is doing good things through it. Also, I had to stop holding that “WRONG” sign over my head. I had to forgive myself. The Lord allows me to walk in His freedom so I’m going to stop holding myself back from that.
So today I choose forgiveness. Today I choose to forgive as He forgave me. Today I choose to forgive myself. I don’t know what I’ll do tomorrow. My mind and flesh may give into unforgiveness, but the Lord won’t change. The fact that He bore my sins and the sins of those who have done wrong against won’t change. So today I’m going to lean into that.
