We were asked to write an essay called “This I Believe” about what really matters to us, as preparation for this world missions adventure called the World Race. This is what I believe…
This I believe…that forgiveness must be exercised. Luke 6:37 “…Forgive, and you will be forgiven…” Over the last year the Lord has been teaching me many things, one such thing is that of forgiveness. Here is what I have learned thus far, and I have much yet to learn. Forgiveness is this incredible gift that the Lord has given to us in our relationship with Him as well as to practice in our relationships with others, and I do mean practice. You see, only the Lord can forgive perfectly as He demonstrated in His love for us by dying on the cross. In this powerful act of love, He removed the penalty of our sin, which is ultimately death, from us and restored us to relationship with him; a beautiful act of forgiveness.
Now we need to practice using this gift, as the only way to get better at something is to practice. Think of it as baking for the first time. No doubt you will make some mistakes, a few measurements will be a little off but in the end you will have something that resembles a cookie. Now if you stick to it and exercise your baking gifts, your cookies will become more and more tasty. Just as with forgiveness we increase our measure of humility and dependence upon God while decreasing our measure of bitterness and anger. The more we practice forgiveness, the more we allow the healing power of Christ into our lives. As we allow our hearts to be healed, it becomes easier to extend forgiveness.
Let us not forget that the person being forgiven benefits greatly as well. Being forgiven is an opportunity to receive Christ’s amazing love as we are all sinners and in need of a great savior. It is a most humbling experience to find out that you have unknowingly wronged a friend and hurt them. In such an experience I can truly see that there is nothing good in me alone, Maithili a created being. Rather it is only Christ in me that makes me good and gives me a desire to do good. Receiving forgiveness has brought me to great depths of gratitude not just to the friend, but ultimately to my Jesus. I know there is much more to learn about forgiveness and I am thankful what the Lord has taught me.
