Forgiveness: noun: forgiveness; plural
noun: forgiveness’s
the action or process of forgiving or being forgiven.
Often, we are told that fear is powerful enough to keep us from attaining
our goals and living our best lives. But it's not always fears ... sometimes a
thing that holds us back is forgiveness. This morning's message during service
was titled "Let's Straighten it Out" in which the Pastor spoke about
forgiveness. Many people say that they can't forgive because they don't
feel it. Huh? What is it about forgiveness that we must feel? For a long time,
it’s how my mind operated and during service Pastor said something that struck
a nerve and made me say “WOW!” His words were:
FORGIVENESS IS NOT A
FEELING. FORGIVENESS IS A PROMISE!
Think about it as such ... it's like trusting God or waking
up in the morning. God wants both of these for us no matter how we feel, and he
wants forgiveness in the same way. After all, hasn't HE forgiven us (and continues
to daily at that) and we probably haven't earned it either.
A wrongful perspective that many of us have about forgiveness is
that forgiveness looks too much like letting people off when in fact it is not!
But sometimes if letting people off is the price that we pay for having
peaceful co-existence then so be it. We imagine that getting even is an
end to it. But often it only formulates the ground for a new set of
resentments, and so the wheel of anger, bitter and violence just keeps on
spinning. Forgiving others who have harmed us is one of the most important
things we will ever do.
“Our happiness, or lack
of it, rises and falls on whether we choose to forgive.”
We struggle to forgive because of the misconceptions that we have
about forgiveness.
What forgiveness is and
what it entails is:
- Choosing to stop
nourishing the anger and resentment toward the person who hurt you but
letting out your hurt in a positive way.
- Letting all
judgments toward the person who has hurt you be handled by God.
- Actually,
getting to the place where you can say to the person who harmed you, I
wish for you a blessing on your life.
- Giving up your
rights to get even.
- NOT USING THE
PAST AGAINST THEM ONCE YOU HAVE CHOSEN TO FORGIVE!
In that same token let’s also be clear that forgiveness can be many different things to many different people but let me tell you WHAT forgiveness is NOT:
- To forgive is to
excuse or ignore the other person's actions.
If you could reason to justify the behavior of the person who hurt
you, then damn it forgiveness is not necessary.
- Forgiveness will
fix the relationship between you and the person who hurt you.
LIES!!!! Forgiveness doesn't inevitably heal anything
... Just because you forgive someone, doesn’t mean you have to trust that
person again. ‘Forgiveness is a gift we give to others. Trust is something that
is earned.’
- To forgive, I
must feel forgiving.
There go them damn feelings again! We let our emotional state
dictate just about everything we do. Many things in life we must do as an
act of our will. IF we act right, our feelings will follow. Again ... "Forgiveness
is NOT a feeling. Forgiveness is a promise!"
- Once we forgive
someone, they have the same rights and privileges they had before the
situation occurred. Forgiveness will make everything be the same
again!!!
The reality is, even if you choose to forgive someone, and the
relationship is healing, things still will never be the same again.
- Forgiveness
makes the person who is doing the forgiving weak.
- To forgive is to
forget.
Let me repeat this for the people in the back ……
TO FORGIVE ... IS NOT TO FORGET!!!!!
Nowhere in the Bible does God tell us to FORGIVE & FORGET ... God just tells us to forgive. Forgiving others does not remove the memory of them violating you, hurting you, disrespecting you, lying on you, cheating on you or any of the above. It is because we remember that the need for forgiveness is real. (SO REAL) I can admit to being someone who struggles with forgiveness because my thought of it was, well how can I forgive if I can't forget? But the ugly reality that I am learning is when we choose to forgive someone we are not saying that we weren’t hurt or that you will ever forget that hurt because indeed it did happen; and the reality is that we can forgive, even if we still remember. But with forgiveness and time, that hurt will disappear. Forgiveness is not forgetting, avoiding, or excusing what has happened. You don’t have to feel forgiving to forgive someone and just because we choose to forgive someone, it doesn’t mean we won’t ever get upset and have to make the choice to forgive them again. BUT LET ME BE CLEAR … It also doesn’t mean our relationships must go back the way it was and sometimes the relationships are left just with that; forgiveness. Just because we learn forgiveness doesn't mean we have to allow the other person back into our lives to do things all over again. Learn to forgive, then move on. In spite of all these things we must forgive, and no one ever said that forgiving others is easy. BECAUSE IT IS NOT!!! Someone once said, “Not to forgive imprisons me in the past and locks out all potential for change. I thus yield control to another, my enemy, and doom myself to suffer the consequences of the wrong.”
Forgiveness has incredible power.
The spirit of un-forgiveness and bitterness toward those who have
hurt us is toxic to our soul and destroys any chance for a life of peace and
happiness. One thing that comes with being unable to forgive others is we
eventually build a wall and the problem with that is when you build a
wall, no one gets in, but you do not get out either. Thus,
you miss all that’s going on around you, all because you can’t let something
go. So many of us are afraid to forgive because we are worried as to who or
what we will be without the hate, unforgiveness, anger, and hostility in our lives.
Some of us live our whole lives surrounded with unforgiveness, hatred, anger,
resentment, and bitterness, so much so that we can't see or be anything else.
Don’t let yourself become emotionally and spiritually exhausted by refusing to
forgive. Remember: ‘Forgiveness is a promise, not a feeling’. We must
choose to forgive, then we must practice it. The lives we live, our
losses, our wins, etc. is what makes us who we are. The experiences we have had
develops us into who we are now and/or who we are yet to become. But, to be the
best at being us, we need to allow the anger, bitter, hate and unforgiveness to
go. It is a silent killer. Stress,
depression, stroke, etc. all caused by unforgiveness. To truly live, we must
allow the process of unforgiveness to start. Being able to forgive is one
of the strongest assets we possess. It will always prove that we are stronger
than the person who hurt us.
“The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the
attribute of the strong.”
Mahatma Gandhi
