Forgiveness
Beloved,
I know that starting over is hard, but it’s even more difficult when you are holding on to hurt from the past. Every year, you make plans and promises to youself and to God–about what you are going to do, how much how often we are going to read the bible, etc, etc. But if there is 1 promise that you should keep this season, it is learning to forgive. If you truly want to let the past be the past, then you have to FORGIVE.
The bible tells us clear instructions on how to forgive, but before I get into that I want to talk about the need for forgiveness. Forgiveness does not stop at “saying sorry”. (Hello Somebody) I know a lot of times when you do something wrong, you think that just saying “sorry” will make everything right, but that is not true. In fact most of the time, saying sorry is really about making ourselves feel Good.
REAL forgiveness requires work, REAL forgiveness requires changed behavior. REAL forgiveness takes time.
3 BIBLICAL STEPS TO FORGIVENESS
1. Analyze Your Emotions
Ask yourself the hard questions. Am I easily offended? Did this person mean to hurt me? Is there a chance this was an accident? Going through these questions internally will help you get to the roots of what truly happened. The Bible tells us in Philippians 2:3, ‘value others above yourselves.’ This Scripture shines a light on the fact that we struggle with this daily. We have to hold each other above ourselves and part of doing that requires us to think about the other person. Maybe the offender had no idea they harmed you or offended you by their words or actions. This isn’t always the case, but oftentimes people aren’t even aware of what they do.
2. Pray for Your Offender
The Bible is very clear on how we are to treat offenders in this life. Matthew 5:44 says, ‘love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.’ This is an easy verse to read, but not an easy verse to practice. Loving people that have inflicted harm onto us is impossible without the power of God’s love and forgiveness working through us. We must remember that God is sovereign and He will right the wrongs. It’s not our job to right the wrongs done by people. It’s only God’s place to do so. Praying for those who have hurt us and offended us requires us to tap into the power and love that God possesses. A fake prayer for someone you dislike isn’t pleasing to the Lord and it’s not fooling Him either.
3. Realize God Has Forgiven You
In Matthew 18:21-35, Jesus warns us about the unforgiving servant. Jesus goes as far as to call that servant ‘wicked.’ I encourage you to read the passage for yourself. The point is God has forgiven us of our sin and we need to transcend that forgiveness to other people. People often confuse forgiveness for trust, acceptance or condoning behavior and these ideas of forgiveness is far from the Biblical truth of forgiveness. You can forgive someone without being okay with what had happened, you can forgive someone without trusting that person for a long time or ever. When we keep in mind just how much God has forgiven us, we will be better equipped to forgive others.
Bishop Autie Hines, Pastor