WHAT IS FORGIVENESS?

The hurt and disappointment was eating me alive. I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t eat. I didn’t laugh. I seemed fixated, almost hour-by-hour, on this powerful sense of injustice. It had a stranglehold on me. A deep-seated bitterness was on the verge of suffocating me.

Forgiveness wasn’t even on the horizon. Just thinking the word would put a knot in my stomach.

Maybe you are like me, maybe not.

When I have been deeply hurt, resentful thoughts flood my consciousness like an overflowing toilet. These cruddy feelings rob me of day-to-day freedom and can be spill all over the place and hurt the people I love. But they are not that easy to flush away.

After all, it doesn’t seem fair to let an offense go especially when the offender doesn’t want to apologize for it. What’s the deal? Don’t we teach little kids to “say you’re sorry” when they have done something wrong?

It’s only right. But too often in life, it’s not the norm.

Honestly, true forgiveness of others may be the hardest thing I have ever done. The deeper the sense of wrong and betrayal, the more difficult it is to do. But don’t forget why we forgive. It is to gain freedom for ourselves too.

We need to move beyond the hurt for the right reasons. Don’t fool yourself or try to manipulate the other person with appropriate actions or words. Forgiveness is an attitude of the heart. Revisit your motives for forgiving to strengthen your resolve to do it.

What does it mean to forgive?

It does include putting a stop to both the angry feelings and acts of resentment for any hurt they have caused. It’s easier said than done. But there’s more.

Forgiveness involves the clear decision of cancelling a debt that we feel is owed to us. We want them to pay. Inside, we desperately want them to admit what they did was wrong, feel remorse over the hurt caused, make a sincere apology to us, and take steps to fix things where they can. We feel we are owed these things. That’s their debt.

It would be so good if they took responsibility and paid what is due – so freeing for us– but this course of action is sadly so unlikely.

It would be so much easier for us to forgive if they took these steps. But the offender may never see things the way we do and we could wait indefinitely for them to get on board. What if they never get to the point of initiating an apology to you?

Then you are stuck with an overflowing toilet.

That’s why we pay their debt. Forgiveness is our step. It is choosing to let go of our need for validation and justice. It is releasing the offender from the hurt they have caused and from their responsibility to make things right. We can’t wait for them to get their heart right, ask for an apology or to make amends. We can’t wait for them at all.

At the core, forgiveness is a heart change that frees both you and the other from what you feel they owe you. You lay the offense down.

It is a very hard thing to do.

Remember, forgiveness is not a step, it is a process – a series of steps all confirming the initial decision to release the person. In all honesty, I’ve had to revisit my decision to forgive many times, sometimes 2 or 3 times in a day. It is an act of the will. You choose to live out forgiveness in spite of tough memories returning and hard feelings resurfacing.

By the way, I have found that God is more than willing to help any of us out. He Himself forgives so well. He can bring perspective, courage and strength to forgive. Ask Him...I did.

Pass this along to a friend. Stay tuned for Why should I Forgive...

Leave your comment below. I would like to hear from you.