In the past I’ve been the participant in very bad things.
Hurt-filled, pride-swept victimizing,
vengeful, pain-inducing things.
Bitter actions.
Yet, I’ve been the recipient of messy grace,
wild mercy,
and uncalled-for love.
There is nothing redemptive about stealing, or hate, or betrayal. It is never right and it always destroys and kills.
[This is what I used to think]
Except forgiveness.
I’m learning that in wrong, even in the worst of all betrayals there is still a good to come, that forgiveness is God’s way of reclaiming the wrong in the world.
It allows the person whose job it is to forgive the chance to grow and change. The wrong, even as evil as it is, can be redeemed in the heart of the forgiver.
But a person has to forgive. He has to get past the wound.
It’s vital. If not, that wrong thing stays where it is and does what it was born to do: stealing, hurting, embittering.
But forgiveness gives you a one-up on the hurt. You can allow your heart to be stretched and fed and matured by opening up yourself to forgive.
That is what my husband did for me. And continues to do every time he thinks about our lives before 6 years ago. In some huge way, he (and everyone else who has participated in forgiving me) has helped to redeem the evil and make some good come from my horrible choices.
Forgiveness changes a soul. It makes you into someone you used not to be.
And forgiveness can also completely alter the heart-landscape of the person you are forgiving. Remember that when you feel like withholding the one thing that can buy back all the evil the hurt has caused.
Today there is grace to be given and there is hurt to be redeemed.
How has forgiveness changed you?
Just recently I forgave an Elder that constantly gave my husband so much grief over small insignificant things. My husband was Senior Pastor. I saw what my husband went through; he disagreed with EVERYTHING. Sorry to say it has been 29 years ago.
Now, the freedom because of the forgiving, makes me pray that this man and his family are being blessed. I thought I would never pray that prayer, but that’s grace pouring down on me! I wouldn’t trade anything in the world for feeling so FREE! Definitely a load lifted. It changed me to trust Deacon Boards.
i love that idea: grace “pouring” down. its such a beautiful thing to think about, isn’t it?
The biggest thing forgiveness has taught me is by my husband forgiving me when I had an affair almost 6 years ago.
His forgiveness and love for me has given me a glimpse of how God forgives and loves. Just amazing.
It was his kindness and HIS kindness that led me to repentance.
that is one of my favorite truths – that His kindness leads us to repentance.
Thanks for this, Sarah. I really…REALLY…needed to hear this today. I am leaving in a few minutes to serve on a retreat weekend, and I am so excited about it. One minute, I feel overflowing love for God and these ladies who will be attending, and my heart is burdened for them. And then, in the very next minute…my thoughts go to woundss and anger and hate for someone who wrecked my life last year (leading me to break off our engagement!). How can those two things exist — love and anger/hate? They can’t. I want to break free from my woundedness and lay it down before HIM. It’s a process. I’m willing. I’m trying. I’m seeking. But it’s hard. Thanks for speaking Truth this morning. I just love you, girl!
the only thing that has helped us in this (both my husband and I) is to remember that Christ was wounded far more than ever possible here on planet earth.
sometimes that’s the only thing that helps. i will pray for you as you serve this weekend. =)
Recently a situation arose where I was able to see a battle my husband and I have been fighting throughout our marriage from the outside. I was able to see, through the pain of another couple, just how much God has done to bring about true forgiveness in our relationship. The hardest part about forgiveness when you’re the forgiver is being willing to give up your right to be hurt and angry. If I forgive, that means I have to move on and can’t entertain my injured feelings. It means that you have to deal with the mess, walk through the muck and allow Him to clean it all away.
But after watching that other couple struggle, I realized just how much better it is to forgive.
“The hardest part about forgiveness when you’re the forgiver is being willing to give up your right to be hurt and angry. If I forgive, that means I have to move on and can’t entertain my injured feelings.”
That IS the hardest part.
But it is better to pursue that – I can attest to that one.
our marriage is forgiveness. that’s our big picture.
him forgiving me.
me forgiving him.
it’s life to us.
i agree. it has to happen if moving on is a possibility. we were stuck in the nasty~ness of it all for months because forgiveness was not flowing freely. (some days it’s a choice to be done over and over and over again) what a difference it makes.
i’m forever grateful for forgiveness. i’m with you, sarah.
it did ‘alter my heart-landscape’, that’s for sure.
oh! isn’t it a daily choice?? yes. i agree with you wholeheartedly.
i have to had to face forgiveness…because when we forgive, it really helps our souls.
absolutely.
Um – I wish I hadn’t read your post just now.
Or attended church this past weekend.
Or read the parts of Crazy Love that I just finished last night.
I wish I didn’t have to believe that forgiveness is not optional if I love God. If I want to be obedient to God.
I am having a rather difficult time (vast understatement) forgiving a person who has caused me unspeakable hurt.
I. Don’t. Want. To.
And – how do you “forgive” someone who never asks?
Is that different?
Can I get a “free pass” on that one?
Lacey, I understand the difficulty of forgiveness of someone who has hurt me… I do… But what has brought me to that place of forgiving is knowing this. Forgiveness is not for the offender, it is for ME. It is for MY heart. As long as I sit in unforgiveness the offender has me captive to their actions. When I release them I do not let them off the hook. I take them off my hook and place them on God’s. He is the just judge. I don’t diminish what they have done to me. I acknowledge the pain and consequences of their actions in the presence of God. I take the pain to Him… I allow Him to tell me what is true about me, the situation, the pain.. In that moment the choice to forgive removes the hold on me that have been caused by their actions. Forgiveness releases me from captivity to freedom. It’s hard, though! There have been plenty of times where all I’ve been able to do is ask God to make me willing to forgive… to get my heart there. In His gentle, tender way… He does.
i’ve learned that there are some people who will never ask for forgiveness. never.
but julie is right – it is about OUR heart, not about righting the wrong. that is jesus’ job.
forgiveness heals us.
i love you, friend.
i’m sorry it’s so difficult, lacey.
Oh, Lacey, I am so sorry as well. I may know a tiny bit of what you are feeling, as I was deeply wounded by someone in authority over me (someone who I trusted). And though they knew they had hurt me, they never asked for forgiveness, and I never felt led to confront them about it – my assumption is that they just have never been ready to deal with it, and so my confronting them would not have done any good anyways. To shorten this story, I talked for several sessions with a counselor about this experience and eventually had to feel all the hurt, all the pain and then lay all the pain down. It wasn’t until I acknowledged how much it hurt that I was ready to forgive. But when I finally really did forgive, oh, the freedom that came. I cannot adequately express the light and almost ‘airy’ feeling of my heart. The forgiveness will eventually do good for whoever hurt you, but it will do much more good for you first.
Without forgiveness I would not be free. I wrote about this on my blog. Here’s a link for any who would like to read….
http://jewelsightings.blogspot.com/2008/09/digging-out-roots.html
neither would i. thank you for the link, julie.
Lacey,
I am right there with you on this one. A meaningful post of everything I don’t really want to hear–because I know it’s truth, and I’m not there yet.
It is because of forgiveness that I am in the desert of humility right now. I’m being taught how to forgive even when not asked by the offender AND how to show unconditional love to that person. Very. Difficult. But I am growing. God is stretching me and I try to remain thankful for that.
but that is oh so hard. keep moving forward, friend. you can do it!!
Very timely, Sarah. We have similar, yet opposite stories. I married in 2000 and divorced in 2005, in part due to my husband’s infidelity. There were other biggies involved as well. I never thought I’d forgive him. Yet God showed me different. Not only did I forgive him, but I remarried him yesterday.
This is certainly not to say it was easy – it was not. It took time and prayer. I plan to tell my story on my neglected blog sometime soon. I pray that it will help someone the way yours has helped me. Thank you, Sarah.
WOW!!
That is so amazing! i’m so grateful for people who, like you, are willing to risk everything to forgive and allow God to heal.
i’m so happy for you. may God bless you in your NEW life with your husband. =)
wow, girl, again you & Jesus amaze my heart!
your words & those of your “readers” like Heather (above) made me think of the old song’s words:
“i’m forgiven because You were forsaken…”
our hearts are made whole because the ONLY One Who did NOT need forgiveness…took into Himself our wrong…and then…
while carrying OUR wrong…He was NOT forgiven…so that we might be made WHOLE & HEALTHY…so that we too might learn the art & the HUGE GRACE of forgiving one another!
think of it…He Who was NOT forgiven…forgives us ALL, whenever we turn & ask!
loving you & Jesus…
dad
thanks dad. i know! isn’t a horrible, beautiful irony?
Hi Sarah,
I am just now starting the process of truly forgiving and already God is meeting me there! He truly is amazing. I am free, I am joyful. It is a process (at least for me) there are bad habits to be broken and I find it difficult to break them but I am also learning…it’s okay, it’s okay that it is hard, because He is there with me and working on my heart.
God wants me to forgive and I want to please Him. This mind set has changed everything for me.
I in no way compare myself to Job but this scripture has been on my heart – When He has tested me, I shall come forth as gold. -Job 23:10
Love-Oly
oly – i love that scripture. thank you so much for sharing it with me.
A few years ago I did something that hurt some people I cared about, and to this day many of them have not forgiven me. For a long time, this meant I couldn’t forgive myself. Everyday was a struggle. But then I realized that God has forgiven me through his abundant grace, and now I am able to let go of the past. If those I wronged won’t forgive me, that’s their choice. It’s on them. But I know I’ve been forgiven by The One who matters.
Great post, Sarah.
i have been there. exactly.
good perspective, chrissy.
I love your writing I think because I can identify with it so much. Several years ago I learned about forgiveness in a way no one in my family could understand and were in fact hurt by my willingness to forgive something they could not at the time. Yet even in the bitterness of those times God planted seeds of healing…because of forgiveness. Powerful words Sarah, thank you for sharing them.
you bring up an excellent point.
many people get ANGRY when we give grace to others. they feel as if someone does not deserve it. especially if they cannot grant it themselves.
i love blog posts that take common Christian themes and turn them inside out to look at them a new way… you have done that with this post. what a beautiful way to think of difficult things… not as pain.. but as an opportunity to offer and receive forgiveness and in doing that to grow in Christ-likeness. i love that!
“forgiveness is God’s way of reclaiming the wrong in the world”
and your statement above is magnificent…
i’ve been working through a bible study called “groups” by willow creek press. this idea that i’ve been working thru is from an article by lewis smedes that is in the book.
he talks about this idea in a roundabout way. i had an ah ha moment and find that writing about something is my primary way to process ideas and information.
we should never stop learning, right?
It sounds nuts, but the hardest thing for me was to forgive God. I was so heartbroken to have to move to CA, and I resented God’s plan for a long time.
But God was so very patient with me and forgives me my lack of forgiveness. And that’s huge.
you’ve brought something up that i think is really important: resenting God’s plans for us.
wow, it’s interesting when you think of it that way.
thank you, jen. =)
when i learned that God never remembers any of my sins… i was challenged to love the same way and forgive those who hurt me. some of those were petty hurts…some though were people who had cut my heart deeply (like my abusers and my child’s father who left me) it was a CHOICE i had to make. no one, not even God could make me do it.
bitterness is poison in your soul that sucks the life out you. forgiveness is the very key to set people free.
the bible clearly commands: forgive as Christ forgave you.
bitterness IS poison. i totally agree. thank you for the reminder that it kills.
every time i choose to forgive, i am reminded of how much i have been forgiven for. and that the things i’ve been forgiven for are no less than the offense that was done toward me. who am i to withhold it?
forgiveness for the things i’ve done has given me freedom. not just the forgiveness i received from Christ, but the forgiveness i’ve received from the people i lied to for years and years while i was in addiction.
forgiveness is undeserving. and that is what makes forgiveness the most sweet.
yes and amen.
forgiving my husband and my “friend” is working over the deepest part of me.
but i’m finding that forgiving myself is striking a chord that is deeper still. i’m not there yet. but i’m asking Him to keep helping me dig deeper. i need to let go and stop holding my failures against me.
mmm. that’s so hard. and so amazing that you are doing the hard things – introspection is sometimes so much work…
Actually, this week has been incredible for me.
Back story…short version…
I was a student pastor for two years at a small church in my hometown.
I left around this time last year because of disagreements with the pastor, lack of support, and being cornered into buying into everyone else’s faith.
To even suggest that God was doing a new thing, that the status quo was not good enough, was borderline blasphemous.
I left scarred and jaded.
Bitter over the circumstances there and feeling as though I had nothing to offer anyone.
My self worth had been compromised.
Fast forward to now…
A blog detailing exactly where I am in the healing process will be up in a couple of days…
Again…short version…
Something came over me Monday night.
And I am again confident that I do have voice that matters.
I will no longer let my anger at my former church hold me captive.
I forgave, and let it go.
That church may never know I have forgiven them.
But that is okay, too.
And I’ve never felt better.
thank you for sharing kyle.
isn’t it interesting — its the anger that holds a person captive. forgiveness is so amazingly freeing, isn’t it?
thank you for sharing your story here.
I cannot believe how timely some of your blogposts are to my life. I really thank God for leading me to your blog. My husband and I are currently going through a separation (hopefully it will be ending soon), and about 5 months ago he admitted to cheating on me a few months prior. I have been struggling with how to get myself to forgive him wholly and completely. After all, it wasn’t just one night of an indiscretion, there was the flirtation that lead up to that one night. This separation is the result of apparent months, and maybe more than a year of his being unhappy in our marriage. I am getting to know forgiveness and I am excited to move on with our lives.
Lovely, lovely, lovely.
Big words from a big heart. Thank you for sharing.
I am in a situation right now where I have the opportunity to forgive big and love much. I am no less than inspired by your story and your constant daily good choices. My heart is that I would be faithful during this time and that God’s kindness in me will help to forgive and heal. Thank you Sarah.
forgiveness.
forgiveness has breathed life into our once shattered home.
forgiveness has released my husband from his chains. He thought I was the one in bondage to my sin because of the hurt I caused.
he later realized months of not forgiving me kept him captive, too.
He forgave 70 times 7. daily. everyday he had to do that just to get through his day.
and everyday, i see forgiveness in the eyes of my children, whom i hurt deeply. they love me depsite the times i was the source of their tears. they trust me even though they woke up and i was gone.
it’s in the eyes of my husband and children that i see love and acceptance. i see the eyes of jesus.
Ladies and gents. let’s come back to earth
and see that if you search the Internet you
will find so many similar stories of people moving on
forgiving etc… Which is not easy but we cannot
forgive blindly, the other person could
hate you and he or she could care less
about forgiveness and will hurt you again.
Self defence in a crisis cannot happen in
conjunction with forgiveness. Asking for Gods
forgiveness maybe, like Jesus did on the cross.
I am not trying to put God out the picture but
the reason the whole earth do not share your
faith and you are a minority is because all
those A HA moments you give credit to the
supernatural for having them are being replicated
the same exact way in the life of billions of people
across the ages while they have another faith or none.
People of all walks of faith have I.e Tylenol
to treat headackes but they sing very different
tunes than you to very different Gods and prophets.
The whole world is signing the same tunes to diff Gods
or none and getting to the same place.
If you check you will see that divorce rates
for the whole of the US are very close to the divorce
rates of baptists/evangelicals.
Just an obervation I have witnessed so many times that
it leaves me confused and. If I want to be brutally
honest with myself without fear of anybody I can’t buy
this reliance on God for every. Blessing unless
it makes you feel better. I know it’s out of subject but could not
help but dare to be honest. I was raised in a Baptist church for
many years and everytime I looked around I felt I was fooling
myself by believing that these people are different.
It is a common way to sell religion adopted thousands of years
ago, Jews believe they are the chosen today it is what
made their religion survive for so long.
And all religion and sects pretty much are waiting for somebody
to come or come back another way the calm the masses.
Muslim Shiites in the 100s of millions are waiting for the “lost”
cleric to come back. It’s very very serious like things are to you.
Sorry, I guess I might be forgiven.
A skeptic with too much evidence around.
I think Sarah is amazing as she lived with a bad
pain once called husband with ADD. I have it too
and been through a lot of horror because of it.
the day I took Adderal XR age 38 and the world changed
very drastically that is when I was born because
I was heading towards total destruction.
If this was not the case believers should shun
pharmacies, doctors and pray to cast the demons
away instead of doing an XRay like non-believers
No offence meant.
Super thankful for this post, Sarah.
For me, forgiveness and God’s unending grace… changed everything. It redeemed me. It redeemed my heart. It repaired bridges that I thought were burned forever.
I’m thankful that I’m not expected to forgive out of my own intentions… but through those of Christ, who first forgave me before I ever came to be.
I’ve struggled with forgiveness, I knew I had to and it was what God wanted me to do but I also was so badly hurt and had to forgive though I couldn’t face that person face to face.
I saw the mess my life became because of that person years of mess..
Someone said before:
“The hardest part about forgiveness when you’re the forgiver is being willing to give up your right to be hurt and angry. If I forgive, that means I have to move on and can’t entertain my injured feelings.”
That IS the hardest part.
I felt I had the right to be angry.
But I didn’t want to entertain those feelings
So often the feeling returned but I did want to do what God asked me to do.
And I felt guilty for the fact I could not forgive completely.
Then some one helped me and openend my eyes.
She asked if it was my goal to come to complete forgiveness and i could completly agree with that.
Then she said you are battling the right game, you are working on the right thing and God sees your heart so go on and don’t worry that much.
It helped me real hard to see it that way and very soon after that came to complete forgiveness.
So getting to forgive some-one is not always a one moment thing it is a proces where God is also molding the forgivers heart!
You are SO right… It is REALLY hard, really, really hard when someone has hurt you and betrayed you. Sometimes all I can do is say to God, “make me willing to be willing to be willing to forgive… My heart is so hurt that I cannot choose it on my own at that point… He always comes and gets me there. He speaks to me about my heart and how He longs for it to be free.
But mostly He speaks to me and tells me what He thinks about me to combat what has been done to me… as He beckons me with tenderness to give it all to Him.
ONLY God can move my heart to forgive when I’ve been deeply hurt…. As He moves, I choose and it is done!
Great words shared here!
I think it was C.S. Lewis who said that unforgiveness/bitterness was like drinking poison expecting the other person to die. Unforgiveness can poison our souls…but forgiveness can give us freedom.
I spent many years hating my father (a pastor), and made the decision to forgive him some time in college. Years later, just before I was married, he approached me and asked for forgiveness for his shortcomings as a dad and it was one of the most healing moments I’ve ever experienced.
I love your post. I’ve been reading them for a little while now….but this is my first comment. Forgiveness is a biggie….if it’s forgiving someone or forgiving yourself….but, its the key to freedom. I myslef have a story like yours to tell, in fact I think we have quite a bit in common! I’m not there yet with the whole forgiveness thing…but I’m working on it….taking a day at a time.
Thank you for your honesty and the lovely way that you make your life experiences available to all. It’s so inspiring.
Keep up the good work
God Bless
Rosie
htpp://www.rosiessteps.wordpress.com