Forgiveness

I was realizing how much easier it is to forgive people you love than people you don’t. And how easy it is to get angry with people when you don't love them when they do things that really annoy you or are really selfish or are really messed up in some way that messes you up. If I love you, I can forgive anything, but there are certain things that people do that really set me off, and I don’t want to give anyone I don't love a second chance because there’s a saying, “Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice shame on me.” Some people use a stronger word than “fool” but I’m trying to be a good Christian here and watch my mouth and I think you get the idea.

I have to watch my mouth all the time. I used to have a mouth like a truck driver. I thought it was cool to curse and tell people off and let people know what I was really thinking about them. I thought it made me tough and not a pushover, I thought it let people know just who I was and that they couldn’t mess with me. I also had a really bad temper – and if I’m left to my own devices, I still do. People who met me after I was born again are always really surprised when I tell them that – they see the sweetness and light but that’s just Jesus. Thank God He sends His Spirit to come live in us, otherwise I’d still be cursing and angry all the time.

The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faith, gentleness, and self-control (Galatians 5:22). Jesus talks a lot about how we will know someone by their fruit – that we can know if someone really is His by the things that they do and how they relate to other people. We can go to church all we want to, and smile and say, “God bless you!” to everyone we meet, we can make a big show of praying and fasting and putting our envelope in the offering basket and writing our checks for our tithe, but what happens when someone does something spiteful to you? What happens when someone lets you down? What happens when the going gets tough and things don’t look like they’re going your way? What happens when someone asks you for help and you don’t have time? Hey, I’m just asking. I know what the answer is for me, so I’m not judging anyone. Without Jesus I’d be a big angry selfish mess.

If someone I love does something really annoying, I’ll make every excuse in the book to forgive them. I’ve had people I love lie to me and be so selfish, and I still kept trying to find some reason to justify continuing to love them. And that was before I was born again. But even now, when someone who I don’t particularly love starts acting up, watch out. I’m ready to say they’re a complete waste of space and that there’s no way I can forgive them. But Ephesians 4:32 tells us, “Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.” If it didn’t add that part about “as God in Christ forgave you,” it would be easy to say that’s just for idiots and doormats and I’m not doing it, but that end of the line is a real punch line. I know how much God in Christ forgave me, and I know it was only because of His kindness and tenderhearted love that I have been forgiven, so how could I possibly say, "no way am I doing that" – do I want Him to say I’m a waste of space too? Do I want Him to say, "I'm not going to the Cross for that mess"? He easily could have – I was a waste of space before He forgave me and let me into His big wide arms of love. I was a mess that didn't deserve the lavish love He gives me every day. And without His grace I'd still be a mess and a waste, but because He decided to forgive and love me, I get a new chance every day to try to do it better.

Ephesians 4:22-23 tells us, “to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.” There’s something that happens when we decide to forgive and to love – and there’s an opposite something that happens when we decide not to. When we hold unforgiveness, when we decide that someone is not worth our love, we’re not allowing that the other person may actually not know the whole of what they are doing. There may be something that has caused them to act the way they’re acting. We don’t know anyone else’s story until we’ve lived their whole life and that will never be possible. Sometimes people hide the deepest and darkest secrets under a pretend of a smile. They put on a really good show and they can fool us. That’s why God tells us that He is the only one allowed to judge, because He knows all hearts (Acts 15:8). We sometimes don’t even know our own.

When we decide to forgive, we allow the other person room to grow and change, and we allow ourselves the freedom to be forgiven for our own mistakes. I came to know the Lord through forgiving people who had been doing some really awful things, things that threatened to ruin my life completely and that would have ruined my life but for the grace of God. I’ve had some insight since then as to why they did what they did, but I’ll still never know the whole story because I’m not them. Only when we all get to heaven will I know the whole truth, and then it won’t matter unless I’ve been walking around not forgiving them all these years. When we decide to forgive, we change the atmosphere of the earth - we can get a little bit closer to heaven and bring a little bit of heaven down here to the earth.

Ephesians 4:29 tells us, “Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear.” What a difference that is from cursing and being angry and letting people have a piece of my mind! Oh, Jesus, thank you Lord. I’m not going to say that I don’t ever get angry, because I know I do. I’m human, and people can be really annoying and really obnoxious sometimes. But I’m learning to hold my tongue – to let Christ renew my mind and take hold of my mouth and my thoughts before I say what I think I need to say. Proverbs 18:21 tells us, “The tongue has the power of life and death and those who love it will eat its fruit.” We can build people up or tear them down, we can pillory people or give them grace. Building up and giving grace is so much more powerful than destroying. Having self-control is so much more powerful than losing my temper. And when you do it God’s way, you always end up winning. When you’re kind to your enemies, you heap coals on their heads (Romans 12:20). When you let God be the judge and the jury, you have peace, and all of the other fruit of the Spirit have room to live and grow in you.

Ephesians 4 begins with Paul saying, “As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received.” There He goes again, those added words that make us think twice before saying no. Paul's a prisoner at this time, because of His faith in God. Because of the choice he has made to follow Christ. How can I take his words lightly? He continues, “Be completely humble and gentle, be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.” And there it is again, those words that make me think about things differently. If there is God in the other person, that person who I am trying not to forgive, how can I condemn them? If I look at another and try to see God, I have to accept that we are part of the same whole and that God is over us both. I am not in control, they’re not in control. I am not right and they are not wrong. We are both part of the same God and His Spirit and His grace are in us both. As Paul says in verse 7, “But to each one of us grace has been given as Christ apportioned it.” I may have more grace today to give but maybe I’ll need more grace tomorrow. It is Christ who gives the grace so that we can give it to others and receive it when we need it.

Romans 15:13 says, "May the God of all hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in Him, so that you may overflow with hope in the power of the Holy Spirit." Now that's a promise I want to hold onto. To be so filled with joy and peace that we are overflowing with hope? And all He is asking is that we trust in Him. God is not asking us to forgive out of ourselves - He knows it's hard, and He of anyone knows how annoying people can be. But if He can forgive the world, if He can forgive as He dies on a Cross, if He can forgive selfishness and pettiness and cruelty and all of the other things we do that do not show love to others or to Him, if He can still love us even as we lie and cheat and steal and throw each other under the bus, He has enough love to share with us all. If we just take a small part of that love and let it start to fill us and heal us, we'll find it's easier to love someone else and let them know the kind of love that can forgive everything. If we trust God to take care of the judgment part, if we trust Him that He knows all hearts, even our own, and that He is always fair and honest and true, we can relax and let go and let Him do what He does best, help and heal and bless and make whole.

Blessings,

Jannie Susan