Foundation of Forgiveness

As I have written previously I believe the purpose of marriage is to further God’s transforming work in us. So lets continue to explore the qualities of God and evaluate how well we are doing in our efforts to be more like Him. One of the most awesome foundational truths about God is His unconditional and complete forgiveness of our sins.

Before I get started on the topic of forgiveness, let me make it clear that our goal is to pursue Christ likeness, but no matter how hard we try, there are some things about Him that we will never be able to understand or imitate. However, He still calls us to pursue understanding and transformation. One example is His ability to forget our past sins. It usually takes much prayer for us to not use past sins against us as ammunition, manipulation or leverage to get something we want. …

God does not keep records of wrongs or use our past to make us do as He wishes. And here is another one, Would you forgive someone if you knew they would do the same thing again? God forgives you even when He knows the future and knows that you are going to repeat the same behavior.

Some of you have not forgiven yourselves for something and others have not been able to bring themselves to forgive someone else. I am going to discuss both of these aspects of forgiveness. Obviously Jesus is our perfect example and we are supposed to learn from how He forgives us. As I mentioned earlier a study of Jesus is always helpful for us to understand Him better. My wife is sitting in a chair right now just a few feet away reading an excellent book by Charles Swindoll that profiles Jesus. Jesus, if we could only be like Him, we would not have any trouble forgiving ourselves or others. 

Before I write a few of my own thoughts about forgiving like Christ forgives us, I want to discuss the practical aspects of forgiveness.

First, let me say that if you are the one who has not forgiven themselves for something, then I would like to challenge you to think about the sacrifice that Jesus made for you on the cross so that you could be forgiven. Was it enough? Do you believe He has forgiven you? If He has forgiven you, as I know He has, then by not forgiving yourself, you are not accepting His sacrifice as enough. I understand that the circumstances or consequences of your behavior may sometimes make it hard to forget or forgive. But God is God and you are not. If He has forgiven you, then you will need to accept.

If you are the one having trouble forgiving someone else, then I think my struggles this past year may be helpful for you. You see I have always been a forgiving person, I suppose it is because I know how much forgiveness I need and therefore when someone needs to feel Christ’s forgiveness from someone here on earth, I am happy to share with them the wonders of how our Savior forgives.

But here is where the problem for me began. I had a year where my trust in someone was abused. This person caused much difficulty in my life, I will not go into great detail, as I do not think it is relevant, but I have to admit I struggled with being able to forgive this person. I have always thought that if anyone where to ask for my forgiveness, that I would offer it freely. But, I have always made this conditional on one word, “Ask”.  If they ask I will forgive them. But the time went by and there was no asking. I stood strong on the verse

Ephesians 1:9“If we confess our sins He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins”

I was trying to model what God does or so I thought. One day as I was struggling with this I realized that It was really damaging me. I was no longer writing, I was not doing some of the ministry things I so much enjoyed. But, I was just waiting for the person to ask me to forgive them. And then it hit me. They may never ask and it did not seem to be bothering them. I was the only one who was being hurt. The thought came to me with a resounding “DUH”. I should have known this.

The verse that I love still bothered me, and then I realized that God’s forgiveness is always available. It is not conditional based on weather or not we ask, but the confession is for us, it is sort of an acceptance of what He has already done. I also thought of another passage when Jesus was dying on the Cross, He said “Forgive them for they know not what they do”. So He does forgive even if we are not even aware of our sin. It is only when we confess, agree with Him and acknowledge our sin that we can enjoy the beauty of forgiveness.

So don’t hold back your forgiveness of others, even if you think they are not worthy of your forgiveness. Holding on to a grudge will only hurt you. If you hold back forgiveness for others or for yourself, you will be held back from pursuing all that God has for you.

Read with Me!