Remember how I went off on a tangent about the word "but" in the Bible and said I was going to have a really catchy title and awesome post about it? Well, apparently Google doesn't think that it's as cool as I do. So I'm gonna have to do a little more research and postpone that one.
Forgiveness is a good topic for today. Sometimes it's easy to forgive and sometimes it's hard to forgive. VERY hard. Through the past year I have lost a lot of things that are important to me. I've lost a best friend, my securities, my ability to be open and vulnerable and a little bit of confidence and faith in people. It seems morbid, right? I don't like feeling that way, but how much can one person take when every one flees from you like you have the plague after they find out what you're struggling with in life? It really is sad. At least I found out who my true friends are and for that I am grateful.
Forgiveness. I can't do it on my own. Over Passion God revealed to me through the reading Ephesians that I have let the sun set on my anger for way too many nights! If Satan can find a foothold in one night of sleeping with anger, how much more can he do over 6 months!? I cringe at the fact that I let him have that satisfaction. Ephesians also says that we must lay aside our earthly lusts that are of our "old self." I think this includes a blood lust: that insatiable need to have revenge and for people to get what they had coming to them. In Matthew 18:22 Jesus says that we are not to forgive our brothers only seven times, but seven times seventy. Which is 490, but I think He said that just for effect, don't you think? And even if He IS being literal, that's a lot of times that I have to forgive the same person, although I'm sure that wouldn't be enough to cover me after all the anger and bitterness I have harbored for so long.
I recently had a friend put forgiveness for others in a different light. This friend has been able to relate to me on so many levels and I am so very thankful that God has brought them into my life. This friend has had to forgive people, just as I have to, that have done some serious damage. But they told me that they thought about it sort of life that's what we do to God. Does that make sense? Probably not. OK, so we do a lot of awful things to God that absolutely break His heart and make Him even more jealous for us. I can abso-toota-lutely tell you that if you have asked to receive it, He has forgiven you WAY more than 490 times. So why is it so hard for us to forgive and it is so easy for Him? Other than the fact that He is completely perfect and Holy, we are human. Bound and determined to make things harder for ourselves and destined to fall into the traps that Satan has so craftily set up. But once you look at someone who has done something to hurt you as what you have done to God it makes you want to reconcile with them immediately.
I have come to a point where I realize that forgiveness is imperative in order for me to walk as a child of God as opposed to a child of the world. IN the world, not OF the world. The world says we shouldn't forgive those who have done us wrong and that "karma" will take care of them. False. We should forgive them as God forgave us, and if they have asked forgiveness from God as well, He is just and more mighty to judge than any justice system on the planet.
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