“Be alert. If you see your friend going wrong, correct him. If he responds, forgive him. Even if it’s personal against you and repeated seven times through the day, and seven times he says, ‘I’m sorry, I won’t do it again,’ forgive him.”
~Luke 17:3-4
I have to admit…this is a really hard topic for me. As I was sitting here, trying to think of something profound that I might offer, I found myself getting more and more frustrated and drawing a blank. But, I did notice something. This particular passage of scripture doesn’t leave a lot of wiggle room…we can’t really get around it.
I think sometimes when we’re in the middle of a situation where we’ve been wounded and often times wounded multiple times by the same person/people, our response is to just walk away and be done. We know that we’re called to forgive, but sometimes it can just seem like too much. We can make a case for ourselves…I forgave them the first time and then they did it again, so I’m done with them. We hear statements like, “Fool me once, shame on you…fool me twice, shame on me.”
But the truth is that God has called us to forgive over and over…it’s a process that doesn’t stop. And when I think about how often I have wounded God and how many times He has forgiven me and that it will undoubtedly be a never-ending process, it causes me to pause.
Forgiveness doesn’t mean that we won’t be hurt again…it doesn’t mean that what has been done to us was okay…and it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t put safeguards in place to guard our hearts going forward.
But at the end of the day, the choice NOT to forgive can easily lead us down a road toward bitterness and more often than not, it ends up harming us far beyond the initial wound that we received.
Scripture is pretty clear…
“Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.”
~Ephesians 4:32
Forgiveness IS a choice…if it was simply a feeling, chances are a whole lot of the forgiveness that I have both received and extended probably wouldn’t have taken place, and I’m sure you could say the same thing. But then there are those times when we've been more deeply wounded...and we're so hurt that forgiveness is just beyond any feeling that we are capable of grasping. So then what?
I believe that there are times that God is waiting for our decision to step out in obedience…then He comes along beside us to teach us something about Himself or our ourselves and He begins to work in our hearts…eventually the feelings of forgiveness and grace come, but it’s about the act of obedience to what He is asking us to do. What I do know is that when we choose obedience, despite the obstacles or our feelings, God shows up every time and He always honors and blesses it. AND…when I have chosen not to obey, I have missed out on some blessings and opportunities that He had for me.
Why choose forgiveness? It’s a pretty simple answer…because God tells us we need to. And when we do, He will walk through that with us…we aren’t left on our own to navigate that path. He’ll love us through it and help us to work through all that troubles our hearts.
How have you seen God show up or honor an act of obedience, even if it was difficult to choose in the beginning? On the flip side, how have you seen unforgiveness or disobedience in general play out?
~Kris Samovitz
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