faithful friday: forgiveness [part two]

Remember my post from last Friday? I can honestly say that I have forgiven Caleb*. I was having time to myself this past week in the bath, which has been known to be my God-time, and I just decided to forgive him. I was tired of holding on to this hurt. I didn't want this pain any longer. So I forgave him. I expected tears. It didn't happen. I expected to be totally overcome by the Holy Spirit. It didn't happen. I expected some momentous occasion to mark this turning point in my life...and it didn't happen. What did happen, though, was this genuine love that came into my heart and spirit for Caleb.

Letting go of the hurt and pain that somebody has caused you, intentionally and unintentionally, doesn't have to be this huge occasion with God as I had found out. It can, for some people, but for others it's short, sweet, and right to the point. Forgiving someone can be as simple as surrendering to God and say, "Okay, Lord, I'm done with this. I want to forgive." That is completely okay. It doesn't have to be this huge shindig complete with tears, wails, kleenex boxes by the dozen, and people around you holding your hand and praying for you like I had thought.

It's about you, and how you roll. For me, I don't like to be the center of attention all that much so maybe that's why this whole act of forgiveness thing was just a tender moment that I had with God.

I feel good about this, I really do. I released him from any ill feelings I had toward him that may have hindered him, in some way, during his walk with God. I repented of that. Here's what I think: I think that when a person holds someone in contempt/unforgiveness/grudge/whatever, they are holding them back from everything that God has for them. I don't know how it all works yet but it's what God has dropped into my spirit this week.

From the words of Louie Giglio on Twitter:

"If you're not speaking God's best over your life each day in 2011, who is? Don't be afraid to preach truth to yourself!"

That's good advice, and it works in forgiveness too. In order to keep the love flowing, it really helps to speak life over the other person and not speak death.

*Not his real name, and yes, he WILL remain nameless!

faithful friday: forgiveness

Okay, so my wish is to start blogging more regularly and in order to do that, I have decided to devote certain days to specific topics. I'm hoping it'll make me more disciplined. Anyway on Fridays I'm hoping to talk about my faith in God and where He's taking me [sort of like what I blogged about last Friday].

What I want to talk about today is forgiveness. Not sure where this is going to go but that's okay.

So God has been speaking to me a lot about forgiving this person who has hurt me in the past. Now, I'm sure it wasn't intentional because if you were to meet them, you would see that they* had no mean bone in their body. But they still hurt me. Deeply. And I thought I had forgiven them, but as it turned out I had only forgiven them in my mind and not where it really mattered: my heart. In my mind, I have forgiven them but there was no depth to my prayer; I was just saying words. It would be a totally different thing if I had just forgiven from my heart because that's where my hurts are, where the pain still is. Because that's where the words will have depth; that's where true forgiveness comes from. It is borne out of the hurt and the pain that has happened within a person's heart.

I know this because recently, every single time they have come up in conversation, I have wanted to kill them. Or, at the very least, kicked their butt all the way to China and back. Not of the good. It's not healthy when every time you picture your heart, all you see is a big steel door with a padlock on it.

I could go into detail as to how they have hurt me, but I won't. Because then you'd want to kick their butt all the way to China and back and despite the hurts and unforgiveness I've locked up, they are really, very cool and I love them greatly.

Yeah, so, forgiveness. I'm going to be honest and lay it all out: I haven't forgiven them. Not by a long shot. God wants me to, I know that for sure, because He wants me to walk in freedom and let nothing hold me back. Besides, He has been bringing this up over and over again, so He obviously wants me to deal with it.

Every time it came up, I'm like, "No," and do something else instead. Like, "I'm not listening to You right now, blah, blah, blah."

Oh, you poor child. After many, many moments like these, God pulls out a whammy and hits me with a hammer that seems like 150lbs. Yay. He says to me, "How can you pour yourself into helping with the teens at church when you, yourself, aren't free and are held back by unforgiveness?" He just has to have the last word, doesn't He?

So, I've been thinking about it. And it's true because how can I expect to give what I have away to the teens when I can't even do something as simple as forgiving someone? So...I am on a journey right now where the destination is forgiveness. I honestly can't say I'm there yet, but I'm close. Really close.

"For we are not fighting against flesh-and-blood enemies, but against evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against mighty powers in this dark world, and against evil spirits.." - Ephesians 6:12 [NLT]

I believe that holding unforgiveness in your heart towards someone is basically fighting against them, and we aren't supposed to fight against humans; we're supposed to fight the wiles of the enemy with each other.

I'm human; I struggle with it sometimes but lucky for me, I have this amazing God who gives me grace abundantly every morning. I'm going to take this next week to really find it in my heart to forgive...even if it hurts.