For if you forgive others for their transgressions, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others, then your Father will not forgive your transgressions. Matthew 6:14-15
In our lives we may have past issues that we have resolved on the surface but allowed embers to burn deep inside. Without resolving one’s hurt and anger, it is virtually impossible to forgive the one you feel has hurt you. After the hurt and anger are resolved, forgiveness becomes a simple choice — we either choose to forgive or choose to hang on to our hurt, anger and resentment. But we must understand what forgiveness really is and how we can use it to set ourselves and others free.
God’s greatest gift was the gift of faith enabling us to have a relationship with Him. God’s second greatest gift is forgiveness enabling us to have a relationship with others and for God to have relationship with us. Forgiveness is a source of emotional health and freedom. It has the power to set us free from the hurts of the past, whether we are talking about ten minutes ago, or ten years ago.
The definition of forgive is:1. To excuse for a fault or an offense; pardon. 2. To renounce anger or resentment against. 3. To absolve from payment of (a debt, for example).
To forgive is to grant pardon without harboring resentment. This does not mean that forgiveness ignores the hurt or the consequences. To forgive someone of something and not deal with what caused the hurt is to merely move forward only to be hurt again because we have not addressed the cause. Forgiveness is literally for both parties involved. They need your forgiveness and you need to forgive in order to be able to heal.
Satan has found a tool that can ravage the land of any man's life in the inability to forgive others or self. “Beware lest a root of bitterness well up within you and by it many be defiled.” Hebrews 12:15There is no greater deterrent to good relationships in business, marriage, family, the church and with ourselves than bitterness. Bitterness is a force of destruction and bondage. It destroys people and relationships; it makes us prisoners of our hurts and hatred, and can also become a source of depression.
The only response to wrong that the Word of God commends the Christian to is love. There is no right to judge, condemn, criticize or hate. This requires more than a human understanding or response. Forgiveness is not an option for the believer. We are to forgive others as we have been forgiven. For most of us (all of us if we will admit it), that’s a whole lot of forgiveness. Understanding forgiveness doesn’t make it easier to forgive, but it does make it more meaningful and understanding the process could make us more likely to offer the forgiveness we are commanded to give.
Overlooking a transgression is to look beyond the transgression as well as the transgressor. It is the power of God working in us that enables us to look beyond. As we forgive, we bring glory to God ... for we are never more like God than when we forgive.
Scripture to Claim:
The discretion of a man makes him slow to anger, and his glory is to overlook a transgression. Proverbs 19:11
