Secret Fourteen: Breathing Forgiveness

Secret Fourteen: Breathing Forgiveness

            Let me say this before we get started, I am NOT a worldwide expert on the subject of forgiveness. I am not an expert about the subject just as much as doing the subject. But let’s face it friends, we all need it. At one point sometime in our lives we have messed up regardless if it was on purpose or an accident. And at that point we’ve needed forgiveness. I am no exception to this rule; I have fallen many times with many different people. Including God and it is God that I usually forget to ask forgiveness from. This is weird to me because it is God that will always NO MATTER WHAT will forgive as well as forget the mistake that we’ve made.

Forgiveness is a common and confusing thing to most people. In our world forgiveness comes (normally) with a price: guilt, regret, even spite. But our world view of forgiveness is a wrong view. Society sometime may label forgiveness is something that the weak do, something that goes to those who don't deserve it. And some like to hold forgiveness from each other, like it’s some kind of thing we have over them. As for me, I view forgiveness as a necessity. In the bible, in the book of Matthew 6:14-15 it says "for if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your Heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sin." We all do things that hurt people; we lie, cheat, steal and hurt one another. It's human nature after the fall happen, people hurt people. So if it’s so natural for people to hurt people then shouldn't forgiveness be second nature? Answer: course not!! Forgiveness is you GIVING UP your RIGHT to HURT someone after THEY have HURT you and that is something most people don’t want to give up. That is an "out-of-human" response. It's natural for us to hurt each other; it is unnatural for us to forgive each other. We feel that if we hold on to the pain that others cause us it somehow reminds us of others (or even our own) mistakes and then (and sadly) it becomes a heavy burden we carry. We can hurt ourselves from doing that and that means...yes...we also must learn to forgive ourselves. But why is forgiveness so hard?? What causes it to be so painful no one likes to do it?? Easy. It's humbling yourself before another. When I say that you are giving up the right to hurt someone else...you literally ARE giving up the right to the other person. 

If you are asking for forgiveness you are humbling yourself before another person, that's hard to do. But for those on the other end have an equally hard task because showing mercy means to get down to the same level of humbleness and saying its okay, then letting go of all pain and wrong done to you. It's not an easy thing to do but we are required to do it. Why?? Because if we don't forgive others of their wrong doing that means when we do wrong doings God will not forgive us. He is both a just and merciful God. Meaning he will show mercy to those that deserve it. Jesus came down and died so we can find peace for our sins. Confused still?? View it like this, we as human are the broken toys in the store that no one wants, sooner or later we will be thrown away, but then, just before we are discarded, a toy maker comes and buys us all. He is able to fix us and make us whole again, but sometimes we still break. And he will continue to fix us and make us whole again. God paid for us to be repaired, he paid for our lives and the chance to be with him forever. That is the perfect example of forgiveness and it’s all because of love. But there is more to forgiveness that we realize, because we need to be genuine about it. I understand, if someone does something that really hurts you, they don’t deserve it, but remember friends…neither do we. If we want our forgiveness to be real and genuine, then let’s forgive real and genuinely to each other.

So why would I call this entry “Breathing Forgiveness?” Easy, forgiveness should be that natural. You’ll be surprised with what you find, because when we forgive others, we are setting them free but also ourselves. We are releasing that chain they had wrapped around them and we ourselves become truly free.  Remember we are no way excused from forgiving and according to the bible it is a requirement for Christians. For those of you that really want to learn more about this I would check out Matthew West’s song “Forgiveness” from his album Into the Light.

Continue to pray for me friend and I will continue to pray for you! God Bless!