By Pastor Greg
In the Feb 23, 2001 edition of the Financial Post, a man took out an ad seeking employment. As I read the ad to you this morning, I want you to think about this question: “Would you hire this man?”
The headline of the ad said, “Employment Wanted, Former Marijuana Smuggler.” Here’s the text: “Having successfully completed a ten-year sentence, incident-free, for importing 75-tons of marijuana into the United States, I am now seeking a legal and legitimate means to support myself and family. Under “Business Experience,” the man wrote: “Owned and operated a successful fishing business, multi-vessel, one airplane, one island and processing facility. Simultaneously owned and operated a fleet of tractor-trailer trucks conducting business in the Western United States. During this time, I also co-owned and participated in the executive level management of 120 people world-wide in a successful pot smuggling venture with revenues in excess of 100 million annually. I took responsibility for my actions and received a ten-year sentence in the United States, while others walked free for their cooperation.” Here are the “Attributes” he claimed: “I am an expert in all levels of security. I have extensive computer skills, am personable, outgoing, well educated, reliable, clean and sober. I have spoken in schools, to thousands of kids and parent groups over the past ten years on “The consequences of choice” and received public recognition for community service. I am well-traveled and speak English, French and Spanish. References available from friends, family, the U.S. District Attorney, etc.”
Now honestly, would you hire this man? I don’t know about you, but I have mixed emotions when I read the ad. On one hand, he has paid his debt to society and should be given another chance. On the other hand, to be totally honest, I’m not sure if I would offer him a job if I had one available. Would you? If you wouldn’t, why wouldn’t you? For me, it is that hiring him would involve a large element of risk. On the surface, I ask questions like, “would he use my assets to conduct illegal activity? Has he really changed? Has he really paid “his debt to society? Would he really be an asset to us?” But when I go deeper. When I dive into my soul for answers, I’m not left asking questions about him, but about me. Am I able to forgive people like Christ would want me to? Forget about this guy for now, I’m not specifically talking about him anymore. In general, am I a forgiving person?
Ephesians 4:32 says “Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ, God forgave you.” To the church in Colossae, Paul writes, “Since God chose you to be the holy people he loves, you must clothe yourselves with tenderhearted mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. Make allowance for each other’s faults, and forgive anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others” (Colossians 3:12-13). These are important words, and I’m afraid few of us realize just how deeply unforgiveness has penetrated our heart.
How are you at forgiving? What does forgiveness look like? First of all, let me point out what forgiveness is not. 1Forgiveness is not a feeling. If you wait to feel like forgiving it will never happen. 2Forgiveness is not pretending you were not hurt. You can’t ignore the fact that what was said or done really hurt. 3Forgiveness is not saying what the other person did was okay. What they did was wrong, and will continue to be wrong even after you forgive. 4Forgiveness does not mean you have to trust that person again. Forgiveness is a separate issue from trust. Experience will teach you whether or not a person can be trusted. But forgiveness merely releases you from the hurt and pain from their untrustworthy actions. 5Forgiveness is not relieving other people of their responsibility. Forgiving does not mean they will go free. It is not letting them “off the hook”.
What then is forgiveness? Forgiveness is a choice; a decision we make to obey God. Forgiveness is getting your own heart right with God; focusing on the Lord, not the hurt or the one who hurt us. In her book, An Invitation to Healing, Lynda Elliot writes about a struggle she had with a neighbor when she was in her twenties. “For months, I replayed the hurtful scene in my mind,” she writes, “talking about it often with a friend. As I expressed my feelings over and over, my pain became deeper and more invasive. It was becoming a part of me.”
One day as Lynda relived the scene again, her friend asked, “Do you know we become like the people we think about most?” Lynda heard her friend’s voice and God’s voice at the same time. She says, “I had a choice to make. If I choose to behold Jesus, to focus on Him, I could be transformed into His image. Likewise, if I continued to behold the image of my neighbor, I could be transformed into her image. In fact, that was already happening.” Lynda had a choice to make. She could grow into the image of her neighbor and reflect her evil, or she could grow into the image of Christ and reflect His grace.
Tim Keller says, “At the very least, forgiveness prevents me from becoming as evil as the other party.” Think about it for a moment. If you don’t forgive, you will become as the person who wronged you. The transformation may be slow, but before long, you will become bitter and angry and consumed by the wrong.
Forgiveness is the only way to keep the people that harmed you from turning you into them. The only way to break their control over you and what you think about is to forgive. Is it risky? Yes. Will they wrong you again? Probably. Jesus taught us, “And if he sins against you seven times a day, and returns to you seven times, saying, ‘I repent, ‘forgive him.” (Luke 17:4)
Why should you forgive those that harm you? One answer is so you can be obedient to Christ who commanded you to do it. Another is because it will help you physically, emotionally and spiritually. But the big answer is because, as a sinner, you need forgiveness too. Jesus said, “For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.” (Matthew 6:14–15).
Forgiveness is a lifestyle of taking our rightful place in God and saying to the person who continues to hurt us, “I’m sorry you feel the way you do about me, but I’m not going to respond back to you in the same way.” Taking this stand puts our emotional health and our life into the Lord’s hands instead of letting the person who’s giving us the problem rule our emotional life.
The bottom line is this: if you refuse to forgive (or say you can’t), what you are saying is that holding on to your hurt is more important to you than going on with God. It’s that simple. The Word of God says that if you don’t forgive, your spiritual life will stay where it is until you are able to forgive.
I want to encourage you right now to ask the Lord to reveal any unforgiveness that might still be lurking in your heart. Allow Him to show you specific individuals that you need to forgive. Chose today to no longer be controlled by an event from your past or by words that had been spoken out of anger. You will find that through forgiveness, you are no longer held in bondage; for any resentment or bitterness you may feel toward another person does not hold them captive. The one held captive by unforgiveness is you.
[2] Ownership for much of what has been said today about forgiveness belongs to a man named Doug Easterday. He is one of the counselors used by the DivorceCare ministry that was offered a few years ago. Doug has an excellent pamphlet entitled Restoration Through Forgiveness, and a few copies are available on the bulletin board shelf. What Doug teaches is something both you and I need to learn.
1 comment:
Very good write-up, Greg!
--Bill Baer
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