A forgiven person should be a forgiving person.

Forgiving those who have wronged us is difficult, especially when the negligent deed is extremely malicious. Whether it is simply a friend accidentally missing a coffee date or your significant other betraying your confidence regarding something deeply personal, we feel pain when others hurt us. And it is not exclusive to only the “weaker” of those among us. We are ALL made that way.

When God created mankind, He gave us our emotions. He gave us the ability to feel joyfulness, happiness, sadness and, yes, even depression and misery. With that knowledge, the question begs “Why? Why would God not spare us from heartache and misery?” That’s a legitimate question most of us have had at some point in our lives.

God allows heartache to stimulate a believer’s spiritual growth and to demonstrate His perfect grace in this broken world. Let’s be honest; when things are going well, when things are easy for us, we tend to feel our need for God less. We’re all guilty of this to one degree or another. It’s part of our sinful nature. But on the opposite side of that, when things are falling apart all around us, we turn and scurry back to Jesus’ arms. That is completely unnatural to our sinful natures. Running to God can only happen because of God’s grace. And that grace is compounded, renewed and strengthened when we race back to Him! So, in a way, it is a spiritual conditioning.

Before we can ask how we can forgive others, we must know why we should forgive others. The no-nonsense simple answer is because God forgave us. He forgave us as a means to relieve our agony and to demonstrate how we are to handle pain others have caused us. Let’s start with 1 John 1:9: “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” John was very clear; God forgives us when we confess our sins. Let’s dig a little deeper. In Matthew 6:14-15 Jesus says, “For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses”. Wait! There’s more! Ephesians 4:32 says, “Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you”. So here’s a truth we can’t get around: regardless of the depth of our pain, a forgiven person should be a forgiving person. Period!

OK, now how do we forgive? First let’s note that Jesus, throughout His earthly ministry, calls us to forgiveness. Matthew 18:21-22 says, “Then Peter came to Him and said, “Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? Up to seven times?” Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven.” (NKJV) And in Matthew 6:12, where Jesus is teaching His disciples how to pray, he says, “And forgive us our debts, As we forgive our debtors.” (NKJV)

Here’s the nuts and bolts on forgiveness. Scriptures teach that the Holy Spirit resides inside each of us. “You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.” (Romans 8:9) “By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit.” (1 John 4:13)

With the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, we receive the fruits of the Spirit listed in Galatians 5 (love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control). Every believer has them infused inside them and all are needed to truly forgive. Being graced with the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, we have the ability to take our grievances to God, asking Him to help us forgive our antagonists, and He will grant it to us. The Apostle John proves this in his first letter, “And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us. And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests that we have asked of him.” (1 John 5:14-15)

Nothing can warm your heart more and bring you closer to God than forgiving others. It gives us a little taste of how God must feel every time He forgives each of us! So if you’re a Christian struggling with forgiving someone, if you feel lost in the agony those feelings of anger, sadness or despair, stop and pray to God for the ability to forgive your adversary, to let go of the grip you have on something you cannot change. If you do and do so with a genuine heart, God will grant you your request. 🙏🏻

~ Shalom! Shalom! ☧

* Scripture marked “NKJV” are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.