FORGIVENESS

There is no limit to the forgiveness that God can give you Isaiah 1:18 'Come now, let us argue this out,' says the Lord. 'No matter how deep the stain of your sins, I can remove it. I can make you as clean as freshly fallen snow. Even if you are stained as red as crimson, I can make you as white as wool.'

But what of asking forgiveness of others. The Bible is very clear on this God will forgive us as we forgive others, Matthew 6:14-15. The big question is do we have to ask that person to their face?

Matthew 5:
23Therefore if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee;
24Leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift.

Matthew 18:
15Moreover if thy brother shall trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone: if he shall hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother.
16But if he will not hear thee, then take with thee one or two more, that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established.
17And if he shall neglect to hear them, tell it unto the church: but if he neglect to hear the church, let him be unto thee as an heathen man and a publican.

Read those two scriptures again. First it is speaking of our brother having a problem with us. Our brother in the Lord. It does not say anything about us going to our brother if we have something against him. In the two scriptures it is speaking of something that is known. If we have sinned against someone and they do not know about it, what are we to do? Ponder on this as we always say. If we have stolen from you and you do not know it is us, then yes we need to make it right and tell you it was us. But what if you do not know, what if it is something that would tear you apart to know? What if more harm would come from the telling then not telling?

Our answer is to ask forgiveness from God. Then if the Lord so leads you to tell this person then do so. Ponder on this example. Can you imagine how hard it is to forgive not one but two child molesters? One was my best friend's husband and the other was one of my son-in-laws. Trust me it ain't easy. I carried that unforgiveness in my heart for a lot of years. I felt these two men didn't deserve to breathe God's air. Then low and behold one Sunday in Sunday School our Preacher/teacher ask us to write down two names of people that we hated. So I did. Then he ask us to tell everybody why we felt that way. So I did. That was hard for me to do. But after telling my story, I felt all that pure hate leave my heart. I heard God say that the hate I felt was just plain stupid. Now I am able to pray for them and I know they are in God's hands not mine. My unforgiveness didn't hurt them, it hurt me and kept me from getting closer to God.

What then about telling that person. The story continues:
No I haven't told them. I see no reason to do so. They wouldn't care anyway. God will work on them the same as He has worked on me. I do not feel that it is always that important to go to the person. The main person in my life is Jesus. He is my source of strength and encouragement. Many times do we really know why someone is out of sort with us? How can we ask for forgiveness for something that only God knows in the first place? Isn't it more important to ask God to clean out our hearts and let Him take care of the rest? Even I will say "I'm sorry" when He tells me I was wrong BUT I will not say I'm sorry for my stand for Him and His cause.

Remember there is a difference between our brothers and sisters in the Lord and worldly people. What we need to remember is to ask God to forgive us for our wrongs and to forgive ourselves. The next step is then to forget, which when you think about it can be the harder part.

The Lord laid it on our hearts to cover forgiveness at this time, if this is you, then we pray that you will go to the Lord with this.

God Bless
recj/LJG