Just Like Us

My first thoughts on looking at this chapter were: “Wow, this is BIG!” Forgiveness is such a key area of being a Christian, so it’s really important that we can not only understand our need to forgive others, but to actually put this into practice in our lives. And even better than that, we need to learn that we ourselves can receive forgiveness…from God… for EVERY sin we have committed!! So, forgiveness really IS a big topic!

But, what is forgiveness? … It is our conscious decision to release someone of what they’ve done, without holding onto any thoughts of bitterness or revenge and trust that God is good and will exercise justice. It is a choice that we should make, no matter how hard it might feel or how much it hurts. Most importantly, forgiveness must be from the heart.

When Jesus gave us the Lord’s Prayer, he emphasised our need to forgive others so that we can receive forgiveness. It’s important to distinguish the link between forgiving others and being forgiven ourselves…because they are in direct proportion with one another. God will not forgive us of our sins if we have not forgiven other people of their sins against us.

But hold on… was I not already forgiven when I became a Christian??  YES, when we are saved, we are justified by Jesus blood, nothing we can do can separate us from God’s love and stop us from being forgiven. However, when we hold onto unforgiveness we are allowing sin to separate us from God. God can’t deal with the effects of our sin unless we forgive those who sin against us. If we choose not to forgive we are allowing the devil a foothold and are opening ourselves up to the fruit of unforgiveness; relationship break-down, revenge, bitterness, negativity, hopelessness, fear, guilt etc. It is impossible for us to draw close to God if we have unforgiveness in the way. This is why it’s so important!! God has so much love for us, so he doesn’t want this to happen, he wants to see us TRANSFORMED and live in FREEDOM with JOY!

It’s easy to read this chapter and think: “That’s not for me”, or “I don’t need to forgive anyone, they need to forgive me”. But actually, whether we know it or not… we ALL have someone in our lives who has wronged us in some way, or caused us to hurt that we need to release.

A turning point in my Christian life came on 2^nd August 2009… At Newday when Stef Liston was preaching on forgiveness (funny enough!) In his talks he’d explained the difference between forgiving others, and being forgiven and then there was a time at the end for us to respond in prayer. In this time, the Spirit made me aware of some things I had been holding on to, without even realising it!! I realised that I’d been blaming my Mum for something that she had no control over and wasn’t her fault, and as a result I had so much anger in my heart when I thought about this… even though my relationship with my mum was going great and I thought I had it sorted with God! I was clearly wrong, and I immediately forgave my mum in my heart. At this moment, I was released …I felt so free and my heart was filled with joy instead of anger. God had forgiven ME… but only because I had let go of my own unforgiveness!! How amazing is that?!

What is important to take from this, is that God can’t break through the unforgiveness in our hearts, it has to be our decision, and we are actually opposing God by not forgiving others… in order to have an intimate relationship with God, we need to be free from unforgiveness.

Some of you are dealing with situations where you are being sinned against on a daily basis and you might be asking, ‘How can God be allowing this to happen? Why is he not helping me or protecting me?’ Jesus hates sin. When someone sins against you he is angry about it. Infact, he hates it so much that he came to earth and died on the cross so that we can be released from all the effects!

I would encourage you to read the story of Joseph, Genesis 37 to 50, it’s a fairly long piece of scripture but you will see the pain and sadness as he suffered betrayal by his brothers, being sold into slavery, taken miles away from his home, he honored God by refusing to sleep with his masters wife, which led to false imprisonment for years, all the time still honoring God, before God raised him to the second in command in Egypt. When he meets his brothers again he has the power to exercise judgment and punish them but instead we see in Genesis 50 v 20, ‘As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today.’ God will bring your suffering for good!

God loves restoration. That’s why he sent Jesus, so we can be forgiven and restore his relationship with his children. Ideally forgiveness should lead to reconciliation between us and the person who sinned against us. This is only possible when both sides are repentant and willing. But in some cases the person might not know they hurt you and it’s not always good to tell them their fault.

For me, I didn’t tell my Mum, as I thought it would cause her more hurt and pain by saying something at the time. So forgiveness works differently depending on the situation, and is certainly not something we should fear, because God has got our backs and he will lift us up!!

Don’t forget that the devil LOVES us to be separated from God. And he will use unforgiveness to try and get in and pull us further and further away from God. The spirit wants to PROTECT our relationship with our heavenly father… who wants to forgive us!!! So when we pray, and listen, don’t overlook the spirit making us aware of any unforgiveness we are holding in our hearts.

Stop and think for a moment… Can you think of anyone you’re holding a grudge against, or someone you want to get back at for something they did to you?