Finishing Forgiveness

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Forgiveness is a process a lot like grieving. Sometimes, like when the sin against us is horrific or ongoing (or both), we really are grieving a death. Maybe a death of our innocence, or something that was stolen from us. Perhaps the death of something that now will never be. Perhaps the death of a relationship. Maybe we’re mourning the pain and the wreckage caused by sinful actions that were just senseless and didn’t have to be.

So in forgiveness, we often go back ‘n’ forth through the five stages of grief – denial, anger, bargaining,  depression, and finally acceptance. All that’s healthy as long as we don’t get stuck anywhere.

Often it’s like peeling an onion. We think we’ve worked through forgiveness, and something pops up and we realize there’s another layer deeper that we didn’t know was there, and we have to work through it again. Can you relate?

So how do we know when we’re finally done? We know we’re done when we can pray blessing over the other person without that initial twang of “but they don’t deserve it” in our hearts. We’re not minimizing the evil they did to us. We’re not failing to hold them accountable. We can still set up healthy boundaries, especially with someone who’s unrepentant or when there’s been no restitution. But we’re acknowledging that they are not the evil they did to us.

A good friend taught us this prayer. It’s not magic words – you can’t pray any prayer by rote and expect to accomplish anything. Just use it as a guide an make it your own. Here it is:

“I speak words of blessings, love, and forgiveness on ____ in Jesus name. Heal me of the hurt, heal me of the memory of the hurt, and give me the working of the gift of miracles to walk as if it never happened.”

Wow. Isn’t that good? That will rock your world if you have the guts to pray it regularly. Sometimes you have to fight through with this simple prayer dozens of times a day. But it’s transformational.

Will you take up the challenge and risk praying this prayer?

Today’s Action Step: When I forgive someone, I will keep working through it with the Lord, and maybe with those in my life I trust, until I can pray blessing over the other person without any reservation.

Kudos also to John Sandford, founder of Elijah House Ministries, for this concept of finishing forgiveness by praying blessing.

So how about you? Does this resonate? Have you been there? Are you there now? Tell us your story and/or struggle in the comments or shoot us an email. And if you think this would benefit others, please share it with the social media buttons below.

Forgiveness & Restitution

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Ok, so say my neighbor Jon borrows my car, and when he brings it back, he says, “Thanks for letting me borrow your car. I got into a little fender-bender, but I got it repaired and re-painted.” He shows where the dent was, and you can’t tell. The body-shop did a great job. He’s repented, and I forgive him.

But am I going to let him borrow my car again? Probably not. Yeah, he fixed it, but now my car’s been in an accident. Cars never drive quite the same afterward. The trade-in value’s decreased. Even though he fixed it, I’m feeling like I didn’t get the better end of the deal here. Interactions with other people have a scale, and in this situation, the scale’s tilted away from me.

I’ve forgiven Jon, I don’t hold it against him, but the relationship has a boundary it didn’t have before. It’s not the same relationship.

So how does Jon repair the relationship to the place it was before? That takes more than repentance and forgiveness.

So rewind. Suppose when Jon brings my car back, he says this instead: “Thanks for letting me borrow your car. I got into a little fender-bender, but I got it repaired and re-painted. While it was in the shop, I had them take out your AM/FM radio and put in a 6-disc CD changer, with a 10-speaker, surround-sound, premium sound system.”

Now can Jon borrow my car again? Absolutely! And I hope he gets in an accident! Maybe I’ll get spinners next time.

My neighbor repaired the relationship by tipping the scale back in my favor. I got the better end of the deal. That’s restitution.

That’s what it takes to repair broken relationships. A sacrifice on our part, over-and-above repentance, blessing the other person, tipping the scale in their favor, so they come away feeling like they got the better end of the deal.

When we do this, we have to look at it from their point-of-view. It has to be something that blesses them, not just something that would bless us. So ask the Holy Spirit, “Lord, what can I do to truly bless the person I’ve hurt?” Then go with your first thought – God will always answer that prayer.

And you know what? If we will make that sacrifice when we hurt others, God will pay us back and tip the scale in our favor. I’ll take that.

Kudos to John Sandford, founder of Elijah House Ministries, for this great illustration.

Today’s Action Step: When I realize I’ve hurt someone, after repenting and changing my behavior, I’ll ask the Holy Spirit what I can do to bless them, to tip the scale in their favor so they feel like they’re getting the better end of the deal.

Can you relate? Have you or someone else repaired relationship by tipping the scale with restitution? Tell us in the comments or an email. And please, if you think this would help someone else, share it on social media with the buttons below.

Forgiveness & Woundedness

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HeadShot Dave 100x100Forgiving someone and being healed from the wound they gave us are two different things.

Say we go to the gun range together. I’m handling my weapon carelessly and accidentally shoot you in the shoulder. You can forgive me instantly, but a gunshot wound takes three or four months to heal.

Suppose I see you the next day after you’re released from the hospital. I slap you on the shoulder, “Hey, how are you doing? Great to see you! Sorry again about yesterday.”

“Ouch!” you respond, because I slapped your back right on the wound. “That hurts!”

“Why are you still hurting?” I ask. “What’s wrong with you? You’re being very unforgiving.”

But forgiveness has nothing to do with it! You’ve forgiven me, but you still have the wound. There’s nothing wrong with you – it’s normal for you to hurt again if I slap the wound. My refusal to acknowledge the reality of the wound I’ve given you is really a sign of my own un-repentance.

And if you continue to observe me still handling my weapon carelessly, I’ve made no change in my behavior, it’s perfectly reasonable for you to put up a boundary and not go to the gun range again with me.

Forgiveness just means we don’t hold anything against the person; it doesn’t mean we’re instantly healed from the wounding they’ve caused.

Yes, we will never get healing unless we forgive first. Forgiveness is part of the healing process. In the gunshot example above, if you intentionally don’t take your antibiotics so the wound stays infected and messy, so you can hold something against me, that would be pretty jacked up. That’s unforgiveness.

In my own life, I’ve experienced a divorce. I’ve forgiven everyone involved, my ex, the lawyers, the judges, etc. And, yes, I’ve taken responsibility for, and repented of, my part in it. But the pain and the wounding continues, both in my own life and in the lives of the people affected by it (my children). The pain goes on and on.

So what do you do? I keep going back to the Lord and giving the pain to him. Day by day, giving him today’s pain. So I can move on with life, not getting stuck in it, but moving forward into the live works he has prepared in advance for me to do (Ephesians 2:10).

Today’s Action Steps:

  1. I will keep a short tab forgiving people, not holding the wounds they caused me against them (although I may put up a healthy boundary to keep from getting wounded again).

  2. I will take my spiritual antibiotics, giving the Lord my pain and wounding each day, so I don’t get stuck and dwell on it, but move forward into the future he has for me.

How about you? Does this resonate? If so, please leave us a comment or an email. Tell us your story. And if you think this would benefit someone else, please share on social media with the buttons below.

The Blessing of Suffering

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Brother Yun, a severely persecuted house church pastor in China, was talking prayer requests with Western Christians. (His story is told in the phenomenal book, The Heavenly Man. Totally recommended reading!) They said they’d earnestly pray that the Lord would end their government’s persecution of Chinese Christians.

“On no, don’t pray that!” Brother Yun responded.

The Western Christians were shocked! “Why don’t you want us to pray for an end to your suffering?”

Brother Yun answered, “Because then we’d become complacent like the Western church. Pray instead that we can bear up under it in a way that honors our Lord Jesus.”

Wow, blows my mind. We in the West have no grid for that. But the Bible says to rejoice in our suffering:

“Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.” James, brother of Jesus, in James 1:2-4.

“We rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and charter produces hope.” Paul, in Romans 5:3-4.

“Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.” Jesus, in Matthew 5:11-12.

What if, when we get to heaven, we see Jesus on his throne (see Revelation 4), the most beautiful being in all of existence. Then we get it! “Oh Jesus, you are so beautiful, now I get it! Now I’ll sacrifice for others! Now I’ll be happy to give up my creature comforts to help someone else in need! Now I understand!” But it’s too late. This is heaven. No one needs anything now. There’s nothing we can do to sacrifice for anyone else no matter how much we want to.

In the whole eternity of our existence, God has blessed us with a brief, very brief compared to eternity, 70-80 year window where we have the privilege of sacrificing for someone else, of meeting someone else’s needs at the expense of our own.

Angels never have the opportunity to do that. That’s a blessing God has only given to us. That’s hardly fair.

And it’s even more unfair than that. Our temporary sacrifices here bring us eternal rewards in heaven (see the parable of the sheep and the goats in Matthew 25:31-46). God has stacked the deck in our favor.

It’s all about perspective, and where we have our eyes set.

When Brother Yun was being tortured in a Chinese prison with an electric cattle prod in his mouth, he had his eyes set on the prize, on Jesus himself. He endured horrific but temporary pain because he had his eyes set on eternity.

Even here in the First World, God blesses us with opportunities to suffer and sacrifice, to meet other people’s needs at the expense of our own. We discover who we really are when we’re willing to go outside ourselves and help others. That’s why it feels so fulfilling.

Have you had this experience? Have you ever begrudgingly helped someone, but afterwards you felt so good, feeling God’s smile, you wondered why it was such a hard decision? Tell us your experiences in finding yourself by helping others in the comments. And please, if you think this post would bless someone else, please share it on Facebook or your favorite social media channel.

The Vows of Victimhood

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Bob had a business meeting in Boston, and decided to drive instead of fly from his home in Washington, DC. His wife, Barb, called him to see how the road trip was going.

Barb: How’s the road trip going, Honey? Where are you?

Bob: I’m in Raleigh, North Carolina.

Barb: Honey, you’re going the wrong way!

Bob: Yeah I know. I want to go north, but the car’s going south.

Barb: Who’s driving the car?

Bob: I am.

Barb: Then why are you going south?

Bob: I don’t want to. I want to go north. But the car got on the southbound ramp and won’t turn around. I’m worried I might be late for my meeting in Boston if the car goes to Florida.

Barb: Honey, turn the car around.

Bob: Hey, don’t judge me! I’m the victim here in this crazy situation! I want to go north; it’s not my fault the car’s going south!

Pretty jacked up, right? Bob’s words, saying he wants to go to Boston, all of his good intentions and planning, all of his heart-longing for it, aren’t going to get the car there. His actions are driving the car, not his words. If he ever wants to get to Boston, he needs to take responsibility for his actions and turn the car around. Pretty obvious, huh?

But we do this in our relationships all the time. We pursue our life-goals this way. It’s our actions that are driving our car and setting our destination – not our stated good intentions or our desires.

When we live this way, we’ve taken the Vows of Victimhood.

“I want to relate but not be hurt.” Although we say we want a relationship, we take steps by our actions to push people away. We decide we’re going to control the situation to keep from getting hurt, instead of trusting God to heal us through the hurt. And it turns out that our trying to control causes us worse hurt than the natural situation would have. But we blame the situation.

“I want to learn but not fail.” We say we want that promotion, but we’re not willing to learn the technology or acquire the skills or do anything different. We don’t want to risk failing. It’s as if Bob intentionally drove to Raleigh to avoid the traffic in New York City. He will avoid the traffic in New York City with this strategy, but he’s also not going to Boston.

Kudos to Dr William Clark from The Lay Counselor Institute for this excellent analogy.

Does this strike a chord with you? Been there, done that, got the tee-shirt? Tell us in the comments or send us a private message with the Contact Us link above. We really want to hear from you.

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Loving Accountability

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Does not judging mean I have to tolerate abuse or evil behavior against me? The perps would like us to think so. Abusers try to pervert the whole “don’t judge” principle to their unholy advantage. So let’s get this sorted out and bring some balance here.

Judging, accountability, and our emotions are all totally independent things. Our society, and even the church, constantly gets these confused. You can forgive someone and hence not be judging them, while at the same time holding them accountable for their behavior, while at the same time still being very angry and hurt. If their behavior was criminal, you can prosecute them to the fullest extent of the law while completely forgiving them.

We should always hold abusers and criminals accountable for their behavior, for two main reasons:

  • To protect others from being victimized like we were.
  • So (hopefully) the person, when confronted with their sin, repents and turns to the Lord who sets them free from it, healing them from the pain in their lives that made them vulnerable to that sin and deception in the first place.

Working through our emotions over the matter is totally separate from whether we hold the other person accountable or not. If the sin against us was grievous, we may need to walk our emotions through the stages of grief (denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance). Get Christian counseling, inner healing, deliverance, probably all of the above, whatever help you need to work through it. It’s normal to need help to work through the emotions in a healthy way. An excellent plan is to work with both a Christian counselor and your Pastor.

Forgiveness doesn’t mean pretending it never happened and or not holding the person accountable. It means releasing them from owing us anything for it. Because we realize they are not the evil they did to us. We can still set healthy boundaries as long as our heart is right – not to punish them but either to (1) keep ourselves safe, or (2) hold them accountable (for example, if we have an authority-to-subordinate relationship to them like parent-child or employer-employee).

Judging and forgiving are not activities centered in our emotions, but in our will. They have nothing to do with how we feel about the person who hurt us. They have everything to do with what we choose to believe about that person. They have everything to do with what we declare about that person.

So what do we declare about the person who wronged us? Are they the evil they did to us? That’s judging. Or can we declare that they are not the evil they did to us? That’s forgiveness. It really is that simple (but it’s not easy).

Mercy toward others triumphs over the judgement we deserve.

So what do you think about all this? Are you trying to sort out forgiveness versus accountability? It took me a while to sort this out in my own life, and I have to keep going back to it. We’d love to hear your story. If this resonates with you, or challenges you, please leave us a comment or shoot us an email (click the “Contact Us” button on the menu bar).

Becoming What We Hated

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We become what we judge. When I first heard this, I took some convincing. But they showed it to me in the Word of God: Romans 2:1 says, “You, therefore, have no excuse, you who pass judgement on someone else, for at whatever point you judge another, you are condemning yourself, because you who pass judgment do the same things.”

See? You become what you judge.

Since learning about this, I have witnessed it to be true, both in my own life and in the lives of those close to me. When we harbor resentment and judgment, we will eventually start doing the same things, and eventually become what we hated.

If it’s not too corny, think about this. Even George Lucas has figured this out. It’s the theme of the Star Wars movie Return of the Jedi. Luke’s vengeance against his father (Darth Vader) gives him the opportunity to become his father. This is the choice Luke must make at the end of the movie – to complete his judgement on his father, and hence become him, or to forgive his father. And it’s the power of Luke’s forgiveness that frees his father from his deception, and he saves Luke. But whether Luke lived or died, he still made the better choice. Better to die at the hands of Emperor Palpatine than to live as Darth Vader II.

Judgment sets us up to become what we hated. This is why forgiveness is so vitally important. It releases us from repeating the evil done to us.

Mercy triumphs over judgment (James 2:13b NIV).

We’d love to hear your story of mercy and judgement. Please leave a comment or shoot us an email.

God’s Return

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What does “don’t judge or you’ll be judged” mean? (Matthew 7:1) It means we will be judged in the same way that we judge others. This is an example of sowing and reaping that we talked about in the last post. And this is really cool, because we can set ourselves up for blessing (or the opposite – it’s our choice).

Judging and forgiving are complete opposites. When someone does evil against us, we are either doing one or the other. This relationship law goes far beyond the evil done to us. Because unfortunately, our judging often goes far beyond the evil done to us.

We judge things we don’t like, even though the person isn’t doing anything to us. We sometimes make our personal preferences into idols, and then our self-righteousness makes them doctrine to impose on others. At that point, we’ve become Pharisees, who made the Traditions of the Elders equal to the Law of Moses (Matthew 15:1-6).

Churches have split over the style of music or the color of the carpet. Ever condemn a style of music you didn’t like? If the words are sinful, then the words are certainly wrong, but not the style. The style, the instrumental music itself, is ok even if we don’t personally like it.

So if it’s something that doesn’t affect us, if it isn’t a black ‘n’ white contradiction to the Word of God, and if it isn’t self-destructive behavior, we’re better off dropping it. It’s probably just our personal preference. And we’ll receive the same grace from God we give the other person (or not).

Mercy triumphs over judgment.

We’d love to hear your story of mercy and judgement. Please leave a comment or shoot us an email.

What Goes Around

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We reap what we sow. Galatians 6:7 says, “Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows.” This one is all over scripture. We’ve all heard the Golden Rule (Matthew 7:12, Luke 6:31), treat others like you want to be treated. But rarely are we told the reason. Growing up, I always thought it was just one of those “must do because it’s the right thing” things.

But the truth is, even from a selfish point-of-view, we want to do this. Because we reap what we sow. Give into the relationship what you want to get out of it. People will treat us the way we treat them. This concept is actually getting a little traction in the culture with the phrase, “Pay it forward.” Or how about the bumper sticker I’ve seen so often, “Practice random acts of kindness and senseless acts of beauty.” Or to put it more bluntly, “What goes around comes around.” See, even the world has figured this one out!

So what about when I sow kindness and mercy and people give me crap? What about when I’m nice and people are still jerks to me? Huh? What about that?!? Wow, then you’re very lucky. Because then, God makes up the difference, because you’re being like him. He will be kind and merciful and gentle and understanding to you. He will “pay it forward” to you. And that’s way better than any person could ever do anyway.

And if you’re really lucky, he’ll pay you back in the currency of intimacy with him. There are no greater riches.

Has this worked for you? Tell us your story in the comments. We’d love to hear from you.

Honoring Authority

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Honor is the currency of the Kingdom of God. “Honor your father and mother … that it may go well with you” (Deuteronomy 5:16) goes way beyond honoring your father and mother. It applies to authority in every area of our life – our work, our school, our church, everything.

So how do you handle a difficult boss? A difficult professor? Honor them. The authorities in our life have been put there by God for our good, whether they realize it or not. God will bless us in that situation based on our own actions, not based on good the authority figure was at being an authority. God holds them accountable for that.

God will hold them accountable for whether or not they were a good authority figure. God will hold us accountable for whether we honored them or not – regardless of whether or not they were a good authority figure.

So if you have a difficult boss or teacher, ask the Holy Spirit how you can honor them (in a godly way) in which they will feel honored. That’s a prayer the Holy Spirit will always answer. Then if you make it your life-style to honor that authority figure by following the Holy Spirit’s prompting, God will make sure it goes well with you in that area of life, whether the difficult authority person does or not.

Have you tried this? Did it work for you? What was your experience? Please tell us in the comments. If you’d like to tell us about on on-going difficult situation, feel free to shoot us an email (click “Contact Us”). We’d love to hear from you and pray with you.