- Mar 4, 2005
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Your idea of forgiveness and Jesus truth about forgiveness is not the same.
If that person needs you back, then you take them back as Jesus said to, to reconcile with them.
I believe you can forgive someone and reconcile with them without having to share a home, or even a life, together.
I knew someone who forgave her rapists. That didn't mean that she didn't want to see justice being done and for them to avoid prison; it meant she refused to feel hatred for them, plan her revenge, let them constantly be in her thoughts and take over her life.
There are fathers who've forgiven the terrorists who killed their sons and relatives - that doesn't mean they want to live anywhere near them, never mind with them.
After the war, Corrie ten Boom was giving a talk about forgiveness. Afterwards a German man came up to her and apologised for the part his country played in the war. Corrie realised that this man had once been one of her guards; one who had treated the prisoners badly. She describes how difficult it was to raise her arm and shake his hand. She did it, but that doesn't mean they exchanged addresses and started having coffee together.
In the case of adultery, if my husband walked out on me, I could forgive him for doing so, refuse to hate him or hold his actions against him and even pray for him.
But that doesn't mean I would be able to trust him again, and might not even want a relationship with him in the future. He would have deliberately broken our marriage contract, and if he came back even 6 months afterwards, I would not feel obliged to live with him again.
Also, your forgiveness does no good if there is no action, it changed nothing, did nothing.
It might have changed the other person.
And also forced the other person to have a contempt heart to you for not opening your self to him.
If my husband committed adultery and walked out on me, then walked back a few months/years later and despised me for not welcoming him back, that would be HIS problem.
Committing adultery = breaking one of God's commandments, and violating the sanctity of marriage. Jesus talks about marriage being 2 people becoming one flesh; in God's eyes, two people are married when there is sexual union. The marriage contract between us would have been broken - by him - as he vowed "forsaking all others, til death do us part".
But if that person is repented and just made a mistake
Making a mistake is forgetting something on the shopping list, or forgetting to pay a bill. Sleeping with another woman and then running off to be with her is more than "a mistake". The mistake might have been not talking about/addressing what was wrong in the marriage, instead of letting it get to the point where he acted of his feelings.
Not that my husband is about to run off with anyone; I'm just using it as an example.
and your not in harms way then there is no excuses to show love and compassion.
I might feel compassion for him - that doesn't mean I could trust him again.
With that said.
You either follow Jesus or you dont.
Jesus said if you have anything against your brother, then go to him and offer a gift.
How more important is a spouse then a brother?
A spouse is someone who has made promises, before God and witnesses, to love and be faithful to you. If THEY choose to break that contract and those vows, who says that forgiveness means that you have to welcome them back into your home, and later, bed?
And supposing they had left you for 5 years and then THEY wanted a divorce? I don't know about where you are, but in the UK someone can be divorced after 5 years, even without their consent.
Also, what is your reward if you do not let them back into your life? nothing, you did what the rest of the world did, nothing.
Why do you boil every forgivness topic into a abusive one?
I haven't posted in that many forgiveness threads, so you can hardly say that I make every such topic about abuse.
To ask forgiveness means that you have done something wrong, to, or against, another person. A person can abuse someone else's good nature, take advantage of them, bad mouth them or ruin their character/reputation - or simply cause hurt by making assumptions, false accusations or telling lies about them.
LEts say there is no abuse to it, lets just say he made a couple mistakes and he has a sexuall addiction and needs help and there is no one to leed him to help, it will conrtoll his lide, but you could help him, lead him into the right direction?
If he talked to me, admitted he had a problem and wanted help for his sexual addiction because he didn't want to cheat on me - sure.
If he just went off, saying "it's not my fault; it's an illness" and didn't talk to me, or a doctor or counsellor, or tell me what he was doing - probably not.
And it would depend on whether he wanted help or whether he only confessed because he got found out.
But becouse of your pretend forgivness with no action he is in worse repair.
I think that I might well be able to say to him, "I forgive you for cheating on me, and now understand that it was due to an illness/addiction." I think I could show my forgiveness, and care for him, by getting him counselling and the help he needed. That is very different from saying, "it's ok; here's your door key back and what time will you be home tonight?"
We all need each other, and to pretend that you do not need to act out of being hurt, well, thats a excuses.
In the above scenario might well have a relationship with him as a friend afterwards. That doesn't mean I would be obliged to stay married to him; to put up with his infidelities and ignore the fact that I didn't trust him. If I did that, it would be unlikely that I COULD forgive properly, because I would see him constantly, be reminded of what he had done, and might do again, and keep re-living my hurt and his wrongdoing.
Forgiveness means to except that person back into your life unless they will harm you.
I disagree.
Forgiveness, I believe, means not holding someone's sin against them; constantly telling others how much you have been hurt - "poor me" - and refusing to think of ways of getting revenge on the one who's hurt you.
If someone had robbed you and gone to prison, it would mean accepting that they had done their time, and not making them pay over and above what the law had decided was fair.
And even if, Jesus said to turn the other cheek and offer it to them. Because your the perfect example.
So if someone hits you; let them do it again? If someone steals your jewellery, run after them and make sure they have your bank card too?
20 For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.
Our righteousness DOES exceed that of the Pharisees - Jesus was made sin for us so that we could become the righteousness of God, 2 Corinthians 5:21.
Pharisees - Jews - do not accept this, nor that Yeshua was the Messiah.
We cannot become righteous, be born again or enter the kingdom of heaven unless we accept Christ, are forgiven by him and live in him.
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