How to Forgive....

[Elijah2]

Lest wanton dealers of offense get too comfortable with this proposition, let it also be pointed out that God intends to remove from His Kingdom ALL who offend, and Christ stated explicitly that it would be better for a millstone to be tied around the neck drowning them in the sea than for anyone to cause one of HIS little ones to stumble.

It cuts both ways. Offenders don't get to dance away going nyah nyah, we get the kingdom and you don't. If anything, their penalty shall be even more severe.

Hey M, you know it as well as I know it that certain sins will not inherit the Kingdom of Heaven. If they don't confess and repent their sins, then how is HE going to be able to forgive them.

The millstone parable is about putting a snare, trap, or stumbling block in someone's path causing them to sin (Matthew 18:6), and the offender who does that will receive the millstone.

Now HE doesn't want you to perish, and nor do I want to see that happen, so what point are you really making about forgiveness and unforgiveness?

Matthew 18:15-35 is good reading.

Be blessed in Jesus' Name.

 

[Angeloffire]

The root of unforgiveness is anger. So it is easy to see that true forgiveness must come from the letting go of anger.

We cannot blame everyone else for the decisions we make and for the anger in our hearts. So to forgive and be forgiven, the anger from your life must be defeated.

Lips service, "oh, I forgive you" doesn't work.....as the anger wells up again with the slightest aggravation.

Why do some people get angry really easy and stay there, reliving it and carrying the baggage with them daily and passing on their aggression and others seem to be able to overlook and go on in peace?

Why do some things tick us off and some things not, sometimes that which doesn't tick us off is more of a crime than that which sets us off?

 

[brinny]

Forgiveness is not an intellectual exercise. It is grace-driven only. God must be at the helm. True forgiveness, when it happens, does not have un-resolved issues that well up and sneak out at inopportune moments. There's nothing lurking in there with its tentacles wrapped around one's heart, soul, psyche....it can only be done after spending sufficient time in the arms of Abba, after which He has done the preparation Himself for the wounded one to be able to do such a thing. He enables it.

"Should" is a word that is best left in an enclosed, locked box, in God's throw-away zone when venturing into the realms of forgiveness.

As i said, I wrote a short piece on forgiveness of my mother. It was only through God's grace alone that it ever happened...a miracle. And inexplicably, in His timing. When she died there were no regrets, hurts, false guilt, or any haunting old unresolved memories or pains. Just peace.

 

[Angeloffire]

Forgiveness is not an intellectual exercise. It is grace-driven only. God must be at the helm. True forgiveness, when it happens, does not have un-resolved issues that well up and sneak out at inopportune moments. There's nothing lurking in there with its tentacles wrapped around one's heart, soul, psyche....it can only be done after spending sufficient time in the arms of Abba, after which He has done the preparation Himself for the wounded one to be able to do such a thing. He enables it.

"Should" is a word that is best left in an enclosed, locked box, in God's throw-away zone when venturing into the realms of forgiveness.

As i said, I wrote a short piece on forgiveness of my mother. It was only through God's grace alone that it ever happened...a miracle. And inexplicably, in His timing. When she died there were no regrets, hurts, false guilt, or any haunting old unresolved memories or pains. Just peace.

Exactly, If you really forgive someone, it means it is gone. You will have a great sense of peace within you.

Sometimes people think that feeling sad about their failings or inability to get past certain things is a bad thing, but Godly sorrow is good for a person to, to realise when they are wrong, and to repent and change.

It has been my experience that true forgiveness only comes with the wisdom and revelation from God on each individual situation. I suppose calling it 'grace' would be just another way of saying the same thing.

There is one common thread to anger though and that it is always us 'needing' something or 'wanting' something from the person we are angry with.

When they don't give it to us, we are angry. But this anger can be destroyed if you but give your heart to the Father and get all your spiritual needs from Him.

This has been a wonderous blessing for me to know and it is a gradual unfolding into my own life.

What would have normally been devasting....false accusations etc, are more like just wind in my ears, or like it is background noise on a radio or something.

Things that used to tear me up......don't anymore because I don't look to others for my source of existence and draw my spiritual needs from them.

 

[ANM29]

The following subject is to open our minds and heal our hearts:


Forgiveness is huge. If you cannot forgive, the bible says you cannot be forgiven.

But you cannot make a conscious decision to just forgive, no more than you can to just forget.

In truth we are all a sum of our past experiences. If you cannot get passed the past, how do you move on?

Clearly we see that we have to forgive, but how?

What is the key to forgiveness?

You can't move on till you get pass it. You can't get pass it without the GRACE of God that gives you the power to let it go. It can be something over time, it can take a long time to forgive certain things, but it can be done.

I believe some people prefer to hold on to it because it makes you think that you have an 'upper' hand on the person even. Sometimes it is just plain out hard. If you don't want to be healed and let it go, and some don't, you won't. Then you are the one walking around with baggage and not able to get to the place God is trying to get you to. You will be stuck and miserable for the rest of your life until you DECIDE that you WANT to forgive. ( This is where you go to God with this thing as much as you have to )

When I realized that I NEEDED HEALING from a lot of pain and took it to God, he began to give me the strength to let things go. I bombarded God for a peace of mind over and over and over again when it would come back, till finally one day I realized, "This does not even hurt anymore and I forgive them, they did not know what they do"

When you forgive the BIG hurts, you will then be able to let go quicker and easier of the small stuff. This is from my own personal experience. Because your eyes just open more and more and more over time. It leads to a deeper walk with God.

 

[brinny]

forgiveness and the subject can be used as a battering ram and a weapon in the hands of those who are not ordained to venture into the subject. It is then that it is twisted, and used to further hurt.

It is dangerous to venture where God has not prompted us to set foot.

An example:

a 23 yr old woman had been kidnapped with her boyfriend.....they both were taken to a house. For days the boyfriend and she were tortured. The boyfriend was raped, his private parts were cut off and he was cut up and put in plastic bags. the girlfriend had to watch. then she was tortured, raped in every way possible, bleach poured down her throat and various places to erase DNA, etc. then her breast was cut off, and various other things.....and somehow she survived.

She's in the hospital..the ICU unit. I go visit her because she attended my church once as a visitor.

There's not much of her left. When i go into the room, she's conscious however.

My first question:

"Have you forgiven them?"

A few years later. I visit her in her apt she has provided by the government. She does not go to church. She hardly recognizes me anymore. She has ventured into a deep recess in her psyche that is carved out from searing trauma that is beyond the means to cope..it's the only place that is safe. it's a hiding place. it's a place of desperation. a place that is a retreat, literally.

yet she is lucid.

I ask her:

"Did you forgive them?"

 

[Moriah_Conquering_Wind]

There is one common thread to anger though and that it is always us 'needing' something or 'wanting' something from the person we are angry with.
When they don't give it to us, we are angry.

For you perhaps, but no single individual constitutes a template or boilerplate from which everyone else gets cut or stamped. God makes us all individual and unique.

Its own anger generally resides in the fact that the person in question had wronged it somehow at some point. It would not want anything from such as those, though it might at times feel it would like to do something TO them.

Generalizing about others from our own experience just leads to passing judgment on them, not to understanding them. To understand others, we must engage with and listen to others. Jesus did, and it forms the basis of ministry. Without that there bes no ministry, just a podium, a showboat, and one or more colossally deceived egos.

What would have normally been devasting....false accusations etc, are more like just wind in my ears, or like it is background noise on a radio or something.
Things that used to tear me up......don't anymore

This has nothing to do with forgiveness. This has to do with an entirely other aspect of things, and there can be positive reasons for this happening as well as negative ones. While it can be wonderful to be untouchable and made of emotional Teflon, placing a value on, and priding oneself in, being untouchable can interfere with reflecting the character of Christ who, as our High Priest, gets touched with the feeling of our infirmities. It also makes ministry fruitless. People know if you can be touched or not, and they know whether THEY have been touched or not. And if one must become untouchable, then one of necessity becomes incapable of touching others.

 

[brinny]

You can't move on till you get pass it. You can't get pass it without the GRACE of God that gives you the power to let it go. It can be something over time, it can take a long time to forgive certain things, but it can be done.

I believe some people prefer to hold on to it because it makes you think that you have an 'upper' hand on the person even. Sometimes it is just plain out hard. If you don't want to be healed and let it go, and some don't, you won't. Then you are the one walking around with baggage and not able to get to the place God is trying to get you to. You will be stuck and miserable for the rest of your life until you DECIDE that you WANT to forgive. ( This is where you go to God with this thing as much as you have to )

When I realized that I NEEDED HEALING from a lot of pain and took it to God, he began to give me the strength to let things go. I bombarded God for a peace of mind over and over and over again when it would come back, till finally one day I realized, "This does not even hurt anymore and I forgive them, they did not know what they do"

When you forgive the BIG hurts, you will then be able to let go quicker and easier of the small stuff. This is from my own personal experience. Because your eyes just open more and more and more over time. It leads to a deeper walk with God.

if someone is struggling with searing trauma and pain they might think you are saying something is wrong with them because they have not accomplished it with the ease you seem to be saying you have with this simple thing called forgiveness.

 

[Moriah_Conquering_Wind]

Re: Post #66:
Good for you Brinny, for speaking the truth with boldness.

 

[ANM29]

Exactly, If you really forgive someone, it means it is gone. You will have a great sense of peace within you.

Sometimes people think that feeling sad about their failings or inability to get past certain things is a bad thing, but Godly sorrow is good for a person to, to realise when they are wrong, and to repent and change.

It has been my experience that true forgiveness only comes with the wisdom and revelation from God on each individual situation. I suppose calling it 'grace' would be just another way of saying the same thing.

There is one common thread to anger though and that it is always us 'needing' something or 'wanting' something from the person we are angry with.

When they don't give it to us, we are angry. But this anger can be destroyed if you but give your heart to the Father and get all your spiritual needs from Him.

This has been a wonderous blessing for me to know and it is a gradual unfolding into my own life.

What would have normally been devasting....false accusations etc, are more like just wind in my ears, or like it is background noise on a radio or something.

Things that used to tear me up......don't anymore because I don't look to others for my source of existence and draw my spiritual needs from them.

Amen!

We think they 'owe' us. God can only fulfill our needs, but we search for them in people, and they fail us every time because they just simply are not GOD. They are fallen creatures in need of Grace just as ourselves. Only God can meet our spiritual needs in this life...which is where true fulfillment is anyway.

 

[ANM29]

if someone is struggling with searing trauma and pain they might think you are saying something is wrong with them because they have not accomplished it with the ease you seem to be saying you have with this simple thing called forgiveness.

You need to reread my post. I cant' be any more honest than I have about it.

You also must have not seen where I said... I said I BOMBARDED God for peace of mind over and over again. Nothing is easy about it at first, but forgiveness can become very easy over time. I speak from personal experience in my own life.

 

[Angeloffire]

For you perhaps, but no single individual constitutes a template or boilerplate from which everyone else gets cut or stamped. God makes us all individual and unique.

Its own anger generally resides in the fact that the person in question had wronged it somehow at some point. It would not want anything from such as those, though it might at times feel it would like to do something TO them.

Generalizing about others from our own experience just leads to passing judgment on them, not to understanding them. To understand others, we must engage with and listen to others. Jesus did, and it forms the basis of ministry. Without that there bes no ministry, just a podium, a showboat, and one or more colossally deceived egos.

We are to live unto God. Nowhere in the bible does it justify unforgiveness. There is only ONE Law of God, One Truth.

We cannot live from anywhere else and have peace, joy, love, or salvation.

People will wrong you all your life, just as you wrong others. If we are consumed by each other's wrongs, how will we be saved?

 

[brinny]

Not if they see where I said I BOMBARDED God for peace of mind over and over again. Nothing is easy about it at first, but forgiveness can become very easy over time. I speak from personal experience in my own life.

good for you.

 

[ANM29]

good for you.

Yes, It has been very good for me.

 

[brinny]

Yes, It has been very good for me.

that's all that matters then.

 

[ANM29]

that's all that matters then.

No, it is not all that matters, Others matter too.

 

[brinny]

No, it is not all that matters, Others matter too.

ok.

 

[Angeloffire]

Amen!

We think they 'owe' us. God can only fulfill our needs, but we search for them in people, and they fail us every time because they just simply are not GOD. They are fallen creatures in need of Grace just as ourselves. Only God can meet our spiritual needs in this life...which is where true fulfillment is anyway.

Exactly.....this is the wisdom I am beginning to know and oh what joy and freedom.

I observed yesterday a thought brought to me by the Father.....it was a sweet little picture.....I saw a herd of sheep some were naughty and when they were their coats turned black and they didn't want to listen to the Shepherd....and then they would turn white when behaving themselves as they listened to the Shepherd.

But they were always just sheep, as I was a sheep and there was only one Shepherd.

I felt no need to turn the sheep either color, but only observed the rather strange and interesting behaviours of the sheep and sort of a common thread, if you know what I mean, but a peace in knowing that there is only One Person who oversees our souls.

 

[ANM29]

Exactly.....this is the wisdom I am beginning to know and oh what joy and freedom.

I observed yesterday a thought brought to me by the Father.....it was a sweet little picture.....I saw a herd of sheep some were naughty and when they were their coats turned black and they didn't want to listen to the Shepherd....and then they would turn white when behaving themselves as they listened to the Shepherd.

But they were always just sheep, as I was a sheep and there was only one Shepherd.

I felt no need to turn the sheep either color, but only observed the rather strange behaviours of the sheep.

OH, what FREEDOM it is...

Awesome..and that is just how we are until we realize that it is wise to follow and listen to the Shepard..Because we are merely sheep and our only hope for survival is in the Shepard.

 

[brinny]

Revival Hymn​

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uwbps9k5Dj0