Anger
makes us smaller, while forgiveness forces us to grow beyond what we
were.
Forgiveness
means letting go of a hurtful situation and moving on with our own
happiness and it takes faith to do that. Here are some thoughts derived
from a forwarded email.
Forgiveness takes
faith in many ways. It takes faith to believe God’s Word and forgive,
rather than clinging to our anger and bitterness.
It takes faith to
believe that peace will eventually come to our troubled heart and soul
after we forgive. And it takes faith that forgiveness alone can change
the situation‚ and that even if it doesn't, we'll forgive anyway.
We
can forgive even
if we wait for changes that are needed.
Jesus didn't wait for
the resurrection to forgive the Roman soldiers who killed Him.
Forgiveness is not a
compromise with evil. It is seeing past the faults and wrongs
of the moment; it is believing God for what we cannot see yet, it is
having faith. And the reward of faith is seeing what we have believed
in, in His time.
Satan hates
forgiveness reflected in God’s children.
It defeats everything
Satan stands for. It transforms failure into hope, and faults into
beauty and power.
When we forgive
others for their sins, the Devil can't condemn them either. When we accept
God’s forgiveness for our sins,
we refuse to accept the
condemnation of the Devil.
Without grains of
gritty, irritating sand, there would be no pearls of great price.
The next time we feel those gritty faults and failings of others rubbing
us the
wrong way, let us rejoice for the pearls they will eventually become in our
own life, as we coat those irritations with truth‚ love, forgiveness,
and faith.
When we forgive, it
does not mean we are accepting the wrongs of this world. It means
we're believing in God’s power to overcome them.
It doesn't take strength to hold a
grudge; it takes strength to let go of one.--Jesse (John Stamos), |