Do not judge
others, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn others, or it will all come
back against you. Forgive others, and you will be forgiven.
—Luke 6:37, NLT)
Through the
years I have learned that the inability to forgive is like a terrible cancerous
disease. It eats at your spiritual health and ultimately destroys your
relationship with God. Because God has given us a free will to either choose or
reject Him, we also have a free will to either forgive or not to forgive.
In this verse
in Luke, Jesus explains that if we don't judge, we will not be judged. If we
don't condemn, we will not be condemned. If we forgive, we will be forgiven.
Isn’t the inability to forgive really judgment of that person? Our hurt and our
pain does not give us a license to judge that person. It does not give us a
license to allow anger and hate to consume our hearts. In
fact Jesus explains in Luke 6:35-36 that we are to “love our enemies, do good
to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your
reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High, because he is
kind to the ungrateful and wicked. Be merciful, just
as your Father is merciful.” We are to love those that hurt us. We can't harbor
bitterness. It will only breed more hurt and devastation. We forgive without
expecting anything in return. Those we forgive may not receive our forgiveness.
But we are to be merciful anyway. Just as Jesus forgives us, we forgive others.
When
we are devastated by someone's action, we have a choice what to do with the
hurt and pain that arises. If we allow that hurt to define who we are, that
pain will immobilize us. We find ourselves in bondage to our bitterness and
hate. It directs our lives, and consumes our waking and sleeping moments. Holding
on to the pain of unforgiveness is exhausting. Grabbing on to the bars of our
emotional prison, we shake and demand our jailer to release us. The truth is we
have jailed ourselves. We keep asking God to release the pain, and all along we
have had the key to open the door.
“Where
the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom,” Paul writes (2 Corinthians 3:17
NIV). The Holy Spirit invites us to forgive so that we might open the door to
our prison. It is our choice. Are we
ready to be released from our bondage of resentment, bitterness, anger, hurt,
frustration, hatred, and all that claims a hurting and hardened heart? When we choose to forgive, then we surrender
what we believe we have a right to own. His power will enable our choice and
transform our heart. “I will give you a new heart,” the Lord promises, “and I
will put a new spirit in you. I will take out your stony, stubborn heart and
give you a tender, responsive heart” (Ezekiel 36:26, NLT). With the power of
the Holy Spirit at work in us, forgiveness sets us free.
© 2017 Lynn
Lacher
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