Welcome Home Sunday: Forgiveness

Forgiveness can be one of the most difficult things we will ever do in this life. It is so hard not to feel resentment toward someone who has caused you hurt or pain. Especially if that hurt or pain comes from someone who is supposed to love and protect you. But when you hold that resentment in and don’t forgive, you are actually causing yourself even more hurt. As the saying goes, “not forgiving someone is like drinking poison and waiting for the other person to die.”

Make allowance for each other’s faults, and forgive anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others. -Colossians 3:12

God does not say to forgive only if the other person deserves it, or if they ask to be forgiven. Actually it’s quite the opposite. In Matthew 6:14-15, Jesus tells us “For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.”

This week, I was able to witness the beauty of forgiveness between my husband and his father. His dad had done some things that really hurt my husband when he was younger. My husband has lived with an anger and bitterness toward his father for many years. He loved him, but he didn’t have a loving relationship with him.

This week, my husband’s dad was placed on hospice care. My husband had so many emotions welling up inside. One of those being an overwhelming feeling of the need to forgive his dad. My husband thought he had forgiven his dad in the past, but now he realized that he had only forgiven him in words and not in his heart.

By the grace and strength of God, this week my husband was able to sit at his dad’s bedside and truly forgive him.

I asked my husband how he was finally able to forgive his dad. He said he wasn’t able to forgive him until he finally recognized that he was also imperfect and in need of forgiveness. That if Jesus was able to forgive him for all of his flaws, he should also be able to forgive his dad.

His dad didn’t deserve to be forgiven. But which of us actually deserves to be forgiven? God doesn’t forgive us because we deserve it. He forgives us because He loves us. And we should do the same.

Forgiveness is not easy. But with the grace of God, it is possible. Forgiveness lifts a heavy weight from your heart and gives you a sense of freedom.

Is there anyone you need to forgive? Pray and ask God to give you the strength to offer them forgiveness the way that God forgives you.

To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you. -Lewis B. Smedes