The Ones We Forget

And when you stand praying, if you hold anything against anyone, forgive him, so that your Father in heaven may forgive you your sins.

Mark 11:25
 

Forgiveness work is an important part of a healthy spiritual life.  The consequences of unforgiveness have major spiritual, psychological, and even physical consequences.  It may not come naturally to us, but forgiveness is a practice that is too powerful to ignore.

If you are new to forgiveness work, check the series of posts I wrote that treat the topic more exhaustively.  For now, though, here are two things to remember.

The first is the issue of deserving.  Often, the thought comes to mind that this or that person doesn't deserve to be forgiven for such a horrendous act.  I won't debate that: many actions are so horrendous that the common attitude would be that the doer does not deserve to be forgiven.  

Don't let that stop you, though.  While those who do horrible things may not deserve your forgiveness, you deserve your freedom, and forgiveness is the way you get out from under the weight of those hurts and offenses.  

The second reminder concerns the offender.  Often when we do forgiveness work, we run though the hurts we've experienced personally.  We look for people who have not treated us as they should have.

In doing so, we omit an entire aspect of offenders: the people who are not part of our personal lives. Think of the customer or clerk who treated you rudely, the reckless driver who cut you off in traffic, the paper carrier who insists on tossing your newspaper into the ditch.  

Think of the criminals you see arrested on tv, the ministers who failed to live the gospel they preached,  the politicians whose greed and thirst for power offend you.  All the persons (or situations or institutions) that offend you when you hear or read about them are opportunities to forgive.  

I remember some of the old ladies of my youth.  "Bless your heart," they'd say when someone mentioned a trial in their lives.  "Bless their hearts," they say when told of people who were sick or in need.  They meant it, too: that was their heartfelt prayer for the unfortunate ones.

Like them, we can breathe a prayer of forgiveness when we are offended by what we read or see or hear.  Someone has committed a horrible murder?  "Bless his heart" or, if you prefer, "Bless his heart and bring him to justice."  Forgive in the way that seems best to you, but forgive.

 

Forgiveness hurts us, the unforgiving.  The offender wins again when we refuse to forgive, thus drawing all the unhappy consequences of unforgiveness our way.  Those consequences begin to accumulate as soon as we tighten our lips in condemnation.  

Do you have good reason for that anger?  I'll say yes, you do.  Is that reason good enough for you to suffer the consequences of refusing to move from anger to forgiveness?  Only you can answer that question.