GROWING SEEDS: Forgiveness Is Hard

FORGIVENESS

So.....there's this scripture that goes something like this:

“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.

~Matt. 6:14-15

Forgiveness is hard.  It's unnatural in this big wide world to extend amnesty to someone who has wronged you, lied about you and talked smack about you.  The last thing....the hardest thing...to do as your soul recovers from the sucker-punch to the gut is to say "I forgive you" when all you really want to do is hurt them back. Am I right?  Please tell me I'm not the only person to feel this way.....

Take the example of the man whose 10-year-old daughter, kneeling beside her bed at night, asks to pray for the accuser of her Dad.  "A lot of wisdom for a 10-year-old", her choked-up Dad says to us through our TV screens. 

Now....think for a second.  

Have you ever been accused of something you "didn't" do?  Have you ever been called-out on something you actually "did" do?  I sure have...and I would imagine you're shaking your head right now remembering when you were.  In both cases, whether I did what I was accused of doing or not, they both required me to quietly and privately ask God for Forgiveness; whether the forgiveness was for me or for the one wrongly accusing me. 

The best part is....God has made it a win-win situation!  If I'm being wrongly accused and I pray for forgiveness for my accuser, it releases me, the prisoner, from the pain of being accused.  (Trust me...this works!) And if I'm the guilty party, asking for Forgiveness releases me from the prison I've been hanging out in since committing the sin.

Forgiveness helps us understand why Jesus took a nail for your sins; He had to find a way to forgive you.