So this past Sunday my pastor preached a awesome service on the topic of forgiveness. The sermon left me completely and totally wrecked and caused me to examine my ability to forgive in my own life. You see in life people will hurt you but also in life we will hurt people as well as God. Forgiveness is a two-way street, God forgives us and we forgive others.
I realize that forgiveness can be a challenging thing to do especially when you are hurt beyond belief but forgiveness is vital in our relationship with God. In the bible we get a very clear picture on forgiveness in the following scripture:
“If you forgive those who sin against you, your heavenly Father will forgive you. But if you refuse to forgive others, your Father will not forgive your sins. (Matthew 6:14, 15 NLT)
WOW! So what is this scripture saying? Its saying if we dont forgive others God will not forgive us. In simpler terms its saying if you want to recieve forgiveness is starts with forgiving. If that isn't clear enough to cause you to forgive i don't know what is? This scripture changed my life! God calls me to forgive so i can be forgiven, and trust me i need his forgiveness, DAILY! If you want to experience the goodness of Jesus then you have to forgive those who hurt you.
I know you may say but Tamika, they really hurt me, you dont understand. Well let me flip the switch, we really hurt God daily when we sin against him but does he forgive us? YES! So what should you do? FORGIVE!
In my own forgiveness struggles i remind myself that if God can forgive the mess that I am i can forgive others. God loves us and he calls us to love others. When people dont meet our expectations we get mad, when they dont do what he want we get mad, when they hurt us we get mad. We may very much have a right to get angry but why not take the anger and turn it into love?
Do you know that if someone did something to offend you and you decided to forgive them that the person may experience Christ because of it? See you may not see it now but in all that we do, even in forgiving a person, we are showing and representing Chrsit. So today, I challenge you to do yourself a favor and FORGIVE! Forgive that person who hurt you, did you wrong, or offended you and revese it and extend love.
Make allowance for each other’s faults, and forgive anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others. (Colossians 3:13 NLT)
God bless,
Tamika Mahomes
