The Grace to Forgive

"Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey, you are that one's slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading to death, or of obedience leading to righteousness?" (Romans 6:16)

All of our lives, we have heard the old adage, "Time heals all wounds." While this rings true occasionally, it is certainly not an all-encompassing rule. There are times when we can actually subvert the effectiveness of time to heal our wounds. Moreover, we an actually work against the power of God to heal our hurts.

What would cause us to do this? It is a matter of forgiveness. When we allow unforgiven hurts to dominate our lives, we are in effect saying, "I do not want to be free from this pain. I want to keep it, nurse it, feed it, and help it to grow. Then, when the time is right, I will thrust this pain upon someone else, hoping to bring misery upon him as well" Most likely, we never actually voice these intentions, but the effect is the same: we refuse to forgive, and therefore we suffer the pain anew every day.

As Christians, we celebrate that God has chosen not only to forgive our sins but to absolutely forget them as well. According to Psalm 103:12, "As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us." You see, when God forgives us, our sins and failures are totally removed. They are gone - never to be seen, thought of, or heard from again. Ask God today to search your heart and reveal any unforgiven sins that have caused you pain, and ask for the grace to forgive and forget.

Lord, do not let me use the chains of unforgiveness to rebind that which You have set free - my soul and that of my neighbor. Amen

~Charles Stanley~