What Is Forgiveness & How Do We Do It?
Answers to hard questions
Forgiveness can be hard and horribly painful. Sometimes we refuse to do it. Sometimes we do it wrong because we don’t understand what forgiveness is and what it’s not. When done right, forgiveness provides amazing results like it did for 2 guys named Walter and Mike that I’ll tell you about.
Their story prompted me to do some research.
- How could Walter forgive Mike for killing his son?
- What did that entail?
- Why did he?
- How far do we take this forgiveness thing?
- Do we forgive everyone for everything — all the time?
My research brought me to my knees crying out to God
How can I do that? I thought forgiveness didn’t mean condone. What about criminals?
I went looking for answers.
Seeking Answers
God didn’t answer me right away so I asked a group of people to help me define what forgiveness is. Maybe God would speak to me through them.
Here are a few.
- Letting go of my right/desire for revenge.
- Forgiveness is something you ultimately do for yourself, and then allow God to handle the offender as He sees fit. They don’t have to deserve it (you didn’t) and they don’t even have to ask for it or acknowledge they were wrong. Forgiveness DOES NOT mean that they still get free access to you to do it all over again, though. Boundaries are healthy and good and should especially be enforced with someone who has hurt you. Boundaries protect you, they are not punitive towards the other person.
- Unforgiveness is a cage, but it keeps the offended locked up, not the offender. When you cling to unforgiveness, you are the one bound in chains. When you forgive, when you release that other person, you discover that cage door was unlocked the whole time and you are free.
- Freedom
- Coming to the point where the person is not the evil they did to me
- No bad feelings, don’t owe anyone anything but love and respect.
Those answers weren’t surprising to me. I felt validated but I still had the burning question that arose through my research. What about criminals?
I needed more answers.
To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you. Lewis B. Smedes
Harder Answers
These answers agreed with my research (emphasis mine). But instead of answering my question — they exposed a double standard in my heart.
- Getting beyond harboring ill feelings and forgiving by the act of pardoning an offender.
- Forgiveness mimics Christ, who said He “cast our sins as far as the east is from the west”. What I get from that is this: forgiveness means the wrongdoing no longer exists. It means that while you’ll never forget, it is no longer held against them. The key is recognizing all God has erased from your record, and deciding to erase everyone else’s in your own heart.
- Letting it go with or without an apology or understanding.
Pardon? Let it go?
Those make the first answers sound easy.
Forgiveness is not about forgetting. It is about letting go of another person’s throat. William P. Young
How it Works
Letting go of a person’s throat is a vivid picture. Anger and pain want to retaliate, take vengeance, grab someone by the throat and choke the life out of them.
We feel we have the right. And in a sense maybe we do. But we also don’t.
The right we feel we have elevates us to judge. We believe we’re better and above the one our anger wants to destroy. Truth is we’re no better. Not at our core. No one is perfect. That makes us all equal.
There’s only one who’s perfect — God. We project our imperfectness onto Him when He doesn’t do what we think He should. I’ve done this. We get angry at God and act out.
How does God respond to this? Does He seek to grab us by the throat and destroy us?
No.
He has the right. The bona fide right. He’s God, we’re not. It’s that simple. Sin makes us criminals.
But He made us in His image and He loves us.
But God has shown us how much he loves us — it was while we were still sinners that Christ died for us! Romans 5:8 GNT
The Bible tells us it was the night Jesus was betrayed He instituted the Lord’s Supper. He declared the New Covenant in His blood knowing full well it would be answered with betrayal.
Because God is Love, by faith He let go of our throats — in the face of betrayal.
Oh, what grace!
Those who accept HIS forgiveness are empowered to forgive others. One fuels the other.
This can be easier said than done. Sometimes forgiveness is a journey.
- A journey to believe we are forgiven and tap into His empowerment.
- A journey from choosing forgiveness to feeling like we have.
His grace is HOW we forgive.
This can be easier said than done. Sometimes forgiveness is a journey. Click To Tweet
What about criminals
Forgiving is not only to cease to feel resentment against, but also to grant free pardon, to let go, condone, to excuse, and to give up all claim.
Here’s the double standard I found in my heart — I welcome it with open arms when I’m the one on the receiving end.
- But what about on the giving end?
- What about those who commit a crime?
- Does that mean to obey God’s command to forgive we are never to press charges?
- Is pressing charges being unforgiving?
- Are we supposed to let people get away scot free and never prosecute?
My heart reeled at the possibility.
I don’t want God to press charges against me!!! But He doesn’t need to because Jesus took my prosecution. God has the legal right to forgive me because of the blood of Jesus. But Jesus died for the sins of the whole world. How is this appropriated? If we press charges are we like the unforgiving servant in Matthew 18? Does that apply? Does it not apply??
This really bothered me until I heard the Spirit of Grace give me the answer. In a still and quiet voice I heard render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s and unto God what is God’s. If someone commits a crime, the government (Caesar) has the right to prosecute.
Wow! I would never have applied that scripture to forgiveness. Oh the eternal wisdom of God.
Forgiveness is not ignoring, endorsing or sanctioning a wrong. God didn’t ignore ours — Jesus took care of it.
We are to draw the strength to forgive from the one who forgave us and allow the justice system to do its job.
Forgiveness is not ignoring, endorsing or sanctioning a wrong. Click To Tweet
Walter and Mike’s amazing results
Walter was a minister. His son was murdered by a man named Mike. Shot point blank in the head.
Mike had no remorse. He offered no plea for forgiveness. Mike was convicted and sent to prison.
Justice was not enough for Walter. He continued to suffer.
Walter knew he needed to forgive Mike — but how? It’s not fair. Yet that is precisely the point. This bereaved dad drew on the forgiveness of Jesus and passed it on to the convicted nonremorseful murderer.
Walter reached out to Mike while he was in prison and told him he forgave him and why. It was about Jesus. Mike had never encountered love like that before and it changed his life. Now Mike knows Jesus and the two have become good friends. (Video source below)
Oh the power of the love and blood of Jesus.
What next
- Where are you on this subject of forgiveness? Share in the comments.
- Do you need to know you’re forgiven?
- Is there someone in your life you need to forgive?
Could that person even be yourself?
Video with Mike & Walter’s story:
Originally published at www.daniellebernock.com on June 26, 2018.
