Forgiveness

"Forgiveness means more than saying sorry." (From the movie Just Friends).

So likewise shall my heavenly Father do also unto you, if ye from your hearts forgive not every one his brother their trespasses. Matthew 18:35.

Every day we are given new mercies and new grace. God continues to bless us even when we don't deserve it. So how is it that we are unable to forgive our spouses when they fail us? Everyone of us is human. We are all capable of mistakes. In fact, we continue to make mistakes everyday - but God is like a big eraser. He erases our mistakes and they are no longer visible, not even the imprint. When someone looks at us, they don't even know that we made the mistake - there is no trace of it, no record.

So why can't we forgive our spouses? Sometimes it's hard to forgive people. I know. But let's look at it from a different perspective. Let's examine this from the other side. If you make a mistake and feel really bad about your error, don't you want to be forgiven for your wrongness? Of course you do! You want God to forgive you every time you ask Him.

Forgiveness is not about you. Your marriage is not about you. Your life is not about you. God has a purpose for everything in your life. Things happen in your life so that in the end, God gets the glory. Your marriage represents Christ's love for the church. When people see your marriage, they should see the love between a husband and a wife as representation of Christ's love for His church (people). When people see you forgiving your spouse, they see a representation of God's love for His people and God's grace and mercy. So unless you don't want or need forgiveness, then you have no reason to forgive anyone else. But I beg to differ that we all need forgiveness; therefore, we should all forgive. Read Matthew 18:21-35 in its entirety about the unmerciful servant. And remember when your spouse does something that hurts you - they don't necessarily mean to, they don't know that they did it, they don't know what they are doing, or they aren't saved. So we could do several things: we could be mad, hold a grudge, seek revenge; but as Christians none of these are Godly. We should; however, pray for them, pray for ourselves, seek reconciliation, forgive them (even if they don't ask - remember it's not about us), and love them. We could also do something nice for them - write them a letter, give them a card, send flowers, give a hug or kiss, etc. I know this sounds strange but in order to heal and get past the hurts once you've reconciled you will need to do something to erase the memory of the scar. Doing something nice for that person every time you think about the hurt will eventually replace the hurt feelings with lovely feelings. This won't be easy at first, pray for guidance, strength, and the love that God gives. And notice that the word forgive has the word give in it.

Now forgive.