"Be gentle and ready to forgive; never hold grudges.
Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others" Colossians 3:13



~Forgiveness~

The Bible has much to say about your forgiveness
I shall try to show many verses that can apply to your forgiveness of another
as well as understanding your forgiveness from God
You must know that you are forgiven by God, and allow that to be in your life.
If you are forgiven by your Father, then so He asks that you also forgive others. Prayer for Forgiveness..

Help me,God,to move
beyond my hurt and make
the healing choice to forgive.
May Your love warm my heart
so I can reclaim the freedom
and peace that come
with forgiveness.

"But more than that, we even boast in God
through our Lord Jesus Christ,
through whom we have now received reconciliation" Romans 5:11

"All this is from God, who reconciled himself through Christ
and has given us the ministry of reconciliation 2 Corinthians 5:18

Human beings, very often make excuses for, and try to rationalize
their sins~"well I did it because I was this in the past, or that
happened to me". Perhaps they think these past, or present circumstances
will make less the transgression. But, God's righteous hatred of sin
is very clearly seen in the awful death on the cross of Jesus, as He
paid the full penalty for all our transgressions, past, present, and future.

"Surely he has borne our infirmities, and carried our diseases..." Isaiah 53: 4

"who was handed over to death for our tresspasses, and
was raised for our justification" Romans 4:25

None of us are like God. We are all sinners, imperfect in our nature,
yet made perfect in God's eyes by the cross of Jesus His Son.
We all have, or may commit sins, requiring a loving forgiveness from another,
and from our Lord God. We know that this will be a perfect, loving
forgiveness, as promised to us through faith in Jesus Christ.
When it's time for you to forgive, look in a mirror. What do you see?
Who is looking back at you? You should see a person, no different
than others, capable of sin.Your righteouness though, through the cross
covers you, when you follow God's command, in forgiving, as He has
done with you~immediate, full, and final.

"Therefore we have been buried with him by baptism into death,
so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the
Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been
united with him in a death like his, we will certainly be united
with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was
crucified with him so that the body of sin might be destroyed, and
we might no longer be enslaved to sin." Romans 6:4-6

How wonderful is it to know, that we are guaranteed a life with God
because of the cross !! But, we shall have nothing, if we do not
follow Christ and do as He did in our forgiveness. This is essential,
and commanded by all who love God, and His Son Jesus Christ.

Before we can forgive others, we have to know what forgiveness is, and what it is not.
It's important to realize that forgiving is not easy to do, nor is it an easy choice to make.
But you can do it, keeping these thoughts in mind.

Forgiveness is not forgetting...
Many times we cannot forget, and we feel the pain of the injustice.
Choose to forgive, and Christ can begin to heal your hurts. Once you do forgive,
the healing for yourself can begin.
Forgetting is never a way leading to forgiveness, but hopefully it may be a good by-product.

Forgiveness is a decison of your will-your hard choice....
A hard, required choice by God, goes against every sense of our conception of what things are right, and fair--
we naturally want to seek revenge for our sufferings--it's a part of our human nature.
When you forgive another person for an injustice, you release the anger,
and the constant punishing of that person in your mind, over and over, for causing you your pain.
In Romans 12:19, God warns against taking out our revenge on others...
"Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave room for the wrath of God; for it is written..
' Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord ' "
He then instructs us to care for, clothe, and if needed, feed our enemies,
overcoming evil with good, heaping burning coals on their heads.
Refusing to forgive keeps you hooked to that person--let them off the hook.
You can trust that they will not be off God's hook,
and then you trust God to deal with the person(s) justly and fairly. If you don't forgive,
releasing your anger and hatred, the person still is hurting you, long after the injustice has been done.
Do it from your heart, for your sake--get yourself free from the past, that you cannot change anyway.

Forgiveness will cause you to live with consequences of another persons sin...
..whether we like it or not, fair or not. Forgiving is most correctly attributed
to sin of another person, either against you personally, others, or society.
Better choice for a happier way to live in these consequences,
is to do it in freedom of forgiveness, rather than bondage of bitterness
Non forgiving is a bondage, to the injustice, and to the person. Forgiving others, we take their sins upon ourselves,
as Christ did for us (Jesus died once-for all our sins), and the justice in that is, the cross makes forgiveness morally right.
Remember, the consequences you suffer from others sins are temporary.

"Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander,
along with every form of malice. Be kind and compassionate to one another,
forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you. Ephesians 4:31-32

Don't wait for the other person to ask for your forgiveness...
Using Jesus example on the cross, we don't need them to ask us to forgive them.

"Father forgive them, for they know not what they do." Luke 23:24

We choose to forgive, no matter what.




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