Bob Hamp

So it happens.  The fallen-ness of our world does it’s work, and someone, somewhere hurts you. The assault begins to try to prevent you from allowing the Nature of your Creator and Redeemer to flow through you.  Then you go to a pastor or christian counselor and they say the dreaded words.  “You have to forgive…”

So we either begin to resist, or try to comply.  Resistance comes from a variety of misunderstandings, and if compliance comes without understanding we may try to forgive and wonder why we still start to twitch when we see “that woman” at the grocery store.

I would like to give a clear description and process to help you receive and enjoy the gift of forgiveness. But before I do that, I need to address a few misconceptions.  Below are five things that forgiveness is not.

Forgiveness is not:

Denial: Denial is the demonstration of this most unusual human trait: We can lie to ourselves and actually believe it. Denial is not just minimizing a thing, it is when people actually believe their own deception. I heard one radio guest say that denial is an acronym. Dont Even No I Am Lyin’  Forgiveness is not lying to ourself about the offense or the intensity of the pain we feel.

Repression: Repression is when we swallow our outward responses and bury them deeper in our soul or body.  We take the pain we feel outwardly and push it down out of sight, and out of mind.  All we have done is taken pain from our emotions and pressed it into our physiology.  The most common issue we find when we pray for those with physical ailments is that they have harbored ongoing resentment, and often true forgiveness allows them to let go of the roots of anger and ultimately receive healing for a number of conditions. Forgiveness is not when we press down our pain because we think God doesn’t want us to show anger.

Letting the Offender off the Hook: One of the greatest obstacles to people making the difficult choice to forgive is the fear that the offender will simply get away with their offense if we forgive.  When we forgive we do not give up on justice, we give over the working of justice to God Himself.  Though it is true that when we forgive, we turn the offender over to God for His version of Justice, this should not be our motive for for forgiving.  When we forgive someone SO THAT God will bring justice to them, this s not forgiveness, we just hired a hit man.  Forgiveness does not let the offender off the hook, it places them on God’s hook.  Justice is not an eye for and eye or a tooth for a tooth, that just leads to a lot of blind toothless people. Justice is when wrong things are made right.

Forgetting: Forgiveness is not forgetting or pretending that the offense never happened.  It is not the willingness to approach again the person who has wronged us.  We may need to set boundaries and maintain safe distance.  Wisdom demands that we acknowledge truth and danger. Forgiveness simply says we relate to the person out of love not out of resentment. Boundaries are a legitimate form of love.

Being a Doormat: Confrontation is also a legitimate form of love.  We reguarly see God in the Old Testament, and Jesus in the New Testament have confrontations in order to right things that are wrong.  Forgiveness is not simply allowing unrighteousness to persist, it is the assurance that our confrontations can issue forth from love not rage.

Once we understand what forgiveness is not, we will hopefully find it easier to enter into what forgiveness is.  Stay tuned.

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