I find it funny that my blogger template and Microsoft Word don't even recognize the word unforgiveness. Microsoft Word recommended that I correct the spelling of "unforgiveness" to the word "forgiveness." The word is so infrequent and unused in society that a computer doesn't recognize it! The irony in this is killing me.
unforgiveness. That one thing that we don't like to talk about cause it's really hard... and we OFTEN don't even think we have a problem with.
I remember taking a class a long time ago about the topic, and thinking the class would be a breeze since I really didn't have anything in my heart that would need forgiving. HA! I was very very wrong. Silly me.
Fast forward to a much more "mature" me. A few years ago I went through a period of time where I really allowed things to fester in my heart. It started off with one person, and then another, and then another. I found myself in situations where I felt taken advantage of, lied to, and unappreciated (all things that actually happened, with all the raw emotions that come with something like that). I found myself reeling from the blows of people who I trusted and looked up to who said and did things that were very hurtful and offensive. There were more people and other things, and many circumstances and situations. It was weird. I'm a pretty easy going person, and I'm a people pleaser by nature, so between the two I rarely have run-ins with people, and I rarely get mad at people... it's just not in my nature, but there I was, for too long, feeling like a lot of stones had been thrown at me, and I was getting buried under the rubble.
Hindsight is 20/20, and while this went on for a little over 2 years, the further I got away from this pain/unforgiveness cycle, the more I started to realize that I think God was allowing or inflicting those situations on me to bring out some dirt in my heart that was hidden. He has a way of doing that; refining us, growing us, by putting us in situations that cause us to squirm, and then to look inward.
The longer I walk this Christian walk I realize that God really does work on one thing at a time in our lives. While we may clean up our act and have some major life change as a new believer, the hard work of really changing and looking more like Christ is a very slow and sometimes painful process- depending on how malleable my heart is and how quickly I want to change.
Were it not for the pain that comes with the lessons the He teaches us and the change that He tries to make in us, I don't think we would do much changing at all. It is the pain that draws me begging and pleading to the feet of Jesus, asking for wisdom and knowledge, and to. be. changed. If there was no pain in the process, I don't think I'd see a need to change at all.
So there I was in the midst of all this yucky unforgivess, not even realizing that it was I who had a problem. I was the problem. Whaaatttttt??? No, no, no, the problem was "them!" Nope, it was me.
And it took my husband pointing that out to me, for me to realize the truth.
Sidenote: Spouses are for refining each other. You and your spouse should be able to (gently) point out in each other the areas in which you are not behaving/living spiritually well... and you should each be able to take what the other says to heart. If you and your spouse don't have that back-and-forth, then you won't be able to help each other on this journey, which is a detriment to you both. You have a teammate for a reason. Be a team player- both of you.
Anyway, I got off track. There I was sitting in a big old pile of unforgiveness, feeling like a victim, and not wanting to believe it was me that needed to do the changing. When I was finally fed up with my misery I began to really look at my heart and ask the tough questions, and process how to forgive people when I still felt hurt.
About that time I was working in the yard, pulling weeds, and I was amazed at the process of the weeds. I'd find these tiny little weeds sticking up about two inches out of the ground, but I'd go to pull them and out came another 10 inches of the weed that was underneath the soil! Yes, clearly I'm not a veteran gardner. My point: those silly weeds made me realize that I was looking at my unforgiveness as a tiny little two inch problem that I thought I was handling very well because I had not blown up at anyone or cut anyone out of my life. Upon further examination, those petty little bouts of unforgiveness, compiled each time I felt justifiably hurt by someone, left me tangled and stuck and almost unable to get past anything anymore because of all those 10 inch weeds underneath the surface of my heart.
I literally was getting to the point where even little things became big things, my thick-skin and ability to roll things off my shoulder were becoming a thing of the past, and I was downright miserable. I was all tangled up, because I was holding on to my hurt, and justifying my anger.
Can I tell you something? During that time, I had a very dry, distant relationship with God. I would open my bible and nothing would jump out at me. I'd pray and it would feel like I was talking to the wall. I got irritated, almost to the point that I didn't want to read my bible, because I knew I wouldn't get anything out of it anyway.
There are a lot of things I'm unpacking here, but I want this to stick: forgiveness is the key to successful spiritual growth and a successful ministry.
Verses that would talk about God forgiving us, and our responsibility to forgive each other would nag at me, popping up in my head... Not that I didn't want to forgive, but c'mon, it's hard!
Walking with God/being in relationship with God/whatever you want to call it requires a heart that wants to be changed. That is kinda the whole point of the Christian walk- that God changes you. He doesn't save you to leave you. He didn't die in your place and then decide you weren't worth being changed. None of us, in our humanness, look or act or embody Jesus, and so we all need heart change.
With this change comes a better us. He doesn't make us different people, he makes us a better version of ourselves. Kinder. Calmer. More merciful. More joyful. Wiser. More in tune to the needs of others. The list goes on.
The problem lies in our inability to forgive others, which hinders the work that God is trying to do to reshape us/better us. Unforgiveness is messy. Unforgiveness hurts us. It doesn't hurt others, it hurts US. And it hinders us from seeing and hearing clearly. It's like an artery that keeps clogging, one little granule of plaque at a time. (I probably said that wrong, but you get the picture.) It's bad news.
I think one of the hardest parts about unforgiveness is that sometimes you think you've conquered it, and it creeps back up out of nowhere. I had a dream the other night about (someone who had/has hurt me pretty deeply, continually for quite some time now--that I have taken great strides to forgive, continually) and (this someone) said a whole bunch of mean, critical, ridiculing things to me... in my dream! And I woke up with all those hurt feelings and ugly thoughts and a heaviness set over me again that I hadn't felt for quite some time.
I had worked R.E.A.L.L.Y. hard on scraping up every last bit of hard feelings toward this person--- even when I knew I would never receive the healing that I needed in the form of an apology and a change in behavior. Despite all that hard work, one stupid dream brought back all my hurts and fears and angers to the surface and I had to start all over.
Dreams are dumb. Sometimes.
Unforgiveness is dumb. Always.
It is a hard battle that sometimes we fight more than once. Hear me when I say the battle is worth it. The freedom that comes from letting go is worth it. The chains that come from holding on to bitterness are entangling and life-sucking and the whole mess will eat at you. It's not worth it.
One last thought I've been struck by recently. Jesus, on the cross, looked at those who had just finished hanging him there and said, "forgive them, for they know not what they do."
Sometimes I make forgiveness less about an apology, and more about making sure people knooowwwwww what they did to me. I get hung up on that. Sometimes, we have to forgive, even when people have no idea how deeply they've hurt us- or even hurt us at all. Oi. I'm learning that this concept is possible, and sometimes necessary, and in the end, I'm ok despite what I feel I'm lacking from someone else.
Ok second last thought. Sorry. Here goes: forgiving people throws people off. When people think you are going to attack, or give a cold shoulder, or change the dynamics of a friendship (or collegue-ship), and you respond in love/grace instead, it throws people off. This is one of the quickest, most stubtly-powerful ways to show Jesus love that you will ever do. Be grace givers. Give the benefit of the doubt. Hand over mercy instead of contempt. You may not get many chances to talk about Jesus or spread the gospel, but you can drench Jesus' message all over people without uttering a word.
Let's start showing people what it means to follow Jesus, instead of trying to tell people how they need to be different.
All for the Glory. You are loved.
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