Forgiving the unforgivable

This is an excerpt from a blog I used to follow and found comfort and guidance in:

Forgive and Forget? Not Really...
by Carla Rossi

To forgive is a powerful thing.
To not forgive is even more powerful. But not in a good way.
Huh. I guess I should be working on that…I’ll explain.

I am a lifelong Christian. My first love was Jesus, my first classroom was Sunday School. My Godly mother instilled in me the basic truths of my faith and I embraced them. I obeyed the Ten Commandments, loved my neighbor, and exercised my mustard seed faith. As far as I knew, I’d learned how to turn the other cheek, love my enemies, and forgive - just as God instructed over and over in His Word.

Then last week as I talked to a friend about a sad period in my life when I was hurt, betrayed, and persecuted by those who were supposed to be my friends and fellow believers, I stumbled upon a terrible truth about myself: I was the owner of a king-sized grudge. The more I shared with her about how I was wronged and cast out, the more anger and resentment bubbled inside me, and I knew if anger and resentment resided there, it was because total, honest forgiveness had not taken place.

I decided to investigate further. “Do you think I hold grudges?” I asked my husband as we waited for American Idol to start.
“Yes.” He didn’t even hesitate.
I was appalled. “Really?”
“Aw, c’mon, Bun.” (He used to call me Honey Bunny, which morphed into Bunny, and now, just plain Bun.) “You’re still mad at me for things I did fifteen years ago.”
“I am not.”
“You are. Remember when I accidentally mowed down your wisteria?”
I became royally agitated. “Give me a break! I put a bright orange ribbon on a huge wooden stake. How could you not see that? The space shuttle could detect it from space, and you just mowed right over it!”
“I rest my case.”

Oops.Next stop: prayer closet.

I began to prayerfully explore hidden anger and buried resentment. I asked God to show me where I’d messed up, who I’d neglected to forgive, and what I needed to do. I delved into submerged pain and forgotten hurts and one by one asked God for help. And the funny part? I realized I never had any trouble asking for forgiveness, I just had a heck of a time giving it.

The challenge: Take a look inside yourself. Are you harboring resentment? Or withholding forgiveness from someone who needs to know it’s okay? The time and energy spent holding that grudge is time better spent receiving the blessings you’ve missed.
Find it, fix it, forgive it, forget it.

This blurb really hit close to home to me, because I've been going through a really hard time in my life right now. I tend to take some things personally in relationships, and in a specific one I've been getting hurt over and over and allowing that to wound my spirit. This was my response to it. My first emotion was anger, because I felt like having to forgive after getting hurt so badly was unfair... but the conclusion I ended up coming to surprised me.

You make a very good point. You haven't truly forgiven someone unless you're willing to let it go and forget about it. But then when does the "fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice shame on me" thing come into play? Or, as Christians, is the answer... never? Do we just always turn our cheeks and continue to get hurt when we've been wronged before? Is that what being like Christ is... not standing up for yourself? So we just stand back and take it, and have the faith that the person wronging you will learn their lesson this time, or that God will intervene? Doesn't God want us to respect ourselves also? Where do you draw the line between being forgiving, and being self-inflicting?

I guess, standing up for yourself can mean different things. Instead of retaliating with anger and taking matters into your own hands, you stand up for yourself by giving it to God and killing it with kindness. By giving it to God, you ARE fighting back... because who is stronger than He? And by killing it with kindness, you are being an example and showing the person who wronged you what Christ's love is like... it's unconditional. Being strong isn't throwing punches and twisting the knife, it's having enough self control to hold back when all you want to do is swing, and loving that person when you want to hate. So just because you're not being "in your face" and forceful, doesn't mean that you're not fighting a battle... it just means that you're doing it in a Christian way. And in the end, you won't feel full of negativity or defeated... because you have God on your side this time. And that in itself is winning not only the battle, but the war.

I wrote that about a week and a half ago, and I think it's still taking it's time to seep into my heart and really marinate. True forgiveness is a hard concept to grasp, but once mastered it can be liberating. I've also learned that until we really learn to forgive others, we ourselves cannot be forgiven . So really, when you hold onto that grudge, you're also holding onto your own hurt against yourself. If you don't forgive others, how can you forgive yourself?... because, in reality, you are your own worst critic.

Let go, and let God.