If you forgive others . . . your heavenly Father will forgive you; but if you do not forgive others, neither will your heavenly Father forgive your trespasses.”
Let’s admit that this is a difficult topic for all of us. The words fall easily from our lips, “Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors,” but everything in us resists the notion of forgiving—large affronts and small. We simply don’t want to do it.
It feels so good to be angry. It feels so right to resent, and hold a grudge and to wait for payback time. Frederick Buechner once said that we love the taste of anger at someone who has wronged us: we roll it around in our mouths as long as possible, savoring every last drop.
To be forgiven is a miracle. It comes from God. God’s forgiveness is something that happens inside us, not inside God, freeing us of the shame of the past so that we can be different people, choosing and acting differently in the future.
Dr. Willy L Mafuta,
Senior Pastor,
Hopewell United Methodist Church, Hopewell, NJ 08525
www.hopewellmethodist.org