I wanted to take a moment as I feel motivated to write about forgiveness. My Pastor’s message on Sunday reminded me that I have not taken the time to get this out of my head. It’s been on my heart for over a month now to write this and couldn’t sleep tonight unless I finally wrote it. I pray that it reaches someone in love and that it will spark you on a journey towards forgiveness. Not primarily focusing on forgiveness from God, but rather primarily focusing on the importance for us to forgive others. Before we get to unforgiveness, let us start by discussing stress.
Stress can be both good and bad. It helps your body reach through “fight or flight”, which is known as the stress response. Our bodies are equipped to handle small amounts of short term stress to help us handle daily situations. Like when we are driving and we see danger, stress will cause us to hit the brakes to avoid an issue. Stress however it is meant to disengage once the situation has been resolved. Often times we find ourselves carrying stress because the situation does not get resolved. Long term stress affects us emotionally, mentally, and physically. How do we know when this is happening? We are easily agitated or frustrated, we feel overwhelmed, and we have difficulty relaxing or quieting our minds. We also can have low self-esteem or feel bad about ourselves. We can feel depressed and it can also cause us to avoid others. If this has been going on for a while, you may be carrying a situation too long.
There are dangers in doing so because it affects our health. Digestive issues, low energy, problems sleeping, heart problems, frequently feeling ill, changes in appetite, skin and hair problems, and many more are all linked to long term stress. Click Here for a good illustration on this.
So how do we relate stress to unforgiveness? Let us follow a trail. To forgive is to cease to feel resentment against. So if you are not forgiving, you are carrying resentment towards a person. Resentment is a feeling of anger, bitterness, or ill will. To be angry is to also be irritated. And we learned that a symptom of stress is that we can become easily irritated. When we allow unforgiveness to create tension between ourselves and someone else, it leaves us in a state of mental or emotional strain and anxiety. In defining the word tension we find that it is also a strained relationship between individuals or groups.
We can easily find this in what we have been through in which someone has done us wrong and we choose not to forgive them. In these cases, it is difficult to continue a relationship with that person. As a result, family members no longer speak to each other, friendships are ended, and marriages are damaged and sometimes destroyed. Because all of this is happening around us, it then has a greater impact because not only are we allowing the incident affect us, but now we are suffering loss as a result of the incident. This is all compounding together to increase our levels of stress thus increasing our chances to affect our mind and body negatively. Most importantly, it is also affecting our spirits negatively as well. As a result, some of us can carry unforgiveness to our graves.
But there is hope! This will not be an in depth teaching on unforgiveness, but my intention is to help you discover ways you can learn to forgive. However the journey is yours to take. I was a kid when my brother and I decided we would wait up to see Santa put gifts under our tree. Our parents explained that he was let in the front door since we did not have a chimney. We fell asleep waiting, but because of the excitement we did not sleep for long. I remember running to the tree and finding it empty. I ran to my parents’ room to find out what happened. They first indicated that maybe he had not come yet. I ran outside and saw friends riding new bicycles, skateboards, or playing with remote controlled cars. I went back and explained that to them. They reminded me of the song, that he knows if we’ve been naughty or nice and maybe he skipped our house because of that. I remember walking off in tears sitting down trying to figure out what did I do wrong to cause Santa to not come? I didn’t stop to think of what my brothers did, I instantly focused on myself. After not being able to figure it out, I returned to their room to find that they were fighting to hold back laughter. I asked, “What is so funny about this?” After laughing they explained the gifts were in their closet and didn’t have time to put them under the tree because we would not go to sleep. I still did not find it funny, but was glad to have my toys. I shared that story because since then, at the end of the year I try to reflect upon the year to think about what went wrong in my life. What arguments did I have? What friends did I lose? What relationship issues did I have? Who did I do wrong? It’s a constant reminder that I am not perfect and I always have room to grow. I evaluate myself so that not only can I try to make things right, but also learn from my mistakes so the next year I can try to avoid making the same mistakes. This has helped me to grow tremendously, and have been doing this ever since being a kid. Truth is, we should be in a constant state of self-evaluation because we never know if the root of our issues is not in other people, but instead the root of the issue grows within ourselves.
I have learned that sometimes a person’s behavior is only a response to a behavior that I first showed. This is often true in behaviors that I consider to be normal and not realizing the affect it has on those around me. So I see a person reacting and I point the finger at them. This is something that happens to a lot of us and that is where self-evaluation helps us to resolve issues. In these cases, we are carrying unforgiveness for a person in which we were the cause of the issue. Matthew 7:3-5 reads, “Why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye but don’t notice the log in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ and look, there’s a log in your eye? Hypocrite! First take the log out of your eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.” That is what we tend to do in conflicts; we point the finger at the other person. However we should first examine ourselves.
The beginning of Matthew 7 starts with “Do not judge, so that you won’t be judged.” Paul teaches this concept in his letters to the churches and I point out Romans 14:8, “ Therefore, let us no longer criticize one another. Instead decide never to put a stumbling block or pitfall in your brother’s way.” Can we see the scenario in this, whereas we do something that causes the other person to react? In this teaching Paul wanted us to know that we should be careful in those areas we believe in that has nothing to do with God and His Word. Those things which are more personal beliefs, traditions, or practices, we try to hold against another person and in turn we end up offending the other person. This is impactful as a Christian because we are also in danger of turning someone away from God because we are supposed to represent God and His character. This holds true when as a Christian we show unforgiveness. How do we show Christ in our lives towards a person we do not forgive?
Before Christ gave up the ghost on the cross, Jesus looked down at the people and in the midst of their ridicule and mocking of Him, he prayed for forgiveness. He was willing to forgive the person who nailed Him to the cross. He was also willing to forgive the person who crowned him with thorns as well as the person who pierced Him in His side. Everyone who had done Him wrong, falsely accused Him, and didn’t believe in Him, He was willing to pray for them and seek forgiveness. This is the example we must follow. Easier said than done, right? I mean, we’ve searched ourselves and we didn’t find anything we did wrong, so that person needs to come and apologize first before we forgive them. However, Jesus did not wait for that moment; he had forgiveness in His heart regardless. And so did God as God allowed Christ to die for our sins. He gave up the ghost with a clear conscience and so should we when it is our turn to die.
And there is the primary danger. Sure, unforgiveness can cause health issues in your body, and stress is enough to kill us. Dying with unforgiveness hinders our chance to walk through the gates of heaven. It is not worth your soul to carry unforgiveness towards someone. I was watching Steve Harvey share a comment that motivated me to want to write this. He shared, “Unforgiveness is like buying poison for someone that hurt you, and drinking it yourself.” After pondering on that for a moment, it is when I understood the point of unforgiveness doesn’t hurt the other person, it hurts us. You know the familiar phrase, “I will never forgive that person for what they did!” We do this because subconsciously we feel this is a way of punishing or getting revenge on a person for doing us wrong. Because they did us wrong, we chose to not speak to them anymore, or maybe we ended a relationship because of such.
But how do we hurt ourselves? After all, we are removing ourselves from someone that hurt us, that should be a good thing right? The way God wants us to treat it is to forgive them and first give them a chance to change and not repeat the hurt or offense towards you. Consider how we’ve hurt God in the way we live and the mistakes we’ve made yet He gave us a chance to make things right? That is what we should do to others. Mark 11:25-26 warns us that if we cannot learn to forgive others when they do us wrong, that neither will God have forgiveness for when it is us who have done wrong. They key to God’s forgiveness begins with a sincere heart. A sincere heart to want God to forgive you, and a sincere heart to forgive those around you. Therefore not forgiving others puts you at risk of dying without God’s forgiveness. Dying without God’s forgiveness means we are also dying with something between God and ourselves. And that, my brothers and sisters, is dangerous.
Unforgiveness is a dangerous game we play that affects us physically and spiritually, and ultimately can cause us to lose our health and a chance at eternal life in heaven. Is it worth it? Now can we see how not forgiving hurts us more than it hurts the other person? So what do we do about it? First thing to do is pray. Sometimes we have issues that is deep rooted and beyond us to be able to resolve. So we must trust God’s guidance in resolving the matter. It may be a case of God removing your anger as well as the other person’s anger so that when you approach the person, the problem doesn’t have a high chance for escalation. I highly recommend that when dealing with any conflict that you pray. I often pray that God would first show me the error of my ways first and correct me then to go and work on the other person. I have found when doing this, sometimes it will come to mind things I’ve done to cause the problem, and other times the person will come to me and admit where they were wrong. We must be willing to admit when we are wrong in resolving conflict. Just as well, we must be sincere in our apologies. We should also be willing to accept someone’s apology when they admit they are wrong and still willing to forgive them if they do not.
You will be surprised at how many conflicts are rooted in misunderstandings. Something was said; however it was taken in another context and offended someone. Now both parties are carrying stress over something that does not exist. So we come together to shed light on the situation and once the misunderstanding is cleared, it feels like a weight being lifted. You know that feeling I am referring to? What we experience in that weight being lifted is our stress response, or our fight or flight, being deactivated, thus we are relieving stress. In relieving stress, we are removing tension and anxiety. Not only can we stimulate healing for our bodies, but also healing for that relationship that was once strained. And now because we have forgiven, we also open the door for our spirits to be healed. For now, we can go before God in Jesus’ name and seek forgiveness from Him. The beauty of that is that with mankind we tend to forgive 
but not forget what happened. God said He is willing to both forgive and forget. . It may not be easy, or barely possible to forget what someone does. But our pray is that God can help us forget how it made us feel. We find in Hebrews 8:12, “For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.” We also find in Isaiah 43:25 “I, even I, am he who blots out your transgressions, for my own sake, and remembers your sins no more.” And we also find in Ezekiel 18:22, “None of the offenses they have committed will be remembered against them. Because of the righteous things they have done, they will live.” I shared these verses as an example of God willing to forget the mistakes of His people. He can do the same for us today if we forgive others, and sincerely seek His forgiveness of ourselves
Ourselves, wow, that is the final thought I wanted to share. (Really this blog should be a book, and maybe I will sit down and write this out in detail in book form someday. Thank you for reading this far!) After we have forgiven others and after God has forgiven us as well, the person we tend to forget to forgive is ourselves. So we’ve done all we can to release unforgiveness towards others and still find ourselves weighted down or depressed. That can happen when we are still holding our mistakes against ourselves. The danger of this is as we learned that stress can cause us to avoid others, this can also cause us to think that others are looking down on us because of our mistakes, when they really are not. It affects our relationships because even though the unforgiveness is directed at ourselves, it can still cause the same irritability and agitation in which case we are at risk for displaying behavior towards others when they have nothing to do with it. And if they respond in a negative manner, they cycle begins all over again.
So not only is it important to forgive others it is equally important that we forgive ourselves. We all will make mistakes over our lifetime. However if we chose to get up, forgive others, forgive ourselves, and seek forgiveness from God, we have an opportunity to learn from what happened. Just as the story I shared on self-reflection, in which I try to learn from problems, we can do the same in times when we have done wrong. To me, it’s only a mistake when you fall and stay down. But when you get up and learn from what happened that, my brothers and sisters, is growth. How many times did we fall before we crawled? Fall before we walked? Fall off our bikes before we could ride successfully? Get an algebra question wrong before we solved it? These are all part of our development and growth throughout life. The same holds true with all things in life. We fail, we evaluate, we learn, we adjust, and we try again. And we keep doing so until we succeed.
So succeed in forgiving. It may be hard, but nothing is impossible with God. With God, He can help you find forgiveness for others because He wants to find forgiveness for you as well. When you have to forgive someone, think about times in which someone had to forgive you. They may have done you wrong, but you have done someone wrong at some point as well. Be open for forgiveness no matter what you go through. Be open for reconciliation after a relationship was strained because of what happened. Sometimes, parting may be a healthy thing to do, but never part with unforgiveness in your heart. It becomes a greater challenge to forgive someone we cannot talk to either because of separation or maybe that person may have passed away. So let us search ourselves and examine if there may be someone we need to forgive and I challenge you to forgive them even if they do not ask for it; even if they are not around to ask for it. Love them despite of just the same way God loved us despite of what we’ve done. As He takes us back, so should we be willing to take others back. This is where I say do unto others as you would want God to do unto you. Unforgivness can kill us through stress, yet forgiveness can bring us healing and life through love. I pray that you have read thus far and I pray that I have opened your mind for thought. I pray you take the wonderful, beneficial, and healing benefit of forgiveness and remember, ask God for help. And if you need someone to talk to about your journey, reach out to your local Pastor or ministry leader and you can always contact me. I love you in Jesus name!
Dear Father, we come to you humbly in Christ Jesus’ name to give you the honor and glory because you are so worthy. You are worthy for infinite reasons, yet for the moment we thank you for your grace and your mercy. We thank you for being patient with us as we grow in your Word. We want to show the character of who you are with all we encounter and we yield, we submit, we surrender to you as we cannot do this on our own. Guide us daily Lord in the way we should go. Help us to have forgiveness in our hearts towards others as well as our selves. Search us Father, and reveal to us areas in our lives that you desire us to have cleaned and forgive us of our wrong. We open up ourselves to you to cleanse us and make us whole! Place us on that potter’s wheel your Word spoke of. Let our lives be the clay that resides in your hands. Shape us into the vessels you desire us to be! Remove any impurities from us Lord, and for this moment, we ask that you remove unforgiveness from our lives. Help us to forgive and help us to reconcile with those we need to forgive. Give us the wisdom to handle our situations in ways that we can draw others closer to you in the way we live and react. Bless our families, our friends, and our enemies. Bless our ministry leaders and our government leaders as well. Help us to not only give ourselves to you, but to give our nation to you as well. We praise you for the mighty God you are! Dominion and power, honor and glory be to your name forever, and ever, and ever! In Jesus’ name, Amen.
I finished this writing at 3:33 AM in the 3rd month of the year. You know what that means right? It means that I finished writing at 3:33 AM in the 3rd month of the year! What, you were expecting some divine translation of the number 3? No no no, there are more important things to focus on than numbers, let us focus on God and the truth of His Word in Jesus name! Thank you for your time in reading this and I pray it has been a blessing to you as it has blessed me.
Humbly submitted,
Brother Kelvin
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