START
THE NEW YEAR WITH A CLEAN SLATE! FORGIVE!
This time of year is a time of reflecting on many things. We look back at
the year behind us, our triumphs and highs, but also our failures and hurts. As
we don’t
want to bring the wounds of the past year with us into the new one, it is the
time to forgive.
Let’s consider 3
areas of forgiveness :
1. Forgiveness toward God. Many are offended at God and harbor
bitterness in their hearts toward Him. They have been falsely taught that He controls all
things in the sense that He is fully responsible for sickness, death, tragedies
and human suffering and they think He is the source of their pain and
problems.
They may know
about Him, but they do not know Him intimately. The solution is to spend more
time with Him and in His Word, in order to develop a close personal
relationship. When you realize how much He loves you and how good He is, you
won’t anymore believe the lie that He is the author of pain and suffering.
2. Forgiveness toward yourself. Our past deeds can sometimes weigh very heavily on us with feelings of guilt
and remorse. Unfortunately, there is no way to travel back in time to undo things
we have done in the past, though many of us wish we could.
The vital starting point for forgiving yourself and being free from guilt
and condemnation, is to understand that God forgives sinners who sincerely
repent and turn to Him with a strong desire to live life differently. When you
will do this, you will be able to move forward. Forgiving ourselves is just as important as forgiving
others.
3. Forgiveness
toward others. In Matthew 18, the apostle Peter asks Jesus, “Lord, how often shall my
brother sin against me, and I forgive him? Up to seven times?” Jesus answers to
him, “I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven.”
Peter
thought he was being very generous by offering to forgive his brother 7 times
in one day, but Jesus said he should forgive him 490 times! Meaning that there
should be no limit to our forgiveness.
Jesus
goes on to tell the story of a king who, moved with compassion, forgave the
huge debt of one of his servants. However, this same servant treated harshly
another fellow servant who owed him a much smaller amount of money and even sent
him into prison! Hearing about this, the king called him back and said : ‘You wicked servant! … Should you not also have had
compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had pity on you?’ And he sent him
to prison…. “So My heavenly Father also will do to you
if each of you, from his heart, does not forgive his brother his trespasses.”
The main thrust of this parable is
that when people wrong us, we should remember God’s great mercy towards us and
respond in kind. Our sins sent a perfect sinless man to the cross. He endured
the shame, the torture, and ultimately death, to forgive you for them.
Forgiving someone else starts with understanding what it took for God to
forgive you.
When we receive Jesus in our lives as our Savior, God does not impute
our sins unto us. Thus we have no right to hold on to unforgiveness, and the
Lord warns us that if we do not forgive others theirs sins, our Father will not
forgive ours.
This New Year, let us strive for the blank slate of a heart full of
forgiveness. Not only will it enable us to be closer to God and at peace with
Him, but it will also bring healing, love and peace to us and to our world.