Relationships. Part 4. Be forgiving

Hey everyone, today is Tuesday now and the first day of the week is behind us. Hopefully if you have a regular 9-5 then you are in your routine and your rhythm that helps get you through the week. So today, we will be talking about forgiving each other in order to show love to the other person.

“Love is patient, love is kind. Love does not envy, is not boastful, is not conceited, does not act improperly, is not selfish, is not provoked, and does not keep a record of wrongs.” 1 Corinthians 13:4-5

Hcsb Bible

So, as Christians we are called to keep each other accountable and try to keep each other from sinning but keeping a record of wrongs in this instance is not what this. In this instance, this is describing someone that will remember a sin or moment you made a mistake and keep it in their mind for months, years and even decades in extreme cases. When they get into an argument or disagreement with you, they will then bring up this fact that you made a mistake on whatever date or they just say the wrong that you did, even if you already repented and apologized for it.

Now people do this for various reasons. Some do it for the same reason that bullies bully weaker people and that’s because they want to feel superior than the other person. Some people do it because they are in an argument and want to win and not listen and so they then bring it up to knock you down a peg or two so they win.

In any case though, this is just plain terrible, and not showing love at all. It belittles the other person and makes them either feel bad or furious after you throw it back into their face even though they’ve repented of it. This then causes even more tension and resentment. Of course we don’t like it when people bring up our mistakes.

So how do we try and combat this sin of keeping wrongs in our own selves and others that we have various forms of relationships with(friends, family, boyfriend or girlfriend)? Well we learn to forgive each other. It’s plain and simple.

Now I know it’s easy to just say that you’ve forgiven someone but take a step back and really look at yourselves and find out if you’ve forgiven them for their wrong. If you talk about the offense from the past and you still get angry or hurt and in your feelings when talking about it, then you still haven’t fully forgiven the person. The goal should be where you can talk about the offense like you are talking about what you had for lunch yesterday or just saying matter of fact and not emotionally charged.

There are plenty of ways that people use to help forgive a person. One of the ways that a lot of people use is that they write out a letter or list of wrongs that someone has done to them and then burning it.

It’s a first step but after that, you still probably won’t forgive them fully because it takes a long time for some and short amount of time for others. So at this point that, we need to remember that Jesus had every reason to not forgive us but he does and did on the cross. He actually prayed for his father to forgive us while he was suffering at our hands on the cross. So as his followers, we need to lay out our lives and forgive those that have wronged us and ask others to forgive us.

As Christians, we need to remember that even though they may have wronged us and we are mad or hurt, we need to remember that we also have probably wronged them or someone else at some point. And after we come to this realization, we need to remember that anyone can sin and accidentally wrong someone. We’re all sinners in the need of a forgiving God and thankfully we have one. So give grace when wronged and ask for forgiveness when you are on the other side.

At the end of the day, we don’t need a list of wrongs but rather a list of things to be grateful for and ways that we can love each other. So be patient, be kind, be gracious, be humble, be selfless and be forgiving like Jesus.

Thank you for reading this and if you have any questions or comments, just comment below or message me. I hope you have a great day.