The dictionary defines
forgiveness as the
act of ceasing to feel
resentment against; to grant pardon, to renounce anger
against.
Forgiveness and self-forgiveness is a
mental and a spiritual process. Forgiveness means turning away from that which
keeps us from forgiving.
Self-forgiveness means ceasing to feel
resentment and anger against ourselves. We stop punishing ourselves when we
feel that we have achieved this. There is no more need to 'make up for it'. How
do we turn away from that which we want to harbor? We deal with it by facing
the person, and renouncing the resentment, and bitterness, and asking the
person who has wronged us to
Forgive us.
Several years ago I felt compelled to write
a
letter to my aunt who had cancer. I asked her to forgive her father for a
grave transgression that he had done against her. The letter conveyed to her
that
living with resentment, bitterness and hatred, only served to ferment a
deadly disease and made her life a living nightmare. Because she had
held onto
unforgiveness for forty years, the only thing that she had achieved was the
ruination of her alcoholic life.
I begged her to forgive all those who she
held responsible for taking away her child, and let her know that according to
the Bible, which she believed in, that unless she didn't forgive, neither would
God forgive her trespasses.
Word got back to me that she had received
my letter, and rejected it. She was furious that I would write and say the
things that I did. After all who was I, just a niece?
Was I hurt? Yes, because she was family,
and I wanted her to understand and ask forgiveness before it was too late.
A couple of months went by, when I heard
that she had accepted the Lord into her life, and she had quit smoking, and
turned her life around. She wouldn't allow anyone in her house to smoke either.
I
was so happy she accepted the Lord into her life before she died. To this end
it made it all worthwhile.
I know that she was received into the hands
of God upon receiving the act of forgiveness into her heart, not only forgiving
others but herself.
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