“And forgive us our trespasses as
we forgive those who trespass against us.” Matthew 6:12
This part of the divine guideline
is always sidelined because of a simple reason; IT IS VERY DIFFICULT TO REALLY
FORGIVE. Meditating on this guideline made me ponder over two really closely used
words that tend to be used as a prerequisite for one another. These words are
forgiving and forgetting.
To simply say you can forget an
incident that hurt or is hurting you because you have decided to “forgive” the
person have been proven to be difficult. So what Jesus meant when He said “Forgive
us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us” is simply this, God
help us to intentionally completely overlook offences committed against us with
no change in our attitude concerning the offense and the offender. This
therefore impresses on me that an act of forgiveness is a deliberate act; one
consciously made.
There’s a saying I grew up
hearing, “FORGIVE AND FORGET”. This is a true saying because when you decide to
forgive, your mind begins to consciously dissociate itself from the pain of
that offence thereby making us loose accurate recollection of the said event. Please
it will be nice to note that shutting down, blocking or “erasing” an offensive
event, experience or incident is not the same as FORGIVING AND FORGETTING. The former
(FORGIVE) allows us face the pain and gives you the opportunity to make
conscious decision to react independent of the OFFENSE hence allowing you heal and
inevitably FORGETTING the offense. The former is what I call a BOTTLING
PROCESS; this process always comes back to bite the person who is bottling
these feelings. It involves you compartmentalizing the pain of the experience
of the offence which most times you have to face again.
As Christians, we need to
consciously ask for grace to truly FORGIVE, as this in turn compels heaven to
show us the same level of forgiveness shown by us to others. We should always
ask for grace to forgive and forget; becoming better Christians. Romans 9:16
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