Brethren, I do not regard myself as having laid hold of it yet; but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus-Philippians 3:13-14
"They're never going to be able to forgive me, are they?"
What do we do when we realize someone we've wronged will not forgive us? How do we cope with mistakes we've made that destroy relationships, and even lives? How do we keep them from disabling us spiritually; how do we keep others (including Satan) from using them to disable or discourage us?
Most of the people who ask us about a hopeless search for forgiveness have had life experiences more traumatic than others: The man who years earlier murdered a neighbor in a drunken stupor; a recovering alcoholic whose family refuses to believe "this is the time I really mean to change"; a daughter whose last words to her father were venomous and hateful, spoken only hours before a hemorrhage claimed his life.
But it isn't only traumatic situations that prompt roadblocks in relationships. The truth is many of us have relationships where wrongs real and imagined make it likely we're going to find forgiveness on this side of eternity.
Worse, many of us have said or done things we can't or won't forgive ourselves for saying or doing!
What do we do when we realize human forgiveness will likely never occur?
First, we go to the one place where forgiveness is offered unconditionally, a loving Heavenly Father. Listen to what God tells us as sinners we can expect when we take our sins to Him: "I will take your sins and move them as far as the East is from the West," (Psalm 103:12), and "I will remember them no more ". (Jeremiah 31:34; Hebrews 8:12; Hebrews 10:17) No sin is beyond God's willingness to forgive (except that of rejecting His Son), and the first stop on every person's ride to glory (salvation) is a scrubbing only God can give; one that replaces the "filthy rags" of our attempts to fix things with the cleansing catharsis of God's total erasure: The sins of our past are now out of His mind, never to be raised again. He literally remembers them no more.
But every mature Christian will tell you even this miraculous restoration has trouble working its way from our heads to our hearts. We know God tells us we're forgiven, but we often still don't feel forgiven. (**See important footnote below) So we must continue our work even beyond receiving God's unfettered, unconditional release.
To do that , we must next realize forgiveness doesn't mean there won't be consequences or reminders; in fact, in most cases there will always be both consequences and other reminders of the wrongs we've visited on God and others. We insult the sacrifice of Christ, however, when we dwell on our stained-souls-view instead of the new picture of us with the robe of Christ's righteousness wrapped around us, the image recorded in heaven's album for us after we accept Christ.
The apostle Paul experienced this often. Before the Damascus Road experience where He was saved , Paul was an ardent persecutor of the Christians. For the rest of his life, most of the audiences he stood before, and most of the churches he wrote to had someone whose father, mother, son or daughter had been imprisoned, tortured and even killed as a result of Paul's pre-Christian aggression. Despite this, Paul took God at His word when He promised him complete forgiveness, and so Paul did what each of us must do: "... but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus-(Philippians 3:13-14)
Hard as it was for Paul; hard as it is for us; we must honor God by leaving the past behind us, moving forward to make a fresh start, this time guided by the presence of the Holy Spirit. And when we stumble again, as we inevitably will do, God picks us up (Psalm 24:16), forgives and forgets the new sin and wipes the slate clean again to remove distractions so we focus on His love and His Kingdom.
Finally, we must stop trying to "feel forgiven." That "good feeling" is a false barometer; felt most often by
- people who don't take their sins seriously (and likely aren't saved);
- or by people who are so self-focused they care little what others think or what hurts they inflict;
- or by people who keep themselves so busy their deepest thoughts never catch up with them.
For those of us who struggle with our sins and who struggle with a sense of worthiness, there is good news: Those very struggles honor God by demonstrating a changed heart in us, and when we combine that with a faithful effort to live redeemed lives of service to Him and others, we open ourselves up to be used by God to accomplish things in and through us not possible before we met Christ.
Then we can say with the Apostle Paul: "I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me (Galatians 2:20)
We join with God and Scripture when we say to each of you: "Go live that life!"
--Randy Kilgore
www.madetomatter.org
** We often don't "feel forgiven" because it seems too easy; that some kind of penance or punishment is required. We feel that way because it's true! Forgiveness of any sin requires a blood sacrifice, which is precisely why Jesus had to die on the Cross! He paid for our sins, so don't ever think for a minute there's anything cheap about the forgiveness God gives us. (If you do, try reading Jesus' pleas to the Father in the Garden of Gethsemane: Those are YOUR sins-and mine-making His suffering necessary.) After suffering so terribly to make grace available to us, who can refuse Christ's gift? Yet some still do, and they will stand before a God who sees ONLY their sins, and His judgment, Scripture tells us, will be swift and terrible. There are no second chances after this life.
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