Barriers to forgiveness

As June Hunt continues Chapter 5 of How to Forgive, she lists some of the most common barriers to forgiveness.  Of the twelve barriers June lists, three caught my attention:

• believing that bitterness is a required response to betrayal– “God knows my feelings are normal”


• requiring an apology or show of repentance– “He shouldn’t be forgiven because he’s not really sorry”


• feeling a sense of power by hanging on to unforgiveness– “He needs to see how wrong he is”

Ms. Hunt states that these stones of animosity can block forgiveness and burden us down.  June adds that she has heard two additional rationales so often they warrant further explanation.  The firs rationale is discussed today.

1.  “It wouldn’t be fair.”  The issue of justice is at the heart of this statement.  It seems that our need for justice is so strong and natural, while the idea of forgiveness is so difficult and unnatural.  June believes there are three reasons for this:

a.  God has instilled within every heart a sense of right and wrong.  Because everyone has a God-given conscience, we feel a need for justice when someone mistreats us.

b.  Based on the law, forgiveness seems inappropriate.  While a black-and-white , law-and-order system seems controllable  and quantifiable, the very essence of Christianity is grace.  June adds that “individually we are to extend mercy.  We are to leave individual justice to God.”

c.  We feel outraged when justice is denied.  Everyone cries for justice- except the guilty person waiting to receive justice(emphasis author’s).  Ms. Hunt finds it ironic that we plead for justice when we have been wronged, yet plea for mercy when we’ve done wrong.  She states this double standard may be human nature, but it sabotages a forgiving spirit.

Today’s question: What stones of animosity have been barriers to forgiveness for you?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: the new Short Meditation, “Like little children”

Barriers to forgiveness

Life- shattering injustices

Today Bill Hybels concludes his presentation of three categories to help us determine our response to those who have wronged us (Chapter 5 of Simplify).

CATEGORY 3: Life- Shattering Injustices.  Pastor Hybels defines a Category 3 wrongdoing as a “life- shattering injustice that comes your way, often out of nowhere, an unthinkable tragedy that forever changes the landscape of your life (for a noteworthy response to such injustice, read Victoria Ruvolo’s book “No Room for Vengeance” . . . In Justice and Healing).”

Working toward relational reconciliation minimizes the seeds of bitterness that could flourish in our hearts.  Forgiveness for Category 3 offenses only is possible by God’s grace.  Pastor Adam Hamilton, senior pastor of The United Methodist Church of the Resurrection in Leawood, Kansas, describes the two dimensions of forgiveness:

“There is your internal release of bitterness, anger, or desire for revenge, and there is the extension of mercy toward the one who has wronged you.  Regarding your release of anger, bitterness, and desire for revenge, you must forgive.  The more serious the wound, the longer the process may take.  But failure to forgive in this sense gives power to the one who wronged you. . . .  But in the second dimension of forgiveness . . . we may actually harm wrongdoers if we extend mercy too quickly.  Wrestling with the hurt they have caused is part of their redemptive process, and for  Christians, redemption should always be the goal.”

Today’s question: Which of the three categories of offenses have you experienced?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “Peace busters”

Life- shattering injustices

The secret to forgiveness

In Chapter 10 (“Where Love Finds You”), the concluding chapter of How Can I Possibly Forgive?, Sara Horn states that the day-to-day bitterness and resentment many of us struggle with can be broken down to our basic need for love.  Furthermore, we struggle most with our hurt when we look to everyone and everything else for love, rather than relying on the only true source- Jesus.  Sara then reveals the secret to forgiveness:

“This is the secret to forgiveness.  When we feel filled up to the brim with God’s love, grace, and mercy, these things also pour out of us, and we can let go of the junk because there’s no room for it anyway- we’re already full of his love.”

Sara adds that when we love God and reflect on His love for us, we are so enveloped by God’s love that it is not a struggle to forgive someone else.  It is a joy.  One way or the other, we reflect to others the nature of our relationship with Christ.  Not only do we reflect what God’s love looks like to us, but what God’s love looks like in us.

Sara encourages us to be intentional in showing love to other people on a daily basis.  But to extend that love to that person who annoys us or hurt us, we must show intensional love- love with intensity.  Sara concludes:

“There is no sweeter sound than the exhale of release.  Forgiveness is possible when we give it all to God.”

Today’s question: How has Sara’s book deepened your understanding of forgiveness?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: the Annotated Bibliography of How Can I Possibly Forgive?

The secret to forgiveness

What about me?

“When we don’t forgive, something dies.  Something moves closer to the edge of death.”- Sara Horn

As Sara Horn begins Chapter 6 (“Holding On to Hurts”) of How Can I Possibly Forgive?, she stresses that when we continue to harbor resentment and hatred toward those who have wronged us, something dies within us- hope, trust, mercy, compassion.  All of these are qualities we need and cannot afford to lose.

Sara states that we need to turn the white noise off by confronting and addressing the ever-present question we implicitly ask when we talk about our hurts: What about me?  Sara explains that this is the question that:

” . . . rests on our hearts, whispered in our minds, sometimes written in jagged, crooked letters in journals and diaries, and sometimes when we just don’t feel like anyone hears us anymore, we scream it from our lips or softly say in tearful prayers, What about me?”

We are unlikely to get an answer to this question, Sara adds, because we never can reach full satisfaction when our goal ends in us.  Our question needs to be rephrased.  “What about me?” must become “What about Him?”

As Christians, theoretically we know the benefits of following Jesus.  Often, however, the draw of our hurts is stronger.  Sara concludes with this caution: Our hurts do not trap us.  We trap ourselves with our hurts.”

Today’s question: Following your ministry downsizing or vocation loss, what opportunities have you had to serve God?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “Holding on”

What about me?