To Forgive

Colossians 3:13 Don’t be angry with each other, but forgive each other. If you feel someone has wronged you, forgive them. Forgive others because the Lord forgave you.

Of all the people on this planet, who is the one person who has hurt you the most, done you the most harm? Can you picture their face? Now, let me ask you, have you forgiven them … or not?

That word “forgive” is such a simple little word. Just two syllables that roll so easily off the tongue – “for-give”. It literally means to give, before. To give before what? Well, before someone deserves it. In fact, that’s what forgiveness is. By definition, when we forgive someone when they haven’t earned it, it’s something that we give before they earn it. Otherwise it’s not forgiveness.

And that really helps us understand what Jesus dying on the cross was all about. He did that before we ever deserved it. He paid for all our failures, for all our … well, let me call it what God calls it – sin – before we ever deserved it.

And then … then He says that all we have to do, you and I, is to put our complete trust in His for-give-ness and it becomes ours. We are forgiven.

What do you make of that? It’s either the ultimate in love or the ultimate in stupidity. And He hands it to us and says You decide.

But not just that. He hands it to us and then, because of it, He calls us to hand it on.

Colossians 3:13 Don’t be angry with each other, but forgive each other. If you feel someone has wronged you, forgive them. Forgive others because the Lord forgave you.

If you truly believe that God has forgiven you through Jesus, then forgiving others isn’t an optional extra. It’s a command.

If you feel someone has wronged you, forgive them. Forgive others because the Lord forgave you.

Pardon them, forgive them, before they ever deserve it.

That’s God’s Word. Fresh … for you … today.

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To Forgive

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