Forgiving is a MUST!

Forgiving is a must. (Col 3:13 NKJV) Bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if anyone has a complaint against another, even as Christ forgave you, so you also MUST do.

We will do many hard things in this life, but forgiving is perhaps the hardest thing that we will ever do.  I have heard all the excuses people use to justify their unforgiveness and yes, I have used many of them myself.  That is until something so terrifying happened to me to drive the "MUST FORGIVE"  home once and for all. 

I was sitting in church and my Pastor was preaching on forgiveness.  I was very angry with someone at the time and the more that Pastor preached the more bitter I became toward a person that had deeply hurt me but was not even there in church at the time.  I was becoming more and more angry and for a moment I thought that I was just going to get up and leave rather than sit and listen to another word about forgiveness.  My Pastor knew nothing of the circumstances.  If he knew what this person had done to me after I had been nothing less than a selfless best friend to them, he would be seeing things my way.  He would feel hatred and unforgiveness too.  And then Pastor read the above scripture.  Uh-oh.  It wasn't Pastor telling me to forgive.  It was the apostle Paul reminding the earliest followers of Christ that just as Jesus had forgiven every one of their (and our) sins on the cross, so must we forgive in order to be forgiven.  Everything became clear to me.  If Jesus went to the cross and forgave me so that I may return to my relationship with my heavenly Father and  if Jesus was that wonderful to forgive even those that had not been born yet, then was I saying in actuality that my judgment of others was above that of Christ?  He had forgiven ALL my sins.  So who was I not to forgive?  I suddenly had a vision.  Everything going on around me in church seemed to dim.  I saw a line of people waiting to see Jesus.  I heard Him say to each one he embraced, "I forgave you for everything when I died and you accepted my sacrifice for you and in doing so became like me.  Welcome home my good and faithful servant.  Enter into my Father's house." . Then suddenly I was in line.  I was next to speak to my beloved Jesus.  I was on the verge of tears.  The person in front of me stepped away and I rushed toward my Savior.  But I stopped short as if I had been stabbed.  The one person that I most wanted to see happy to see me stopped smiling the minute I approached.  Not only did He stop but He frowned and said to me, "You could not find it in your heart to forgive even after I forgave you. You will pay for your unforgiveness with my unforgiveness.  Depart from me.".  With this He turned His back on me.  Absolute terror filled me.  It felt so real that it drove the importance of forgiveness home to me for all time.  When I snapped out of it, I was actually standing up right there in my pew in the middle of the service.  It had seemed so real.  After service I went directly to a phone and called the person that I was angry at.  I blurted out my forgiveness the minute they said hello.  As it turned out the person did not really care if I forgave them or not.  But I knew that I had done what Jesus had done for me and forgave.  I no longer was saying that my agenda was above that of our Savior, Jesus Christ.  It is simple.  In order to be forgiven, we MUST forgive. 

Are you in unforgiveness today?  Hatred and anger only hurts you.  The person that you are harboring all this toward cannot feel what you are thinking about them and may not even care.  Therefore the only one being subjected to all your anger and hatred is you.  Whatever it is, turn it over to God, forgive and go on.  Whatever it is, it is not worth losing sleep, OUR YOUR SOUL over.  Remember, you CAN do all things through Christ who strengthens you! (Philippians 4:13)  FORGIVE!