Unforgiveness
My computer says that isn't a word, but we are going with it.
What does it really mean for us who are Christ Followers that death doesn’t have the final say in our lives?
Yesterday I shared a message on how woundings born out of injustice can turn into bitterness. One commentator I came across had a trajectory of how we end up in a bitter place. Injustice leads to disappointment, disappointment to anger, anger to unforgiveness and unforgiveness to bitterness. This had me thinking on the drive home about unforgiveness. How do we forgive so we stop the poison, or infection, of bitterness from spreading within us and coloring how we see the world and live our lives?
For a long time I have thought of forgiveness as making peace with the injustice in my life or the people who have done wrong to me. Making peace, maybe not necessarily with them face to face but making peace with them in my heart. I wonder if this is where forgiveness can feel impossible because when horrible injustices are done to us at the hands of others, it isn’t ok. We don’t have to be ok with things that aren’t ok happening to us.
These thoughts are a work in progress and I wonder what you think as well. What if forgiving is not allowing the person and their actions to change us? What if letting go of the offense isn’t saying it’s ok (because injustice isn’t ok) but instead what if it is not allowing that offense to change our perception of ourselves? Stick with me.
Injustice happens all around us. If we are living a connected, meaningful, faith filled life we can’t escape injustice. We live in a world where every person is in process and as people in process we are going to act out of unhealth, insecurity, selfishness and our own unprocessed woundings. If I allow how people treat me to rewrite the story of who I am in Christ I will be side tracking my own sanctification process.
One of the reasons forgiveness is so key to our overall health is because to not forgive is to allow humans and their actions to dictate who I am becoming. To forgive is to remember who God says I am, his plan for my life, his power to redeem and restore all things and to work even in the midst of injustice.
Our perceptions of ourselves must line up with who God says we are in him. When we allow unforgiveness to dwell within us it turns to bitterness because instead of focussing on God, who he is and who he says we are, we are focussing on the person, what they did, and what it might say about us or what we perceive they think about us.
When we get our identity from anywhere else except Jesus, we are distracted from the work God is doing in us and subsequently we are less able to do the work we are called to do with him, not because of God but because of our misguided focus.
I am going to leave us here and come back tomorrow, but in the in-between time, I want to challenge us to think about how we have allowed other people to dictate who we become and how we live our lives instead of allowing God and who he is, what he says about us, to be the loudest voice.
One of the many things Jesus resurrection means for us is the injustice in our lives doesn’t have the last word. When we look to Jesus for our identity and next steps, he is faithful to redeem and restore us and further his work in our lives as we respond to the work he has called us to. Only looking to him for our identity and path.