It is so easy to get offended when people say something or don’t say something we wanted or needed to hear. It is so easy to get offended when people do something that hurts us, or when they don’t do something we expected they should do. Society today even celebrates when people get offended, but worse than that, encourages people to get offended. It is so easy to hold on to offenses, to hug them close, and to bury them deep inside us. The problem is when we do that, those offenses will fester and become a “heart infection” or a cancer in our soul. It is much hard to forgive, but forgive we must.

God offered forgiveness to the whole world, if we would just accept it. He forgives all the wrongs that we have done to Him, all the wrongs done to His people, all the wrongs done in His name, all the wrongs we do to our own self….ALL of it forgiven and never remembered again! There is something we have to do to receive that forgiveness, though. We have to repent. Repenting means that you feel genuinely sorrowful for what you have done, you turn around, and you don’t do that thing again.  It is humbling yourself before God and allowing Him to be the Lord of your life.

For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more. Hebrews 8:12

How shameful that we are not willing to forgive one another for the minor offenses that we intentionally, but more often unintentionally, do to one another. The thief comes to steal, to kill, and to destroy (John 10:10). He doesn’t always destroy in one giant swoop; sometimes, he destroys relationships and the people in them one small offense at a time. Little by little, bit by bit, speck by speck.

Jesus said this:

Therefore if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee; leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled with your brother, and then come and offer your gift. Matthew 5:24,25

Note that he didn’t say if you have something against your brother, but if HE has something against you. It’s a pretty serious thing when God says, “don’t even offer me a gift if there is unforgiveness between yourself and someone else, until you have reconciled the issue.” But Jesus laid it out very plainly for us: If we do not forgive others, God will not forgive us.

For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you: But if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. Matthew 6:14, 15

After all that Jesus went through, the pain, the beatings, the betrayal of his friends, the public humiliation and degradation, the mocking, and worse of all separation from God…all of that, because Jesus became sin. He took our sin upon himself and endured the punishment that we deserve. We would have begged for mercy…anything to put an end to our suffering.

Jesus did not ask for leniency. Jesus did not ask for mercy. Lash after lash, strike after strike….yet he did not call 10,000 angels. He could have. Though mocked and abused, he did not save himself, even though he could have. Jesus did not even take anything to ease his suffering when it was offered to him. Jesus went through all of that, pain we could not even imagine, for us!

Yet, we dare to think we have the right to carry anger, hatred, bitterness, disappointment, and indignation against our selves and others. We cannot live in this world without being hurt by others. Usually it is the people that mean the most to us that have the ability to hurt us the most. But it is your choice in whether you allow that hurt or offense to become a “heart infection.”

For a Christian to refuse to forgive denies the very sacrifice that Jesus made for us and the greatest mercy we have ever been given that we did not deserve. Let it go! Don’t just drop it so you can pick it back up later. Throw that sucker away and forget about it, so that what was meant to destroy you no longer is a stumbling block, but becomes a building block.

The Spreading Love & Hope Challenge this week is  a gift to self. Is there anything you have done that offended someone? Is there anything someone else has done that offended you? If so, don’t let that fester and become a “heart infection” that destroys relationships with others or your relationship with God. Let us forgive one another.

And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you. Ephesians 4:32