WHAT EXACTLY CAUSES US SO MUCH PAIN 

THAT WE ARE NOT WILLING TO FORGIVE…

How can we forget something negative that's stuck in our mind? 

The Bible says God remembers our sins no more. 

So how can God forget something when He is omniscient? 

How can He know everything and still forget?

 

When we forgive and forget, 

the forgetting means that we are responding just like God,

 so that we don't hold that wrongdoing to the offender's account. 

God forgets the charge against us; 

He remembers it no more after we repent to Him. 

Oh, He knows about it, just as you do, 

but He will never bring it up again. That's what we are to do as well.

 

Don't let the sea of forgetfulness, 

after you have tossed the memory to the wind, 

have you fishing in the past. 

Leave it there. Live in the present moment…and forget.

 

I think we get hung up on whether or we can forgive someone 

by making their repentance to us conditional 

and only our choice to forgive only possible should they ask us for our forgiveness. 

In other words they have to acknowledge what they did to us, 

come to us with remorse and then beg us to forgive them

 before we are willing to even consider the possibility.

 

This kind of thinking is actually retaliation against the person

 or a way of getting even and holding onto the grudge 

until they repay every penny they owe us ...

and that does not necessarily mean money,

 it could be the form of punishment we have decided is sufficient 

enough to let them off the hook.

 

But in God’s eyes we are to forgive them period

 whether they ever acknowledge the offense or not.

 As born-again Christians we are held to a higher accountability 

than the world. 

When we sin against someone else we are to always go

 to God first and ask Him for forgiveness 

before we go to the other person that we sinned against 

because like David said regarding GOD...Against You and you only have I sinned.

 

Always go to God and ask God to forgive us first 

then we need to repent to the person and

 turnaround and go in the opposite direction of the sin we committed 

by forgetting the offense and not dwelling on the wrong that was done to us.

 

We do this because we know this is what the Bible 

has taught us that this is what God expects from us. 

To forgive others, ourselves and GOD is not an option…

it is a commandment that GOD says is mandatory.

 

This is why the enemy fights us so much to get us to disobey GOD…

the feelings are just the reinforcement the enemy 

sends to remind us so we will not let go and allow GOD to intervene.

 

When it comes to forgiveness, because of the finished work of Jesus, 

we can now look at things the way He did. 

We should never say, “How can I forgive them?” 

But rather... “How can I NOT forgive them?”

Especially in the light of everything we ourselves 

have been forgiven. Jesus last words on the cross were... 

“forgive them, they know not what they do."

 

We can disagree with Jesus, and say, Yes, they did...

They knew exactly what they were doing. 

Even if they did it on purpose and they realized the reason for why they did it, 

the why is still often not realized as to what pressured them to do it 

and the why is never discerned and understood correctly unless

 they realized it was temptation from the enemy to separate them from GOD.

 

They may have not realized they just cooperated with the enemy... 

and they did not realize it was not their own thoughts. 

Most people don't know why they do what they do. 

They think it is just and fair to retaliate and get even with people. 

But this is never the case with how GOD thinks.

 

Maybe that person wanted to do what they did because it felt good

 to lash out in anger and rage. 

But to get the full picture of what is actually taking place,

 we need to go beyond the surface. 

We have to ask ourselves, why did it feel good to get even? … 

when that is never GOD's way. 

This is where the enemies thoughts have infiltrated our thoughts 

and they become inseparable to discern until we recognize Satan’s strategies.

 

God is good, and His ways are good, 

and nothing else is really good. 

That is what the scripture means that says, "No one is good but God." 

God created Adam and Eve good and even declared it was good. 

But when Adam and Eve sinned

nothing was ever good like it was before, 

everyone now has the sin nature and the predisposition 

that makes us want to sin against one another.

 

We can be restored from what was lost in the garden 

but our goodness will never be derived from within ourselves any longer 

as when God created and made us good originally 

before sin entered into the picture.

 

Sin that is inherited from Adam and Eve, our original parents, 

will always be a part of us. 

We are born with it and it is inherited from our forefathers. 

That is why we can be no longer good and we cannot find our good in anything else

 but the goodness of Christ. 

He redeemed us, but He didn't make us good...again.

He became our goodness. 

 

So those feelings that were not good 

and did not originate just from us, 

can be forgiven. 

What we have been participating with was programming 

from the fall that makes us listen to temptation and be susceptible to its desire.

 

We have been trained by the enemy to think unforgiveness 

and being offended are just a part of life.

 Offenses will come, but they were straight from Satan and His kingdom.

 

The feeling that felt good from the devil was the wrong feeling 

put there to reinforce the wrong decision. 

Satan can make the incident appear one way 

and make you like something that GOD hates...

 and it can feel good because Satan is giving you the feeling

that reinforces the behavior he wants you to accept.

 

That is why the Bible tells us not to go by our feelings. 

We all have them, but we are not to yield to them when they oppose God’s commandments.

 

Believe it or not, what we do or choose not to do, 

is just a choice we make...either we will or either we won't agree with Satan’s kingdom.

 

The ball is in our court. 

Embrace the Word of GOD and not emotions, 

spur of the moment feelings, 

and everything that goes with it. 

When we become offended, accept someone's rejection, 

want to retaliate, let our heart be hardened and become bitter and angry, 

we are just looking at ourselves 

and what we think we think we need to not be vulnerable and hurt again.

 

But that is precisely the lie the enemy would have you believe. 

It is all about self wanting to be justified rather than justifying God.

All offenses take root by appealing to

our self-focused interest in ourselves because if the enemy can get us to focus on self, 

he is able to control us.  

Satan's thoughts that we allow will blame others for the wrong conclusion

and justify actions for why it happened.

 It becomes… all about us when we refuse to forgive.

 

Jesus knows everything about everyone, 

and He was still willing to forgive those that never acknowledged their sin to Him.

Jesus never gave a thought as to why people were doing what they were doing. 

His expectation was not in what they did or did not do.

 

John 2:24-25 KJV

"Now when He was in Jerusalem at the Passover, in the feast day, 

many believed in His name, 

when they saw the miracles which He did. 

But Jesus did not commit Himself unto them [trust, rely on, accept their behavior],

because He knew all men [what was operating and flowing out of mankind 

and that it was not them that was speaking and acting, but sin that dwelled within.]"

 Jesus only put His expectation in God alone. 

We should do the same.

 

People are just people. 

Even those that are born again or in ministry, pastors,

teachers, those that love the Lord, 

those that are supposed to love us, 

often allow things to flow through them that are very destructive and damaging.

 

It is the case of the husband beating his wife

 and then apologizes later, 

someone lying because of fear, 

hating ourselves because of something someone did or did not do, 

letting other's opinions of us mater more than God's, 

finding our worth and value in what good things people say about us 

rather than God, and the list goes on.

 

I have seen that the things that are in people when they are confronted will, 

if they are not willing to see it and take responsibility for it, 

cause them to project that very thing on someone else. 

It is the old saying... we sometimes accuse others of what we are guilty of ourselves.

 

God wants us to be free from all of the above 

and anything else that has the potential to cause us to not forgive.

 

END of PART I

FORGIVE AND FORGET

READ PART 2 and 3 to see how.

 

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