Tuesday, July 19, 2011

please forgive me

you know when you keep hearing the same message from different sources over and over again, that you probably need to pay attention....right?  that was my experience a few months back as the topic of forgiveness kept knocking on my door like a newspaper salesmen during dinner time.  i kept telling him to come back later at a more convenient time and each night as i heard the knock on the door i was reminded that was still unprepared (unwilling) to listen to his pitch. 

forgiveness is a strange thing to me.  it's not something you can hold or put into your car.  you can't see it or smell it...but make no mistake, it is incredibly powerful.  powerful for the one getting and the one giving.  when i feel wronged and i tighten my grip on forgiveness, almost gritting my teeth as i refuse to give it away, that offense seems to rule over me like a cruel king sitting on a monstrously tall thrown swinging his scepter at me every time i deny his request.  likewise when forgiveness is given freely it can feel as if the chains of ill-will have been broken and dropped from your shoulders.

but the aspect of forgiveness that is most intriguing to me is how sometimes it must be given more then once.  it's a choice to be sure...but sometimes you need to choose it now, and a year from now....choose it again.  and maybe a month later....choose it again.  our emotions aren't like light switches to simply turn on and off.  i think we are more like dimmer switches with varying degrees of light or darkness.  you may need to forgive the same offense many times.  in fact, for some offenses, you may never have a time that you don't need to choose forgiveness again, and again. 

i hope this resonates with you....it does for me.  take care.

3 comments:

Katie Gonzalez said...

Thanks jeramy...needed that reminder big time right now...

Sue Lum said...

So how do you feel when you need forgiveness and the person you need it from doesn't forgive? I find that hard to deal with.

Mary Marantz said...

awesome post! so true!