Tag: Forgiveness

cut

Karla Lees

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When words cut deep, anger rises to the surface
as the first line of defense.

Some of us are able to tame it more quickly than others, while some struggle to get it under control.

One thing we all have in common…

We all hurt when words are used as weapons.

Especially when the one throwing them is a loved one.

Someone we trust, pour our hearts out to, live with.

Deep emotions erupt when we are wounded.

I think the deeper the love, the deeper the hurt.

Betrayal doesn’t hurt if you don’t care about the betrayer.

There is one who responded so radically different in a horrible situation, it has mindboggled millions over the years.

In the Garden of Gethsemene, Judas approached Jesus and betrayed him.

Not just for the money he was given to do so, but I suspect he saw Jesus do so much good, he wanted to push Jesus to the next level…force His hand to reveal more of who He is, for the new Kingdom to come in his present.

And instead of being angry…which almost everyone who reads that story for the first time feels…
Jesus acknowledges him.
Without anger.
Lets Judas, one of his closest friends, kiss him on the cheek in a greeting, knowing it will be for the last time.

Jesus’ heart must have been cut to the quick, in a very natural human response.

However, Jesus knew, as He was (and is and always will be) God that Judas would betray Him, and would pay a high price for doing so.

And so chose to show compassion instead of anger.

Sometimes our actions can speak louder than our rage ever could.

The rest of the disciples were confused, surprised and more than a little angry. I love how Peter does what I would imagine any strong able bodied man would do in defense of one he cared for…he sprang into action in attack mode. He tried to harness the anger into action.

Notice how Jesus heals the ear of the man Peter assaulted.

Caring for his enemy even in such a time as when His heart was breaking.

Showing forgiveness instead of anger. Even though He had every right to feel hurt by the one He loved.

Love poured out of His wounds instead of anger.

Anger given over to God will not hinder us from fulfilling our purpose.

The anger we cling onto and refuse to let go of binds us to our wounding, keeping us with open wounds and hurting hearts.

Its time to allow God to heal the wounds earthly love has left behind with His everlasting, good and perfect love.

He wants to drain the infection of anger, bind us up and set us free to become whole.

Will you let Him transform you with His love?
This same love that poured out when He was cut, for you and for me.

you can’t have one without the other

Karla Lees

Which holiday do you prefer, Christmas or Easter?

This is one of those questions I have thought deep and long about.

Christmas and Easter are not stand alone, exclusive events.

They are fantastically intertwined expressions of God’s intervention into history. HiStory as God intended.

Christmas.
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(image from: http://www.flowingfaith.com/2011/12/hunting-4-the-perfect-christmas-gift.html)

The reveal of God with us.
Among us.
Loving us as one of us.
The Presence of God overwhelming Mary to create Jesus.

Fast forward 33 years, give or take a few days.
Passover.
The criminal was passed over as Jesus was chosen to die in his place, on the cross, between two other criminals.

The reveal of God for us.
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(Image by Ann Voskamp, http://www.aholyexperience.com)

Jesus took all we could never remove from ourselves, the stain of sin started in the original garden, faced it with a willingness to follow in the garden of His betrayal, took the blows intended for us, and remained on the cross out of His great love for US.

Despite the great physical, emotional and spiritual pain.
He alone took the weight of the world, and gave Himself up to death.

God for us.
Doing what we could not-
making things right between us again.
God did it for us.

For us.
Because He knew there was no other way.
He alone is and was and will always be the way.

The pain and anguish of Good Friday, where Jesus passed over to death.

The despair of silence.
Unsure what had happened.
Knowing something amazing did.
Not seeing the point yet.
Saturday.

The triumph of Sunday.
He rose, fully God and man.
Defeated the enemy.
Paid the price for all sin,
even though He did not take part in sinning.

The gift of Christmas, God with us,
became the gift of Easter, God for us.

If Jesus had never been born, we would never have had Easter.

Easter could not have happened without God coming down and doing for us what we could not do on our own.

Jesus.

HiStory changed us all forever.

You can’t have the new life, rebirth without His death.

Unwrapping Christmas leads to Calvary.

You can’t have the one without the other, without missing the point.

God so loved every single person who has, does and ever will exist that He gave the world the gift of His son, Jesus.

God with us.

So Jesus could do the work needed to bring us to God.

God for us.

It took His presence to be the present
we desperately needed to be free.

Christmas and Easter are one in HiStory.
One ultimate seamless love story.
That leads to one Home.
God in us.
Us in God.
Forevermore.
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(Image from: http://propheticalert.files.wordpress.com/2011/03/heaven.jpg)

bind with grace & mercy

Karla Lees

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When was the last time you were shown grace when you least deserved it?

Mercy is NOT getting what we deserve.

Grace is getting what we DON’T deserve.

Both show us just how much God loves us.

But are we in turn showing that to those around us?

I have had a few doozy situations where I have been badly hurt by someone I loved over my lifetime.

Forgiving them is offering grace. They don’t deserve it for the hurt they caused, but neither do I for the hurt I cause others either. God’s grace plan for all of us…in His mercy.

Forgiving them is showing mercy.
Not cutting them out of our lives over the hurt that they have caused.

Sometimes we do have to part ways with someone. Things may be too unhealthy in how we relate to hang out anymore.  If God tells us to move on, there is a good reason for it. Usually so we can both grow healthier.

But we aren’t to take the baggage of unforgiveness along with us as we go.

Not offering mercy and grace locks us in a prison within. We add our own wound of to those we are already needing healing for…making a worse mess to clean up than had we released ourselves to forgive.

Let me be clear.

Forgiving someone does not mean what they did was okay. It wasn’t and isn’t and never will be.

Forgiving means we aren’t standing as their judge. We allow God to judge them instead.

God forgave us at a high cost to himself. Jesus, the Holy, had to take all of humanity’s crappy dirty scuzzy let’s just call it evil unholy acts of sin on Himself, and did for us to be given mercy and grace.

Because of His great love for us.

By honoring that selfless act of sacrifice, we chose to align with the mercy and grace He offers us, by offering it to one another when we hurt one another.

It keeps us free and whole within when we forgive each other, and ask God to bind up and heal our hearts from our woundedness.

We are no longer tethered to one another in ways we can not always understand when we release and forgive.

I know that I am sooooo not qualified to judge anybody else. I know what I am capable of when I don’t follow the Spirit’s promptings, and the messes I can cause and make along the way.

I am thankful in His mercy, I am made right with God. I am grateful by His grace, I am able to walk with God.

Our forgiving one another opens the receiver of that forgiveness to catch a glimpse of His gift to us, Jesus.

Forgive.
Show mercy.
Radiate grace.
Soar free.

partner with hurt

Karla Lees

We get hurt when we partner with the person or thing that is hurting us.

Simplistic in its truth, but jam packed with implications.

We have a choice to make in that split second after we are hurt.

To agree with the hurt, and plant a seed of harm in our soul and heart, ready to deepen and grown into a negative, unholy crop.

Or refuse to partner/agree with it, and offer immediate grace, mercy and forgiveness. Releasing us both to heal, and grow in freedom.

Sounds easy, but it becomes easier the more you practice it.

Like a doctor, the more experience you have, the more health and wholeness you will ideally give your patients.

Patience, grace, mercy, love, peace.

Just a few of the fruits that grow in our garden when we forgive.

The fruit in the Garden of Eden negatively impacted us because Eve and Adam partnered with the snake/enemy.

Join in with what God calls us to.

Walk in forgiveness, just as Jesus did with and for us.

I can’t say it is easier, because feeling justified to feel hurt and pain is very natural to us all.

The inner freedom to not add any more wounding to the load I already carry that I m trying to unload is priceless.

God knew we need less weight, and offers us a way to have Him carry it.

Take Him up on the offer. Partner with grace, and live in more and more freedom as you do.

Fly high with forgiveness and grace.

hurting people hurt people

Karla Lees

Keep in mind, hurting people often hurt other people as a result of their own pain. If somebody is rude and inconsiderate, you can almost be certain that they have some unresolved issues inside. They have some major problems, anger, resentment, or some heartache they are trying to cope with or overcome. The last thing they need is for you to make matters worse by responding angrily.
Joel Osteen

thurteen

Karla Lees

There are a great many hurting people around.

Recently I reheard the saying,
“Hurting people hurt people.”

And it got me wondering.

You see, for the first years of my life, I didn’t grasp that my family was made up off hurting people, like me. I picked up on emotions, but not necessarily what was the driving source behind them, as a child and preteen.

Somehow, the year I turned thirteen, I got it.

We moved a year earlier from one province to another, and like my brother, we had to start over with a new neighborhood, friends and school. We had lived in a great place our last few years before moving, and life was good.

We moved mid school year, an awkward time for anyone to move, so I wasn’t quite 12, an gawky all legs no tushie French speaking preteen who was in her ugly duckling stage.

It wasn’t until grade 8, when I turned 13, when I understood how hurtful my peers could be.

There was a writing assignment we had to complete where we described a fellow classmate, which was read allowed for the class to guess which of us the description described. One of my best friends described me as the homeliest girl in the school.

The written word can hurt, I learned that day. A lot.

Our mutual friend tried to play peacemaker, but the writer didn’t care that she had hurt me, and as result I withdrew. Which I found out, years later from the mutual friend, was due to her insecurity and jealousy over my friendship with the peacemaker. The writer wanted her for herself, and succeeded by wounding me in the process.

Fast forward to my first fight with my husband. Neither of us had been taught how to fight in love.

The spoken word can hurt, I learned that day. A lot.

I had wounding in my past that needed to be addressed, forgiven and released so I could heal and move on. So did my husband.

Hurting people hurt people.

I believe that almost every time someone hurts me, they are likely hurting too.

I know quite well that every time I hurt someone, I am hurting within.

Thirteen was the year where I grasped this concept.

It took thirteen more years before I understood how big a role grace plays in soothing our hurts, those of the wounders and the wounded.

That’s why I refer to that year as ‘t-hurt-een’, the hurt teen.

I had been hurt before, but it took me until thirteen to comprehend why.

Hurting people hurt people.

Bind up your wounds before you wound another. If more of us did so, we would have less wounders and wounded hurting.

Less hurt sounds pretty good to me. How about you?

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Image from lincolncrockett.WordPress.com

seventy times seven

Karla Lees

Some days feel more like a daze.
I feel like I have been shot, or numb to the core.
I’ve been wounded, but not physically.
An unkind word, a hard situation, a back been turned towards me, hands pulled away.
Someone has hurt my feelings again.
It takes some time to figure out what happened sometimes, for rejection and harm don’t always come through the door with guns a blazing.
They subtly sneak in the back door on occasion, and catch me unaware as they strike.
I weep, I reel from the pain, I physically feel ill.
Then a sudden jolt reboots my mind as I recall Matthew 18:22.
I may squelch that first inner voice reminder, content in covering myself with “I shouldn’t have to forgive” or “They hurt me, they should ask my forgiveness”, and give bitterness a deeper root to keep growing within me.
I will keep seeing, hearing reminders through book I read, movies I watch or seemingly random conversations.
Forgive.
Yes, again.
Seventy times seven.
Is it fair? No, but life wasn’t designed for fairness, but rather lessons in life, designed to teach us who we can depend on along the way.
And it isn’t likely that any human along the way will never ever hurt you in our crossing points.
Yet the One who had the ultimate right to not forgive, chose the opposite to what the majority of us will and do choose most days…forgiveness.
Which restores.
Releases.
Frees.
The person who is holding on to unforgiveness.
Aha you say. But I was the one who was damaged, hurt. The offender needs to make it right.
And you would be right to think that way. Because ultimately, they are being held accountable for their actions. When they meet their Maker.
And you, and I, and everyone else, are not only going to have to explain ourselves for our harmful actions towards others, but why we didn’t take better care of ourselves and forgive whenever we could.
Forgiveness doesn’t erase the wounder’s offense, it releases the wounded’s hurt.
God knew unforgiveness would eat away at our insides, doing even more damage than the initial offense, unless we learn to release it.
Think of it this way.
Unforgiveness is a fish you are not licensed to catch and keep. It needs to be released before it can rot and smell up from within, deadening what was intended to be a full life.
Is seventy times seven realistic?
If you are married, or have children, or a best friend, you know they answer to that one is yes.
70 x 7 Forgiveness is supposed to be an example of extravagant grace, just as the Judge forgave all of humanity though Jesus. Accept His gift of forgiveness, and pay it forward every chance you get.
Seventy times seven.
Leave the wounds in the past.
Stop giving them life in your present.
They can only hurt you as long as you keep resuscitating them.
Move on, release grace, feel peace in its place.
Seventy times seven.