Forgiveness Is Freedom

True Forgiveness Is True Freedom

The other night as I was trying to fall asleep God had a totally different plan for me (as he often does when he wants to get my attention). To understand what he was trying to tell me I have to let everyone in on some pretty dark secrets of my past that I rarely share so please bear with me as I tell this semi-lengthy and unpleasant story.

I was adopted at an early age and was sent to Florida to live with my adoptive parents. Now while most people assume that people who adopt kids actually want them I do not think that was the case with the people who got me. I do think my adoptive mother did at first, but after suffering years of abuse at the hands of my adoptive dad I think she gave up. My legally adoptive dad was an extremely vicious man who hit my mom constantly, beat me like a dog, and verbal/mentally abused the entire family. On top of that he sexually abused me and I would find out years later that he had molested my older sister for years. Also, my grandmother died when I was six and my parents began making me stay over at my grandfather’s house. It was at this time that he began molesting me and this went on for 8 years till he died when I was 14. People have to understand that this type of thing was not talked about in the 60’s and 70’s and yes I did try to tell my mom once, but when I did she put a towel around my neck and started strangling me and said if I ever said anything about her dad again she would kill me. I ran away twice, and the second time I told the police I didn’t want to go home but they made me and my dad beat me within an inch of my life. So since I had no way out of this nightmare I began drinking, smoking cigarettes, and doing drugs at the ripe old age of 10. My grandfather would also buy me smokes, alcohol, and even pornographic magazines to “sedate” me and keep me in line and he would give me money which I would use to buy weed and pills (which he did not know I was doing). So as you can see from an early age I had a lot of people that I was going to need to forgive!

Around the age of 13 my dad began going to a “holy ghost filled charismatic” church in Oldsmar Florida. At first my dad would not allow me to go the youth meetings (I would imagine it was because of all the dark family secrets), but after awhile he gave his okay for me to attend them. At this time I must give a personal thanks to two people named Harold and Barbara because it was because of their dedication to go out of their way to pick me up that literally saved my life. At the age of 14 I went forward and gave my life over to Jesus, and everything began to change. However, I still had issues because I was so screwed up in my head. For one, I had been exposed to sex at the age of 6 and two I had been exposed to drugs, alcohol, and smoking at the age of 10. This meant that when things went bad in my life I turned to those things because that was all I knew. Now you have to remember that my dad was still doing “his thing” to us at home, but no one in this “spirit filled” church had enough of the Holy Spirit I guess to “discern” that he was molesting his children (so how much of the Holy Spirit was really there?). As a matter of fact everyone in this “spirit filled” church thought my dad was such a great man of God. As time went on a certain group of the youth began to gravitate toward each other because we all had similar issues. Billy had a dad who was a drunk, Sheila and Elfreda’s dad was a drunk (and we also suspected other things were going on), Ronnie’s dad was a mean drunk and would beat him, and Debbie’s dad was just plain mean to her all the time so all of us had less than even close to normal home lives so we found solace hanging out together. However, the rest of the youth group would shun us, and we were considered the “less spiritual ones”. It is so sad that when we really needed the “Love of God” the most that the “spiritual ones” turned their back on us. However, I found out years later that many of these same “spiritual ones” had fallen away from God and many of them ending up divorcing and marrying each other’s spouses (we must remember that we will always reap what we sow). Once again, this was a “charismatic spirit-filled church”, but what spirit was really filing this building is the question that runs through my mind. The judgment got so bad that I decided enough was enough and I left and swore never to return. Now I had more to add to my forgiveness list…

After leaving this “church” I went to school for awhile and then I went into the Army. When I got out I went back to this church hoping that it had changed but no it was still had the same self-righteous judgmental attitude because when I came back very few people barely said a word to me (even those I had known for years). After a few months of this garbage I left once again and for the next 34 years my saying was simple which was “God and I have an understanding, I stay out of His business and He stays out of mine” and except for a couple of occasions I never again darkened the door of a church. Once again, I had added more people to my list that I need to forgive down the line…

Back To The Future…

About six years ago I was sitting on my picnic table outside my house in Orlando and said the most dramatic “sinners prayer” that I have ever heard and it went something like this “God I have totally destroyed my life and if there is anything left you can use it is yours, Amen”, and then I went inside (pretty dramatic eh?). From that moment (even though I did not realize it at that moment) my life would never and I mean EVER be the same again. Now I know that might sound a tad dramatic, but to me it really has been.. Now I want everyone to hear this, a “sinners prayer” means NOTHNG if the person saying it does not plan on repenting and stopping their sin so before you even consider saying a “sinners prayer” make sure you really want to make Jesus your Lord and that you want to stop your sinning because if not then you are just wasting yours and God’s time. One of the first things God began to deal with me on was love, and the first area of love he began to work on was forgiveness because God’s love and forgiveness go hand in hand. In the Lord’s Prayer we read where Jesus said “forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors” (Matthew 6:12) which literally reads “forgive us our debts in the same manner as we forgive our debtors” so however we are forgiving is how we will be forgiven. However, God gets even stronger about his stance on forgiving others because later on in Matthew 6:15 he says that “if ye forgive not men their trespasses neither will your Father forgive your trespasses” which is a VERY scary statement. Are your prayers not getting answered? Could it be because you are walking in unforgiveness? In Mark 11:25-26 we read that “When ye stand praying, forgive, if ye have ought against any: that your Father also which is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses. But if ye do not forgive, neither will your Father which is in heaven forgive your trespasses”. Forgiveness affects everything in our lives because forgiveness is an act of love and it comes from the fruit of the spirit which we should be bearing in our lives (Ephesians 5:22-25). The Bible clearly states that he who does not love does not know God (1 John 4:8) period and true love ALWAYS leads to true forgiveness. At this point I want to offer a word of caution because I said I said earlier that walking in unforgiveness will stop the blessings of God, but if someone is walking in unforgiveness they can still be blessed… by satan… Yes, you heard me… Much like the false teachers on the TV who are wallowing in millions appear to be “blessed” by God satan too will send false blessings to believers who are walking in unforgiveness so that they will continue to walk a weak christian walk. Nothing makes satan happier than seeing christians walking in deception, sin, and unforgiveness because they are no threat to him and in reality they are harming the Kingdom of God. So what does all this have to do with what God told me? Everything!!!

You see it took a couple years to work through forgiving my dad, my mother, my family, my grandfather, and all the people at that church who hurt me over the years but I finally did. Now when I speak of them there is no pain and there is no animosity towards them and I now I only speak of them if I am ministering to someone or if I am trying to make a point (like I am doing now). However, as God told me it is not always the big things that we have to be careful not to forgive but the little everyday offenses that people do to us. Also, in my case it not just what was done to me but what was done to someone I love (more on this later). First we must understand that we are commanded to forgive others as we have been forgiven, and this is not an option and if we do not we are walking in SIN! The Bible clearly tells us we are to forgive in the same manner as we are forgiven so please use the following verses as references to that fact…

Ephesians 4:32

“And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you”

Colossians 3:13

“Forbearing one another, forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel against any even as Christ forgave you so also do ye”

Luke 17:3-4

“Take heed to yourselves if thy brother trespass against thee; rebuke him and if he repent forgive him and if he trespass against you seven times in a day and seven times in a day turn again to thee saying I repent thou shall forgive him”.

So now that we know we are to forgive as Christ forgives, how does Christ forgive? Once again let the Word speak for itself!

Psalm 103:12

“As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he removed our transgressions from us”

Hebrews 8:12

“For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more”

Isaiah 43:25

“I, even I, am he that blots out thy transgressions for mine own sake, and will not remember thy sins”

So how does God forgive? First, he casts our sins as far as the east is from the west and second he remembers them no more. So how should we forgive others? We should cast their sins so far away from our minds that WE remember them no more. So what stops us from doing this and are their signs that we need to look for that will let us know that we haven’t actually forgiven people of their transgressions against us?

As I was laying there the Holy Spirit began showing me four signs that I needed to look for that would let me know if I was walking in unforgiveness towards someone. The first sign he gave me was that if I am constantly thinking about what they did to me or letting it “fester” in my mind then I can be assured that I have NOT forgiven them. The second sign he said that if I am always telling others about what they did to me then I have not forgiven them because I am looking for people to take my side or looking for people to offer me pity or comfort. The next thing he told me was that if I am telling others about the offense in a way that makes that person look bad, or in other words “bashing them” then I am not walking in love and thus not walking in forgiveness. The last sign he told was that if I am trying to rally people against someone who has hurt me or came against me then I am not walking in forgiveness. Finally, he told me that if I am plotting any type of revenge against them or if I am even just trying to damage their reputation then I can be pretty sure that I have not forgiven them. The Bible says that “Vengeance is the Lord’s I will repay” (Romans 12:19) so where do Christians get off saying they have the right to “pay people back”? I won’t get into that topic today, but I will say this people need to put away their Constitutions and pick up their Bibles because they are not the same, and they are not written by the same people!

Finally, forgiveness does always just means something done to us. My issue was not something done to me, but something that was done to someone I love which was my wife. Without going into detail, last year a group of people came against my wife and me and said some pretty nasty things about us and they were all lies. Now, come against me and I really don’t care but come against my wife and I am like a bull in a china shop. Once it was over, I was all over what they did to me but it wasn’t till God showed me the other night that I had not forgiven someone for attacking my wife. You see, we not only have to forgive people who hurt and attack us (as far as the east is from the west and never talk about it ever again) but we have to forgive those who hurt the ones we love the same way (as far as the east is from the west and never talk about it ever again). If we don’t then as Jesus said “For if you love them which love you, what reward have ye? Do not even the publicans the same? And if ye salute your brethren only, what do you more than others? Do not even the publicans so? Be ye therefore perfect even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect” (Matthew 5:46-48). So if you read this verse in context, the perfection that God is looking for is the perfection of love and perfect love always goes hand in hand with forgiveness! Now as I said, there was a person involved in the attacks on my wife that I had not forgiven but since forgiving her a couple days ago I have been totally set free from her. Yes, I said “from” her. There is saying that is so true and it goes like this “Hanging onto resenting, a grudge, or unforgiveness is like letting someone live in your head rent free”. You see, it doesn’t matter to the offender if we are holding onto resentment, bitterness, and unforgiveness because most they won’t remember what they did or they because they won’t even care what they did so by holding onto what they did we are allowing them to keep us in bondage. When I finally let the hurt and pain go then and ONLY THEN could God could come in and heal what they had done to me. We have to remember that as long as we are hold onto what someone has done to us or someone we love then God cannot help us and he won’t help us.

I truly hope this helps someone and I pray that we all learn to walk in real forgiveness…

As with all my blogs, feel free to pass them on to those you think could use them!

God Bless…

Brother Dan