Therefore, I say to you, whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you will have them. And whenever you stand praying, if you have anything against anyone, forgive him, that your Father in heaven may forgive also you your trespasses. But if you do not forgive, neither will you Father in heaven forgive your trespasses. Mark 11:24-26
Last week I came across two short videos about forgiveness, and the first explained forgiveness from a clinical Mental Health stand point. The first one was titled, Forgive, Forget, and Heal; The true path to Mental Health. The video started out explaining that “the Law of Forgiveness states that you are mentally healthy to the degree to which you can freely forgive and forget grievances against you. The single most important determinate of whether you are a fully integrated, fully functioning adult human being, because the tendency to blame and to hold grudges is a childlike pathological tendency that is possessed by all people who are mentally ill. If you accept that as true, there are four people you have to forgive. First you have to forgive your parents, most of our research shows that almost all our adult problems face back to being unwilling or unable to forgive our parents for something they did that hurt us. Number two is too forgive others. Forgive everyone else, forgive everyone who has ever hurt you in any way for anything, just let it go! Some people will say “I can’t forgive that person, because what a terrible thing they did to me. Remember this that forgiveness is perfectly selfish, forgiveness has nothing whatever to do with the other person it has only to do with your peace of mind and with your assuring your own mental integrity. Number three is to forgive yourself, forgive yourself for every wicked, senseless, brainless, fully stupid thing you ever did. Finally, the last part of this is if you have done something to hurt someone else, GO AND APOLOGIZE! It is amazing how many lives are ruined year after year by people who do not have the intestinal fortitude, the guts, the courage, to go and say I am sorry.” (Most of this can be backed with scripture, I would add here that it also affects our relationship with God). The other video told the story of a mental health care worker who was instructed to help a ward of mentally sick individuals, with out the use of medications. The healthcare worker began to teach on forgiveness. As the patience began to embrace the power of forgiveness, their mental health began to improve and after working with them until they fully understood forgiveness and fully practice the Laws of forgiveness, the patience became mentally stable and the ward was emptied out. You may ask if I am saying that mental illness is caused by unforgiveness? While I am not trained to be a mental or health care giver, according to the Word of God, much of this video is truth.
Can unforgiveness cause a person to lose their ability to be rational? In Matthew 18, Jesus told the story of dealing with the unforgiving servant. There was a man who owed the master a lot of money and when his debts were called to be settled. He was unable to pay the debt then the master commanded that the man, his wife, and children and all that he had be sold to pay the debt. The man fell on his face and asked for mercy, the master was moved with compassion, released him and then forgave all his debt. After being forgiven, the servant went and found someone that owed him a little money, and threw him in prison. When the master heard what the forgiven servant had done, the master became angry and delivered him up to the tortures until he could pay all his debt. Then Jesus said in verse 35, “So My heavenly Father also do to you if each of you from his heart does not forgive his brother his trespasses.” Could a form of being turned over to the tortures be mental torment? In 1 Samuel 16 Saul disobeyed God and was rejected as king, and verse 14 states, “a distressing spirit from the Lord troubled him.” If God turns us over to the tormenters, I wonder if the distressing spirit that tormented Saul was caused by unforgiveness. While the Bible does not say Saul was unforgiving, he could have held unforgiveness towards Samuel for not going with him and supporting him in front of the nation, he could have been angry and unforgiving towards God because God took the Kingdom of Israel from him, or instead of repenting and moving on with his life, he may have lived in regret and not forgiven himself for making a bad decision.
I will be honest, there have been seasons in my life that someone really hurt me and I got stuck in unforgiveness. During those seasons, I was absolutely miserable. All I had to do was think about the hurt or the persona and this dark cloud would just surround me and I would get angry and sometimes depressed all over again. Even though I survived the hurt and the situation, I refused to cut emotional ties and I would get dragged back into the mess emotionally all over again. One of the reasons we do not like to forgive someone who has hurt is that if we forgive them, then we are agreeing that what they did is ok. Forgiveness does not okay the actions of others, all it does is free us from their actions. Another reason I am tempted to hold on to unforgiveness and rehash the offense, I am trying in a very warped way to protect myself. If I keep in mind what they did, then I will not let them back in to hurt me again. We can forgive a person and in a healthy way build boundaries to keep their bad behavior away from us. While the ultimate goal of forgiveness is reconciliation, unless the other person is truly sorry and has changed their ways, the relationship does not need to be restored. During the time of the New Testament, if a person was found guilty of murder, they would tie the body of the dead person to the back of the accused murderer. The decaying flesh of the dead person would rub sores and seep infection in the wounds caused by the weight and ropes on the murderer. The smell from carrying around something dead was so great, I am sure no one else wanted to be around them. Then eventually the infection of carrying a dead body around would eventually kill the person it was tied to. To me, that is what unforgiveness does to a person.
I found it interesting that the professor said the first step in walking in unforgiveness is forgiving your parents. I understand there are varying degrees of pain caused by parents, from not saying the right think and not showing up for important events to child abuse and molestation. I love being a mother, but I will gladly admit I am not perfect, somedays I was tired, worried about finances, preoccupied with a problem. No matter how much I love my children, I did not always get everything right. Maybe you have a different love language that one of your children and you just did not know how to relate to them. Maybe you faced true abuse or neglect as a child and unforgiveness seems justifiable, remember that unforgiveness just keeps the cycle of abuse going. When I was going to Church Camp, one of our evangelists told the guys to take a real hard look at their girlfriend’s mother. He said that if the girlfriend was unforgiving to her parents, she would turn out like them and keep the cycle of disfunction going. (Same goes for a man.) Our relationship with our parents is so intense and go on for so long that there is more opportunity to have an offense at them. Next, we must forgive others. I think we should also look at unforgiveness towards God. While most Christians deny they have ever been mad or disappointed at God. If we are not careful, we can become unforgiving because a prayer did not get answered when or the way we wanted. Or we blame God when the hard times in life happen. Sadly, we have not been taught that God is absolutely good, and we tend to think God is out to get us or has abandoned us. For the times we have been truly wronged and the other person does not really deserve our forgiveness, we have to remember our willingness to forgive is selfish, it for our peace of mind and mental stability.
The last person we need to forgive is ourselves. I can be honest, there are countless wicked, senseless, brainless, fully stupid, insensitive and selfishly things I wish I could have a do over on. No matter how much you blame and hate yourself, you cannot change the past. Instead of looking in the review mirror of our past with regrets and shame, it is an amazing thing to look back and say “Thank you God for where and what you have brought me from.” I believe in some instances if we have confessed our sin and have corrected bad behavior there are times God allows us to have a do over. A mature way of looking at our mistakes is to realize that everybody we walk past in the store, at work or even at church has made many of the stupid choices they regret. Paul said “forgetting those things which are behind and reaching for the things which are before.” Philippians 3:13.
Why is it so easy to give place to pride and refuse to admit we were wrong or our actions hurt someone else. At this stage in my life, even though I am not perfect, most of the things I do that hurt someone else is because I am too tired, overextended, or just plain not thinking. It should be easy to say I am so sorry, I was, insensitive, (whatever else you may have done)” and ask for forgiveness. I know some of the stupid things we do are more serious and have more lasting consequences, but as Christians, we should quit blaming others for our bad behavior and take responsibility for our actions. It is not enough to just say I am sorry, if we are truly sorry, we should change those bad behaviors. I know for me the quicker I deal with bad behavior in my own life the easier it is to heal relationships.
I pray that God will show you the people you need to forgive and let go of. I pray that He will also show you the people you have wronged and give you the courage to go and say I am sorry. Let this truth set you free.
Cathy Nesmith