Un-forgiveness
Colossians 3:13 “Be tolerant of one another and forgive each other if anyone has a complaint against another. Just as the Lord has forgiven you, you also should forgive.” (Good News Translation)
Many people will harbor the feeling of unforgiveness sometimes for lifetime, not knowing or understanding that they are only hurting themselves and not the person that they have unforgiveness towards.
When someone has unforgiveness, that unforgiveness can consume that person and hold them in an emotional bondage that can lead to a person having;
- having a grudge against someone who has offended them
- bitterness
- resentment
- anger
- rage
- revenge
These feelings can spew out on others around you, that have nothing to do with your feelings of unforgiveness towards someone that they may not even know. Emotional bondage can subject a person to a type external power or control, and can literally control our inner feelings.
Many times the person that is having a grudge held against them, are not aware that someone feels this way towards them.
Hebrews 10:30 “For we know Him who said, “Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,” says the Lord. And again, “The Lord will judge His people.”
Many times unforgivness can be a persons way of “getting even or getting back” at someone.
Proverbs 16:18 “Pride goes before destruction,
And a haughty spirit before a fall”
Pride can destroy the possibility of having a healthy relationship with another person. Pride can also hinder forgiveness, and give way to growth of unforgiveness.
Ephesians 4:31-32 “Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamor, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice: 32 And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you.” (KJV)
When a person forgives someone, that forgiveness becomes a release to the person who is forgiving, and now that person can experience freedom from any type of bondage that they have been experiencing.
Matthew 6:14 “For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. 15 But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.”(NKJV)
When a person forgives, it opens up the way for our heavenly Father to forgive us.
Matthew 18:21 “Then Peter came to Him and said, “Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? 22 Up to seven times?” Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven.”
Once we forgive someone, it’s a possibility that it won’t stop there, and we may have to forgive that person again, and again. We have to be in a continuous state of mind to forgive others.
Ephesians 4:26-27 “Be angry, yet do not sin.” Do not let the sun set while you are still angry, and do not give the devil an opportunity to work.“
Lord Jesus, thank for you making a way out of the bondage of unforgiveness by giving your people the strength to forgive, in Jesus name…Amen!
Continuing in His service…Rev
