“Unforgiveness is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die,” Marianne Williamson once said. Look into the eyes of the most bitter person you know and you’ll find unforgiveness. We can all identify the destructive power of unforgiveness in others, but our own unforgiveness is much more slippery to identify. We have a host of reasons why we wouldn’t release someone willy-nilly who has hurt us.
“How can I forgive them?” It’s a question spoken out of a yearning to release the one who has inflicted injury. It’s a question that is spoken out of hurt and sometimes anger.
How do we forgive the person who keeps sinning against us? How do we forgive the one who sins against us in a grievous way? How do we forgive the individual who sins against us and isn’t repentant?
Forgiveness is mandatory as a Christian. In his depiction of how we ought to pray, Jesus ties up with our forgiveness with the forgiveness we offer, “and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors” (Matt 6:12).
Knowing that we will probably choke on that commandment, Jesus offers an explanation for the stakes of our forgiveness at the end of his prayer, “For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses” (Matt 6:14-15). Goodness gracious. There it is, in black and white. We must forgive the one who has offended us.
