THE DANGER OF UNFORGIVENESS!

Colossians 3:13---> Forgive one another as Jesus also forgave you.

Many people help deceive themselves by re-defining forgiveness to be the control of hostile feelings instead of a merciful expression of love.Forgiveness is the only way not to be kidnapped by the past.It is the only way to give your relationships the blessing of fresh starts and new beginnings.
  When Peter suggested to Jesus that we should forgive seven times, he was correct (Mt 18:21). "Seven" in the bible stands for an indefinite number of times;so Peter was saying we should forgive indefinitely.This is the correct answer, but not the correct emphasis.Jesus proclaims we should forgive "seventy times seven" meaning "indefinitely times indefinitely" (matt. 18:22)
     You see it's not until someone kills your friend or betrays your trust that we start talking about forgiveness it starts from that person who mistakenly steps on your foot when you're looking all clean and good, it starts from when you're walking on the road rushing for a meeting and then one fast car just splashes water all over your fine outfit.
      I heard someone once say the bible said just *forgive* and it did not add *forget* ,so you can choose to forgive and not to forget, back then it caused a stir because no one really had anything to say about it but really let's discuss it you really want to forgive and not forget do you know by doing that you're putting yourself under unnecessary pain because ok, you *think* you've forgiven the person in your mind and then you keep on remembering the incident, my friend i tell you each time you keep remembering,the pain of the original incident keeps coming back but each time with even a greater force until you really can't take it anymore then you start blaming life and you'll start hating the person whether consciously or unconsciously. now tell me have you really forgiven that person?
     You'll discover your relationship with God will suffer from stagnancy because there's just no way you're going to go any further with an unforgiving heart like that.If you're really really hurt talk to God about it and he'll surely help you to recover...see forgiveness is not a process it's either you forgive the person or not, it's the *recovery phase* i'll say is a process and then it's you that decides whether you want that process to last a lifetime or a matter of days.
    Forgiveness is the only way to negotiate through the weakness and failure that will daily mark your relationships.I pray with this series of posts on forgiveness you'll understand how this is an important ingredient in our everyday lives.

God Bless
ibksuper.
:)