Forgiven

I know that I am forgiven. I know that I have been given an amazing gift of grace by the creator of the universe who loved me enough to sacrifice his son for me. And I know that the love between a parent and child (at least for me) is incredibly fierce. I know that this forgiveness is the greatest gift I could ever receive. But I have so often abused grace. I have turned and gone my own way over and over again.

I know how valuable forgiveness is. I recognize my own desperate need for it. I realize that it is nothing more than a gift.

So why is it so difficult for ME to forgive?

I want to be angry. I want to have a right to that anger. I want to hate. I want to know that my feelings are justified, that it is "fair" for me to feel this way. I want to cling to my pain because my pain means that I can feel "RIGHT" in the resentment that I feel. I can do what I want, justify what I do... because I have been hurt.

But that just makes me a victim. And it makes me an ingrate. How can I experience such deep and complete forgiveness from God and then turn around and hold a grudge against those who have hurt me?

My pain is deep. My pain is comfortable. My pain is reoccurring. It lingers every day. Every time I think about my brokenness, the pain that awaits my daughter, the fact that I am losing everything I own and the life that we have built together, cashing in 14 years of memories and truly good times, overwhelming moments of happiness...the pain returns.

But I can't live in that pain. I can't continue to dwell on it. It cannot be my home. As easy as it would be to do, and as much as I might feel the need, I cannot do it. I have to choose forgiveness. I have to ask God to help me do that, because right now, I don't have it in me. I have to ask God to stand in the gap for me because the gap right now feels more like the Grand Canyon. This is that gap that we all experience... the gap between what I know I SHOULD do and what I really WANT to do. It is the distance between the me that I AM and the me that I truly want to be.

I am choosing forgiveness. I just don't know quite how to get there.

Maybe the first step is just putting it out there. Saying it out loud, writing it down.

Forgiven. You are forgiven. It doesn't make what you are doing right. It doesn't give you my blessing. But it means that I cannot live in this place of pain. I don't want to play the victim. I am choosing to let go of that, asking God to bridge the gap, choosing to live in the freedom of forgiveness and grace, and praying that God's promises are realized in that place.