Forgiveness
offers immediate and forever benefits to those who pursue it. Before these
benefits can be experienced, you must confront your resistance to seek or offer
forgiveness. Although it's not specifically addressed, there’s a tendency to offer
forgiveness with conditions or receive it with reservations. This limits the
healing benefits inherent in forgiveness.
Conditional
forgiveness is like conditional love. "I will love you if you behave in a
way I prescribe." Conditional forgiveness translates into a predictable
change in behavior and attitude that fits a personal definition for ways to behave.
The hidden agenda in conditional forgiveness is maintaining control over a
relationship.
Conditional
forgiveness inhibits the healing process while subjecting a relationship to potential
failure. When you seek God’s forgiveness, he will put away your sins and forget
them for eternity. God’s love is unconditional, and his forgiveness is assured for
eternity. As he has loved you, so love one another.
I – yes, I alone –
will blot out your sins for my own sake and will never think of them again.
~Isaiah 43:25 New
Living Translation
God loves you and
has chosen you as his own special people. So be gentle, kind, humble, meek, and
patient. Put up with each other and forgive anyone who does you wrong.
~Colossians 3:12-13 Contemporary
English Version
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