Forgiveness Isn't Painless

        

          In recent days, three loved ones, severely wounded by another’s sins in unconnected circumstances, began the difficult journey toward forgiveness. With bruised, battered, and bleeding hearts, they crawled from the Pit of Shock only to be greeted by the raging Storm of Anger. In time, the whirling fury calmed as they trudged day after day through the Valley of Sorrow and Suffering until each path abruptly ended at the foot of Mt. Forgiveness. The steep precipice appears daunting, and the ascent seems impossible.

In My Utmost for His Highest, Oswald Chambers wrote:

"God does forgive, but it cost the breaking of His heart with grief in

the death of Christ to enable Him to do so. The great miracle of the grace

of God is that He forgives sin, and it is the death of Jesus Christ alone that

enables the divine nature to forgive and to remain true to itself in doing so.

It is shallow nonsense to say that God forgives us because He is love…The

love of God means Calvary – nothing less! The love of God is spelled out

on the CROSS ad nowhere else. The only basis for which God can forgive

me is the CROSS of CHRIST."

And the only basis for which we can forgive others is through the CHRIST of the CROSS. I urge you, sisters and brothers, stay NOT in the Valley of Sorrow and Suffering, take the hand of Jesus and climb Mt. Forgiveness – a place of liberty and healing.

“In (Jesus) we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace.” (Eph.1:7 NASB)

“Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with malice. Be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you!” (Eph. 4:31-31 NASB)