This book explores how forgiveness can benefit the life of both Christians and non-christians alike. It offers teaching from the Holy Bible as well as the authors personal examples.
Excerpt
Forward
My belief is that each of us that has been given the gift of
a successful life (or not so successful) has an obligation
to share our experiences and strengths gained as we live
our lives fully and share the path that led us to our own
personal truths. The reader will find this text is instructive
and inspiring; it offers the reader the benefit of the hills
and pot holes of the author’s road well-traveled as well as
the opportunity to learn from his many challenges and
victories.
As a senior university professor for nearly twenty-five
years, I am often asked to read and edit text books but
seldom have the opportunity to read literature that has
been written by a person that I have known since the day
of his birth and have had the honor of watching him turn
into a fine musician, businessman and now scholar.
Glenn’s book will leave you with no doubt that he has
benefited from discovering and nurturing a personal and
strong relationship with God and how his focus for living
is to follow Jesus Christ’s example and teachings as
close as any human can do.
This book has great utility for those that struggle with the
day-in-and-day-out challenges that face each of us as we
interact with others. When God’s Will is the cornerstone,
all is well; when the individual’s will is the template for
interacting with others it is suggested that there will be
problems on the horizon. Glenn explains in detail how
we can spot many of the negative consequences of selfwill
and prescribes the exact solution.
The reader might keep a Holy Bible close at hand while
reading this fine book as you may be inspired to look up
the various references that inspired Glenn Smith and that
he shares with you.
This book, like an eternal building stands on the concrete
truths found in both the ancient scripture and the more
modern New Testament.
Calvin B. Harris Ph.D.
Sr. Professor, Park University
Founder MSA Inc
Chapter 1
What is Forgiveness?
“Forgiveness ought to be like a canceled note ““
torn in two and burned up so that it never can be
shown against one.” “” Henry Ward Beecher
(18131887),
U.S. Congregational Minister
Have you ever heard someone say, “I will forgive you, but
I will never forget what you did”? Is that forgiveness?
How about this one: “If you apologize first, then I will
forgive you”? Or “I can forgive you for this, but not for
that.” We all do this, thinking that somehow we are in the
right. I suppose, if we look at it from a superficial point of
view, we might be. But is that how God views it? Is this
how God wants us to live? Well then, “What is true
forgiveness anyway?”
To fully understand the concept of forgiveness, we must
first define it. Webster’s dictionary states that to forgive is
to grant relief from payment of a debt. In other words,
when you forgive a debtor, they no longer owe anything
to you, and they are free from that bond. According to
this definition whatever you were bound by, be it a
contract or a promise, when it is forgiven, is no longer in
force.
Here is an example of something that my wife and I did
many years ago. We had sold a mobile home to a very
nice young couple on contract. They had a couple of
children and were just getting started in life. About three
years into the contract, they fell upon hard times and
were struggling to make the payments. After talking to
them and praying about it, we decided to waive all of the
remaining balance and signed over the title to them. We
fully released them from any further obligation for that
contract. This would be an example of forgiveness.
Again from Webster, another definition of forgiveness is
to give up resentment (or the claim for requital) of an
insult, and to cease to feel resentment against the
offender. In this example, you give up your claim to the
offense. This is something that is not done easily. The
problem with resentment is that it usually harms the
offended more than the offender. Here’s a quote from an
unknown author that I really feel puts this in proper
perspective: “Resentment is like a glass of poison that a
man drinks. He then sits down and waits for his enemy to
die.”
Chapter 5
Binding and Loosing
“When you hold resentment toward one another,
you are bound to that person or condition by an
emotional link that is stronger than steel.
Forgiveness is the only way to dissolve that link
and get free.”
“” Cathleen Ponder, Inspirational Author
In the previous chapter, I mentioned the binding and
loosing concept. In this chapter I want to examine closely
how this can actually affect us.
Have you ever been hurt or offended by someone? Of
course, the answer is yes, we all have. It is a real part of
life that when certain things happen, we become angry.
Sometimes it is something big, like infidelity in marriage
or serious physical abuse. Other times it is relatively
small, like a silly argument over what color to paint the
bedroom. Either way, we end up miffed. It is how we
respond that is important. We all want to have things
resolved and worked out for the best. The problem arises
when we can’t agree on what “the best” is. It is here that
pride enters in, where the need to be right overrides the
need for truth. It”˜s a danger zone for all sorts of bitterness
and resentment. This is where the most damage is done
to relationships. God has a better way, through
forgiveness, but our simple human nature generally
seems to win out and into the abyss we go. Why? How is
it that we choose to trust God with our health, finances,
even our soul, but when it comes to the need for
vindication, we choose to trust ourselves?
I can honestly say that I, again, speak from experience.
Many times in my life I have gone through trials and
troubles that left me wounded and angry. I went looking
for a way to make things right, only to find myself sunk
deep in the mire of bitterness and outright depression.
Always the end result was loss in some form or another.
But, as I have grown in the knowledge of God, I have
begun to learn why this happens, and have seen how
God’s way is infinitely better.
In Matthew 16:19 and 18:18, Jesus said, “What you bind
on earth is bound in Heaven and what you loose on Earth
is loosed in Heaven.” This is most profound when it
comes to offenses.
Imagine being tied to a tree in a hurricane. The wind is
whipping and rain is pounding, yet nothing can be done
to stop it from tearing you apart. Now consider this:
instead of seeking shelter when you knew the storm was
on its way, you chose instead to tie yourself to a tree,
refusing to let go as the storm hit. The damage you
sustained was largely self-inflicted, as your pleas for God
to save you went unanswered. In the end you are
battered and bruised, with a new-found anger at God.
After all, He didn’t answer your cries for help. Of course,
you could have avoided all of it by just releasing yourself
from that tree, and then safely getting into the shelter
before it was too late.
That is how unforgiveness works. We bind ourselves to
someone by a cord of offense, then refuse to let go.
Maybe it’s a friend or a family member, or possibly
someone at work or even in the church. Every time you
see or think of them, you become upset. As the
bitterness sets in, it begins to affect your relationships
with other people. You are now starting to have difficulty
trusting others. As things progress, you look to involve
others in the ordeal. You might even go so far as to
implicate the original person as the source of all of your
troubles.
In the midst of all of this, you cry out to God to heal your
bitterness and to restore peace in your life, all the while
praying for God’s will to be done in the offender’s life.
This prayer, of course, is just a veiled attempt to try to
convince God to mete out some form of punishment on
that person for the great wrong they have done to you.
But when God doesn’t respond, a greater level of
frustration sets in and deeper into the hole of despair you
fall. You seek counsel, therapy, maybe even mood
management drugs, but nothing works. Eventually your
bitterness extends toward God, even causing you to
consider giving up on Him all together. Maybe you don’t
go to that extreme but instead just try to bury the feelings
deep and go about your business as if nothing was ever
wrong. But then it only takes one little thing to set you off
and you are right back where you started. Even time
won’t make it go away.
Why? What you bound is bound! You have bound
yourself to the tree of offense with your own hands, and
you never let go. Somewhere in the process, you chose
not to forgive the person whom you felt wronged you.
Maybe it was just a simple disagreement or an
unresolved argument, but you chose to retain it and
therefore bound it up. And, of course, you didn’t just bind
it here on earth, but also in Heaven. Remember, God will
never violate your will. It’s up to you to submit your will to
God. If you choose to bind yourself to something and not
let go, God is not going to forcibly tear you from it. He will
honor your desire to stay bound. The trouble really
comes when you bind yourself with unforgiveness. At that
point, you are literally binding yourself to sin, as that is
what unforgiveness really is. Sin is the contract with the
devil that leads to death. Although that contract was paid
in full by Jesus at the cross, if you choose to again bind
yourself to it through the sin of unforgiveness, God is
bound to leave you there.
God wants us to always trust Him fully. This means in all
aspects of our lives. If we choose to retain or bind an
offense, we are actually telling God that we don’t want or
need His help in dealing with the situation. It is our pride
that causes us to believe that God must need our help in
order to resolve the issue. For some insane reason, we
can’t see how God can possibly make it all right, without
our involvement. Yet our involvement is the first thing
God wants removed.
God gave me an interesting revelation once during a very
stressful time when I was involved in a dispute with
someone in the church. Things had become rather tense.
At the height of the situation, as I was praying for an
answer, God told me I had to release it and get out of His
way or He could not fully shine His light on the problem.
He then showed me that I was like a large tree, casting a
shadow. God wanted to fully expose something with His
light, but I was in the way. I was preventing Him from
doing what He wanted to do. I had to be literally removed
from the line of God’s light. What I saw was that as I
retained the problem, I was blocking Him. As I bound
myself to the issue, He was bound from it. I had to forgive
before God would move. When I finally let go of the
situation, God moved and the problem was resolved in a
very positive manner. I had to forgive the person, not
because I was right or that there had been some form of
repentance, but because I was blocking God from His
desired purpose. By forgiving unconditionally, I subdued
my pride. Only then was God free to work.
That’s the beauty of God’s way, and it always works out
best for God. If it is best for God, it has to be best for us,
too. By my letting go, I was able to find safe shelter in
God, thus avoiding the storm. Because I didn’t receive
the storm’s damage, I was spared the bitterness and
strife. The end result was a complete restoration with that
person and peace in my soul. Remember, what you bind
is bound, and what you loose is loosed.
Copyright 2008 Glenn Smith Jr. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the author.
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