I will remember the works of the LORD; yes, I will remember Your wonders of old. I will reflect on all You have done and ponder Your mighty deeds.  Psalm 77:11-12

An interesting thing happens when we become adults.  We are driven to give people what we needed but never got; what would have altered the course of our lives for the good had we experienced it.  We know in great detail what it was like to live void of it, whether it’s love, protection, innocence, a stable home, or the opportunity to reach our potential without obstructions. If you are in ministry as I am, we each have the privilege of teaching others about what we suffered and how we are healing.  While on the journey, we experience unexpected encounters where God meets us at Bethel ~ as He did Jacob.  We mark the spot, call it holy, and know the benefits of revisiting these hallowed places.    

God, Himself, gave His children specific instructions for how to keep faith alive.  He knows how small and feeble we can be, how fragile our faith is when we’re tempted to fear, and how frail our faith can be when set against the backdrop of a trial.  He named this prescription and repeated it many times throughout the Old Testament.  His exact words were  ~

1. Remember and Review 

God didn’t just encourage the Israelites to remember the stories of His faithfulness, He commanded it.  He didn’t require such a thing for His good, but for their good.  Faith is contagious and by keeping stories alive, He knew they’d find new strength.  They became the storytellers of the ages, the ones who built monuments and altars as markers.  Their culture centered around commemoration feasts.  All these things had this in common; they provided spiritual fuel that spanned generations.    

Remembering and reviewing is critical for me for the same reasons.  It gives me three things; strength, supernatural energy, and courage.  If my faith is weak and fear has overtaken me, I know it’s time to get out my journals.  The greater my need, the more comprehensively I review my Bethels.  After I re-visit my holy moments, I move on to review my spiritual ancestor’ stories, the ones whose lives were fueled by the Spirit.  God is the same today as He was yesterday.  Who He was to them, He is to me.  What He did for them, He often does for me.  God personalizes their stories in just the way I need to hear them.

Tomorrow, I’d love to highlight a few of my favorite biblical characters; the ones who burned brightly because the fire of the Spirit was behind them.  

If we had no scriptures, we’d not be able to trace Your fingerprints.  Take us back, stir our memories, and make it manna all over again. 

So then, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your salvation with fear and trembling;  Phil. 2:12

If I hold a prism up to the light, I see beautiful colors that sparkle.  As many times as I change the angle, there are different facets to behold.  This is the concept of ‘working out my salvation with fear and trembling.’  If I ask God to open my eyes to His Son and the wonder of the Gospel, I discover that there are endless combinations of shades, colors, and textures to captivate me.  I find that I was created to stand in awe and to worship the One who gives the gift of Himself; One so incomprehensible that no matter how much I behold the Light of the world, there is always so much more to discover.  

Worship and trembling go together.  There have been moments where I’ve been so moved during worship that I could no longer stand up.  Isn’t it a beautiful thing to be overcome by the Spirit?  I should never get so used to Him that I fail to be affected by His glory.  I’ve been captivated by a few life experiences too, like a song in the process of being written or arranged.  The music runs in my head all night.  Or, a new writing venture has also consumed me.  The material was being unwrapped and defined constantly, all hours of the day and night.  

But being captivated by earthly things is nothing like the wonder of discovering Jesus.  He is the Word and He ministers to every part of me as a woman.  With divine disclosure, I walk into the expanse of Eden’s restoration.  I see that, in Him, the curse has been lifted and perfection restored.  Trembling is born. 

After the death of Jesus, two men walked from Jerusalem to Emmaus. Both disciples of Jesus, they were in deep discussion about the report that Jesus was alive. At that moment, Jesus appeared and walked with them though they didn’t recognize Him. He challenged their unbelief about the resurrection and began to remind them of Old Testament prophecies about the Messiah’s life, death, and rise to glory. His words were so dynamic that when it was time to leave them, they begged Jesus to stay longer. Later, when He broke bread with them, their eyes were opened.  Then they had this conversation. “We should have known. Didn’t our hearts burn within us as He walked with us?”

Does my heart burn when Jesus speaks? Does it burn with conviction, but more often, does it burn as having been affected by a supernatural influence? Have I known a series of life-changing moments when the heavens opened and all became clear?  This is what it is to tremble under the beautiful weight of a divine experience with Jesus. His words are potent.  I’m often sleepless due to the excitement I feel and I’m voraciously hungry for more. I certainly feel more alive than I’ve ever been and wordless to describe the experience. Trembling is the aftereffect of having heard the Rabbi’s voice. 

Trembling is the place where fuel is born.  There is no energy like supernatural energy that comes from having spent time with You.  I want even more momentum and combusion.  Speak to me in this series and give me Your abundant life.  Amen

• I can force myself to love the unlovable and all the while I’m fuming under my breath.
• I can put on a smile and say, “God is good” when I feel He’s being unfair.
• I can declare that God’s peace passes all understanding but never have experienced it.
• I can appear patient but underneath, a volcano of frustration is just waiting to come out.
• I can perform acts of kindness but resent every moment of it.

You can probably fill in the blanks for the rest of the attributes. But is this the way I am supposed to live? Am I never to know the exhilaration of being fueled by the wind of the Spirit? Am I never to feel a supernatural wind gently nudging me to step in the sandaled footprints in front of me?

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I will lead the blind by ways they have not known.  Is. 42:16a

6.  Forgiveness is hard because ~ I’ve embraced a fake forgiveness.

Forgiveness is messy.  No one looks forward to a season like that.  It involves reviewing the hurt, asking God to show me how I internalized it, feeling anger, grieving a loss of some kind, and many other things not easy to navigate. I fear that if I start feeling angry or I grieve deeply, I’ll never be able to escape the cycle.  

What’s the safe alternative?  The one the church so often adopts.  Their paradigm is this ~ A person goes forward during an invitation, they kneel at the altar, cry a few tears and tell God that they will forgive their offender.  They get up and put on a face that says, “Now I’m finished.  Been there ~ done that!” This brief encounter with the edges of forgiveness leads onlookers to believe that this person should be all better. In fact, others will expect it.  When this person’s heart fails and hurts again, they will beat themselves up over being a failure of a Christian. And if they confess their struggles to another, they will probably hear sermons that stir up guilt. 

What is the answer?  To understand that forgiveness is not cerebral, nor is it momentary.  The bigger the hurt, the longer the process, and the messier it is.  I have to be careful not to surround myself with confidants who have the false expectations of an unbiblical kind of forgiveness.  To be vulnerable to hardliners who diminish God-given emotions   is a mistake.  I don’t know what they would have done with Jesus when He modeled a very wide emotional spectrum.  He was free to express joy and also free to grieve to the point of sweating drops of blood.  We here in the western world have numbed out to the extremes that are healthy for us.  We believe that to be stoic is to be holy.  

If you are one who has walked the aisle, said the words, cried briefly, and then wondered why – with time – you didn’t feel much better, perhaps you have been the victim of poor teaching and unreasonable expectations.  What should you do? Start over. Find a journey partner or prayer partner.  Be yourself and acknowledge what you have been afraid to disclose to anyone, including yourself.  God already knows it’s there and has been waiting for the exposure of what’s been hidden.  Now is the season for refreshing.  

There is a promise that goes with you so don’t fear. I will lead the blind by ways they have not known, along unfamiliar paths I will guide them; I will turn the darkness into light before them and make the rough places smooth.  Isaiah 42:16 

You are leading me into the dark, turning on the light.  Amen

So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the flesh craves what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. Galatians 5:16-17

5. Forgiveness is hard because ~ It doesn’t feel natural.

After teaching on forgiveness, I always give an invitation for women to respond; to indicate publicly that they are ready to follow Jesus in a lifestyle of forgiveness. I encourage them to abdicate their self-imposed right to sit on the throne of judgement and give God back His place as sovereign Ruler. I ask any who are ready to do this to stand and then lift one hand toward heaven and say, “Long Live The King!” Oh, how I wish I could take each of you with me to witness what happens.

The battle begins. Some people do it quickly as God had already prepared their heart through the teaching to desire freedom and the things of the Spirit. But for most, the struggle to respond is evident in their body language. Tears flow, weeping can be heard, and there are tentative beginnings of arms slowly being raised, but then lowered again. Raised/lowered ~ the battle continues. Other than salvation, I believe this is the biggest spiritual war any child of God faces.

I’ve had women tell me, “No matter how hard I try, I just can’t do it. I don’t have it in me to forgive this person.” I assure them that I know this to be true. They do not have it in them. That’s because forgiveness is not natural, it’s supernatural. What’s natural (and of the flesh) is revenge, and how we love to fantasize about it!

When I can’t forgive, I cry out to the God for help. He offers it no matter how great my need may be. His Spirit, inside of me, is ready to equip me for obedience. He infuses me with grace. Yes, it’s a war. Everything in me says that someone has to make them pay, someone needs to make sure things are fair, and if I don’t do it – I fear God won’t. This is the language of the devil and once I know that, I can reject those thoughts and focus on what the Spirit is saying in the Word. His way leads to life and freedom. Satan’s way leads to anger and bondage.

Copying Jesus is impossible. My flesh wants what He doesn’t want. Oh, Father – but living by Spirit is possible because I’m giving You all the power to make it happen. Fill me today with Your desires. Amen

This is a faithful and trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance and approval, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost. I Timothy 1:15

4. Forgiveness is hard because ~ I believe that some people just shouldn’t be forgiven.

If my husband, Ron, had been one of the casualties of 9/11, would it have been hard to forgive the pilots who hijacked the planes that leveled the World Trade Center? If my parents had been victims of the holocaust in Auschwitz or one of the present day casualties in Syria, would it be hard to forgive Adolph Hitler and/or Bashar al-Hassad? The worse the crime, and the more personal the crime, the more the ability to forgive is impaired.

It’s easy to forgive lesser sins committed against me. It’s also easier to forgive someone when they have hurt me rather than someone close to me. I wonder if every person has a hidden category of sins they consider unforgivable. I suspect it’s pretty common. When that awful thing happens, we relegate the person who did it into a special group of people. We believe that this person is outside the veil of a pardon. His crime was too great. You’ve heard this saying, right? “I can forgive most things but definitely not that!”

Aren’t you glad God doesn’t have special categories of sins? The Apostle Paul admitted that of all sinners, he was the worst of them. I believe it’s Steve Brown, the founder of Key Life, who said, “I am the worst sinner I know.” I often feel that way. It’s humbling to come to realize that God’s heart is driven by love and mercy and mine is not. I have limits. He does not. If He did, I wouldn’t be His child.

What do I do when I come up against an offense so devastating that I swear I just don’t have it in me to extend forgiveness? I talk to God about it and confess it. “Lord, I’m not like You. I don’t understand your radical love and mercy. It is simply out of reach for me to produce it. Forgive me. Give me a heart of mercy like yours and the grace to extend it. Live through me and do what I can not do.”

If Hitler, or Hassad, or Sadam Hussein had seen Jesus in all of His glory just moments before they died  and then cried out to be saved, would they be in heaven? Absolutely. At that point, they’d be no different than the thief on the cross. When I think I’m better than they are, I have work to do.

Obliterate my special category – by the power of Your Spirit. Amen

One who is righteous is a guide to his neighbor, but the way of the wicked leads them astray. Proverbs 12:26

3. Forgiveness is hard because ~ Our story is trapped inside.

After a while, I lose perspective about the story of my life. It becomes normalized which is dangerous because normal can very well mean unhealthy. It also becomes cobwebbed and no matter how much I try to make sense of it, wisdom is lost in the complicated weave of the strands. Sooner or later, I wish for someone to hear the contents of my heart.

Personally, I have found that until I tell my story to someone God picks, I don’t have a truthful perspective. It isn’t until there is a safe, empathetic listener, that I can begin to sort things out. Sometimes, I even surprise myself at what I’ve been holding inside.

How does this pertain to forgiveness? If my story is locked inside, swirling without clear definition, I will be unclear as to what and whom I should forgive. If I need to forgive a blamer, chances are that I have assumed the guilt they imposed like a sponge. I can’t sort it out myself. If I’m someone who minimizes my pain, I won’t forgive the real offense. I’ll say, “Maybe it really wasn’t all that bad.” A Jesus-kind of listener will give me a barometer for assessing how good or bad something was. I’ll go so far as to say that I’ve never had real clarity about something important without talking about it. I’m a very private person so that is difficult for me. I’m the kind who only makes a few close friends and shares nothing personal on Facebook. I’m an introvert and that puts me in the minority. Introverts can get lost in their head where extroverts tend to spill everything without a filter. Only spiritual maturity gives both sides balance.

If you find yourself stuck in what you suspect is unforgiveness, could it be that you don’t have clarity about the offense? Maybe you say to yourself one of the following, “Maybe I was the one who was wrong.” Or, “Maybe I”m making too big a deal out of this.” Or even, “Maybe it’s worse than I thought!” It’s probably time to open your heart to someone.

One last thing ~ speaking something makes it real. Unspoken pain can remain surreal and is easier to ignore.

You made me to live in community with others. I need them and that means talking. Thank you for my ‘listening ears.’ Amen

He who is slow to anger is better than the mighty, and he who rules his spirit is better than he who takes a city. Proverbs 16:32

2. Forgiveness is hard because ~ there’s a reluctance to let go of toxic anger.

A woman who suffered one loss after another told me, “I feel like I have lost everything, Christine, and all I have left is anger. It makes me feel powerful. I function on surges of adrenalin. I even dream of starting a movement to help others who suffer what I have suffered. How is this a bad thing?” I explained to her, “Because of what anger does to you on the inside.”

I have learned that there is was freedom I never knew. It was on the other side of forgiveness. There was a surge of lasting energy I never guessed was there. It was on the other side of forgiveness. There was a mission waiting to be born that would be driven by the wind of the Spirit instead of rage. It was on the other side of forgiveness. Toxic anger only felt good because I hadn’t experienced the gifts of forgiveness waiting for me at the opposite end of the continuum.

I appreciate this quote by Frederick Beuchner.

“To lick your wounds, to smack your lips over a bitter confrontation still to come, well – in many ways it’s a feast for a king. The chief drawback is that what you are wolfing down is yourself. The skeleton at the feast is you.”

A modern day proverb, one you may have heard before, also sums this up. “The anger of un-forgiveness is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.” This is the lie that Satan wraps in glitter and encourages me to embrace as the truth. My anger feels good and I believe it will hurt the other person but in reality, I’m the one who has drunk the poison.

The over-arching question, I believe, is this. Did Jesus harbor toxic anger? No. He listened to His Father for the proper immediate response and they were varied. Sometimes walk away. Sometimes stay silent. Other times, speak up because His Father was offended. There was no uniform response. God showed him incident by incident. If my anger has been simmering, and it’s old, it’s time to start a fresh page.

Let today be a new day for the one wasting away under the cancer of unresolved anger. Amen

Are they ashamed of their detestable conduct? No, they have no shame at all; they do not even know how to blush.  Jeremiah 8:12

1.  Forgiveness is hard because ~ the offender doesn’t want forgiveness. 

I can make strong personal vows to never forgive someone for what they did.  I feel so powerful and in control when I withhold it.  It feels like justice.  The problem is ~ the person who offends usually only takes partial, or no responsibility for it.  Because they don’t own it, why would they care if it’s forgiven?  I can think I’m punishing them but in actuality, they are living scot-free and not even thinking about what they did, much less thinking about me.  

Oh, how difficult it is to come to this conclusion.  My so-called punishment of them is really punishing myself.  My heart suffers, my mind suffers as I obsess, and my body suffers the effects of how bitterness is being played out pathologically.  The only one who appears to be thriving is the perpetrator.  

If I watch the evening news for one week, I will undoubtedly hear a victim’s family make this vow.  “I’ll never forgive them for what they did.”  It’s the only sense of control they can seize and it feels weighty.  For the most part, in that moment, they fail to understand that the one who committed the crime doesn’t care about forgiveness withheld.  

I need to conform my thinking to biblical standards.  I don’t choose to forgive because someone has asked for it and I don’t withhold it because someone will suffer if I do.  I choose to forgive because I belong to Jesus and my life is not my own.  As He forgave me, I am to forgive others.  As His pardon of me was outrageous, so mine is to be of the same nature.  

The way of the disciple is a pathway carved out by Jesus.  I place my feet in the sandaled footprints in front of me.  When it’s difficult, and most of it is, I ask for grace.  Forgiveness is the only way I will be free to soar on the pleasures that can be mine in His presence.  I need to just trust God’s promise and I can tell you, personally, that when I have taken the leap, the freedom afforded an energy I never knew existed. 

Your law brings life, even when it doesn’t feel like it will.  Thank you.  Amen