Fewer things impact your walk with the Lord more than forgiveness. The next “vegetable” we need to eat, even if we don’t want to, is forgiveness. In this message, Pastor Jamie Nunnally encourages us to live a life of forgiveness.
Forgive:
To forgive is to send away or to set free, with the understanding that we are to not
pick up what God told us to put down.
Three things I want you to know about forgiveness:
- Forgiveness brings freedom.
Physical health is about what you eat, but spiritual health is about what’s eating you.
You don’t forgive people for their benefit, you forgive people for your benefit.
Matthew 18:23-35 – You won’t survive unforgiveness.
It’s hard, but the pain you feel during the process of forgiving someone is nowhere near the pain you will feel if you hold on to the unforgiveness. - Forgiveness is a two-sided coin: heads, I’m forgiven; tails, I forgive.
Matthew 6:14-15 “If you forgive those who sin against you, your heavenly Father will forgive you. But if you refuse to forgive others, your Father will not forgive your sins.” - Forgiveness is a process.
Matthew 18:21-22 “Then Peter came to Him and said, “Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? Up to seven times?” Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven.”
Forgiveness is not just a point in time action; It’s a life-long decision. Don’t pick back up what God has told you to put down.
Here is God’s promise in the process: If you will forgive the people who hurt you, God will remove the pain they caused you.
Joseph – Genesis 37-50
Notice who all the people Joseph had to forgive:
His father for the favoritism and setting him up for failure, himself for his arrogance, his brothers for selling him into slavery, Potiphar’s wife for accusing him, Potiphar for putting him in jail, the cup bearer for breaking his promise to remember him, and God, for allowing all this to happen.
Genesis 50:19-20 “But Joseph said to them, “Do not fear, for am I in the place of God? 20 As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today.”
Joseph could forgive because he trusted God.
Romans 8:28 “And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them.”
God didn’t want it, God didn’t cause it, but God will use it.
Jospeh stopped viewing his future through the past. You can’t move forward if you’re always looking backward.
God can’t redeem it until you release it.
Are you walking in forgiveness?