Forget and forgive...

I’ve just been having a chat with a young girl who earlier in her life experienced the breakup of her parent’s marriage. It was very hard for all involved, and has left some really hard memories in her life.

She asked me how can she forget and forgive.

First, my heart went out to her; at such a young age, she shouldn’t have to be asking such questions. I say to her and anyone wanting to move on from traumatic events in life, that healing starts with forgiveness.

Forgiveness has its roots in our choice making, though it may feel like it comes from our emotions. We can choose to forgive or not too, and both will affect our emotions. When we chose to forgive, we don’t only release the other party, we release ourselves. In time our emotions will catch up with the choice we make.

Forgetting is something we all want when it comes to horrible memories – forgiveness can start that process, but shouldn’t give us the expectation that we will always forget. Some things live on and may never be forgotten (it sucks I know, but that’s the truth!). But hear this, if we chose to forgive, we start the healing process and we do what Jesus would want us to do.

I believe that Jesus knows our pain, that he knows what we’re struggling with, and yes He can make us completely forget the past hurts of life. However, sometimes what He does is help us move on, He helps us live on. Complete healing from our hurts will one day come to us, but in the meantime Jesus can show us how to find release.

When we turn to Jesus and seek forgiveness for the things we’ve done wrong in our lives, we often forget that we can also leave at the cross, the wrong things that have been done to us. If you’re carrying scars from past hurts, why don’t you today, give them over to Jesus so that He can work with you to bring healing from them?

In closing, I want to speak to parents – I haven’t as yet been blessed with children so I don’t pretend to be an expert on the subject of parenthood.

In a perfect world parents would remain together as husband and wife, and would never have the difficulties that often leave a lasting impact on their children. That’s the perfect world (one that we can all work towards), however, that’s not the world this young lady has lived in and she isn’t alone. Can I just say to parents (in fact not just parents, but uncles, aunts, brothers, sisters and so on), we need to be aware of the hurts some children are carrying, hurts that are, maybe being experienced by them in almost complete secrecy. We need to come alongside them and love them through the pain. We need to seek wisdom from God and lead them to that place of healing.

May God meet with us as we seek Him for wisdom and healing, and may we all be used by God, as he seeks to bring freedom to the many children out there who are hurting.