Forgive and Forget!!

Sunday’s Gospel Lesson about forgiveness….are you like the man in the parable?
The Parable of the Unmerciful Servant
21Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, "Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?"
22Jesus answered, "I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.[a]
23"Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. 24As he began the settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand talents[b] was brought to him. 25Since he was not able to pay, the master ordered that he and his wife and his children and all that he had be sold to repay the debt.
26"The servant fell on his knees before him. 'Be patient with me,' he begged, 'and I will pay back everything.' 27The servant's master took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go.
28"But when that servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii.[c] He grabbed him and began to choke him. 'Pay back what you owe me!' he demanded.
29"His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged him, 'Be patient with me, and I will pay you back.'
30"But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt. 31When the other servants saw what had happened, they were greatly distressed and went and told their master everything that had happened.
32"Then the master called the servant in. 'You wicked servant,' he said, 'I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. 33Shouldn't you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?' 34In anger his master turned him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back all he owed.
35"This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother from your heart."
Yesterday’s sermon talked about forgiveness. Pastor O said that “If you can’t be forgiving then you can’t be forgiven…and if you can’t be forgiven then how can you forgiving?” We looked back at Genesis 50:15-21 the story with Joseph…the brother that got sold, then enslaved, then read dreams and reunited with his family…well his brothers still felt that guilt and were worried so much that Joseph hadn’t really forgot and even after being back with him for 17 years they still felt scared that revenge was still due to them, that Joseph wasn’t forgiving…they even said that deceased father had left a note for Joseph to make sure that he had forgiven them and to bring no harm to them. I sat through this sermon twice so listened contently as things were repeated in a different manner to the different crowds of people sitting in front of the pulpit. Do you ever feel that you are just holding grudges and that it is just so hard at some point just to let them go, to fess up to even holding one. I know I have. I have a friend that let me down and for some reason after a while we just stopped talking to each other, it took forever to just say sorry on the part of both of us.
Forgiveness
The verses above Jesus is talking to Peter about forgiving his brother not seven times, but seventy-seven times. Take this as meaning 7 as being a complete so in terms saying we should forgive our brother (others) every time they need forgiven. Oh how hard that is for us sometimes, but like in the story above how can we expect forgiveness if we can’t deal it out. With the word Forgiveness comes Grace. Because God’s forgiveness is something that we don’t deserve, it is the reason we go up for Holy Communion it is the reason we say “Forgive us our trespasses…” God is Gracious and Good our Sunday school teachers teach, but look at that word…the word inside it is Grace, How important that word is to us as sinners. With out it where would we be? How do you forgive someone who doesn’t deserve to be forgiven….are there such people such events that take place that forgiveness isn’t an option for you to give. Pastor talked about fools.. “Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me.” We should let people continue to hurt us, how can you forgive someone for something such as rape, incest, brutality if they don’t repent from there actions if they don’t want forgiveness. We shouldn’t put ourselves in positions to get hurt over and over again when we know that forgiveness is something we can’t always offer. That is so easy to type and such a hard thing to do…. So often in people are in relationships that things happen and reasons are found to stay in them…I know as a female the male population isn’t full of ‘nice datable men’ according to our father’s respectable sense…and I also know that the female population at large isn’t the nicest group of women, we use men just like they use us. It is hard to say the words I forgive you and it is also sometimes hard to just walk away because we put ourselves first over what should be important in the relationship. If God isn’t in a relationship with a person whether it be your partner in life or in friendship how well off is that relationship? ---wow I got off track from my forgiveness spiel---
The main point I’m making is ask for forgiveness from God, but remember you need to ask forgiveness from those around us too. Give forgiveness to others around you just as God forgives us.

Prayers: Pray for forgiveness that I don’t feel bad about not beating the Hawks and I pray that you forgive the off task in my writing and all the typos.

May God Bless this beautiful day!