I don\u2019t know how many times I have heard people talk about getting revenge.\u00a0 \u201cI am going to get them back!\u201d\u00a0 And I\u2019m not talking about when you\u2019re playing around or having water balloon fights or things like that.\u00a0 I mean when people have taken serious offence to something, and they will not rest until they\u2019ve had vengeance.\u00a0 Why do people feel so passionate about causing someone else pain?\u00a0 Do they really think that will end the cycle?\u00a0 Do they really think the other person will passively accept retaliation without escalating the conflict?\u00a0 And when I\u2019ve asked, \u201cWell why don\u2019t you just forgive them?\u201d it\u2019s like asking them to cut off their own arm.\u00a0 \u201cFORGIVE THEM?!\u00a0 I can\u2019t forgive them!\u00a0 Do you realize what they did to me?\u00a0 I\u2019ll forgive them after I get them back.\u201d\u00a0 So they wind up, whether they exact vengeance o r not, carrying around this baggage of anger and bitterness and animosity, and completely miss the opportunity for healing in any direction.<\/p>\n
I think that\u2019s why Jesus said if you don\u2019t forgive other people when they hurt you, then he won\u2019t forgive you for hurting him.\u00a0 Think about the wicked choices people make that shatter their relationship with God.\u00a0 You can probably list quite a few sins.\u00a0 Think about what Jesus sacrificed his life for.\u00a0 Without his forgiveness, you will never restore that relationship.\u00a0 Basically Jesus said, \u201cIf you refuse to forgive, you will go to Hell.\u201d\u00a0 After all the pain you\u2019ve caused your own Creator, who has a love for you the size of infinity and therefore can feel the pain of your selfish hatred more than you can imagine, you can\u2019t be his friend if you can\u2019t let a little of your own earthly pain slide. \u00a0It\u2019s completely hypocritical to expect forgiveness if you\u2019re not willing to give it.<\/p>\n
So besides the fact that you risk your soul by not forgiving, you miss the chance for reconciliation with others.\u00a0 You can build relationships through forgiveness.\u00a0 You can introduce others to the grace of God because they got a taste of his forgiveness through your grace.\u00a0 God likes a BIG family.\u00a0 And if you can\u2019t see fit to add more people to it by building relationships instead of denying them through unforgiveness, then you\u2019ve got no place in the Kingdom of God.<\/p>\n
How\u2019s that make you feel?<\/p>\n
Podcast: Play in new window<\/a> | Download<\/a> (Duration: 17:15 — 7.9MB)<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I don\u2019t know how many times I have heard people talk about getting revenge.\u00a0 \u201cI am going to get them back!\u201d\u00a0 And I\u2019m not talking about when you\u2019re playing around or having water balloon fights or things like that.\u00a0 I mean when people have taken serious offence to something, and they will not rest until […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[131,9,11,132,50],"class_list":["post-374","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons","tag-baggage","tag-forgive","tag-forgiveness","tag-forgiving","tag-selfishness"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pastorfrog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/374","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pastorfrog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pastorfrog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pastorfrog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pastorfrog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=374"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.pastorfrog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/374\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":407,"href":"https:\/\/www.pastorfrog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/374\/revisions\/407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pastorfrog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=374"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pastorfrog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=374"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pastorfrog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=374"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}