SUNDAY MEMORIES
Judy Wills
FORGIVENESS…what a word…what a concept. And such a difficult thing to wrap our minds around, let alone our actions.
Do you have a difficult time forgiving someone? Something someone does? I think it comes with human nature – and after all, we have our pride, right?
One of my very favorite books is called Cafenova, written by S. Jane Scheyder.
It is the first book in the Clairmont Series. If you are a reader and haven’t yet read any of Ms. Scheyder’s books, I encourage you to do so. Wonderful Christian author and book series. In it, Ms. Scheyder has an older gentleman (Otis – 80 years old), giving his neighbor (Maddy – 29 year old B&B owner) his excellent definition of forgiveness. I have Ms. Scheyder’s and her publishers permission (Andres&Blanton) to quote from Cafenova here. And you’ll just have to find the book to read “the rest of the story.” It’s well-worth your time.
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“I don’t know,” she said as they finished their sandwiches. “It sounds easy, the way you talk about it, but it’s really…hard,” she finished, for lack of a better argument.
“Forgiveness came at quite a price. I figure God has the right to tell us how to do it.”
“I can’t argue with that,” Maddy said softly. She hadn’t forgotten everything she’d learned in Sunday School. “But what if you feel like part of your issue is with God? I mean,” she hesitated, struggling to express herself. “Sometimes I feel angry with Him for letting this whole thing happen.”
She knew she wasn’t alone. Many of her friends were disillusioned, and had abandoned any religious practices that they’d grown up with, and God along with them. Some of them, if they were honest, didn’t actually reject the concept of God, they were angry with Him.
“The trouble is,” Otis replied slowly, “people have this idea that God owes them something, as though creating them, redeeming them and promising them a perfect eternity weren’t enough.” He shook his head. “Jesus never said that life on this Earth would be easy. In fact, He assured us that it would be hard. Most of us have it so good that we can’t comprehend suffering, and when it happens, we’re shocked and angry with God.” He stopped and looked out over the water.
“Somehow we’ve come to believe in this image of God as a sort of genie figure who grants our wishes when we pray. That’s fine, as long as everything goes our way. But as soon as something goes wrong we get angry, because that doesn’t fit our image of how we think God should behave.
“People don’t take the time to get to know God the way He chose to reveal Himself, and that’s through this,” Otis put his hand gently on his Bible. “The truth is all in here, and everything we need for sorting it out when life hurts,” Otis sighed. “I guess people don’t want to work that hard.”
“….He [Otis] turned earnestly to Maddy. “I know that you feel like something was taken away from you. I don’t know what you went through with that boy in Seattle. What was his name?”
“Phil.”
“I don’t know what that Phil put you through, but it must have been pretty bad…..”
“But as long as we’re talking about God giving and taking, did it ever occur to you that God took you away from Phil, and for good reason?”
“….Again, I don’t know the fellow,” Otis pressed, “but knowing what you know about him now, can’t you at least acknowledge that maybe God did you a favor by taking him out of your life? Maybe it didn’t happen in a very nice way, I don’t know, but did you ever think that God allowed that, so when you finally healed up inside you would never second-guess whether that boy, that Phil, was really the right man for you?”
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God wants us to forgive any and all wrongs done to us. It’s not to help the one who did the wrong – it is to free US from that weight of grief and sorrow. After all…look what Jesus did to forgive us – He hung on that cross and died, and asked God the Father to forgive them – and that means you and me!
Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me? Up to seven times?”
Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times
Matthew 18:21
Judy is living in Central Florida with her retired U.S. Air Force husband of 50+ years. Born in Dallas, Texas, she grew up in the Southwestern United States.She met her husband at their church, where he was attending the university in her town. After college and seminary, he entered the Air Force, and their adventures began.They lived in eight of our United States, and spent six years in Europe, where their oldest daughter was born. She was a stay-at-home mom for many years .
Judy has always been involved with music, both playing the piano and singing. Always interested in exercise, she was an aerobic dancing instructor, as well as a piano teacher for many years, and continues to faithfully exercise at home.
After moving to Central Florida, she served as a church secretary for nearly nine years.Her main hobby at this point in time is scanning pictures and 35mm slides into the computer. She also enjoys scrapbooking.She and her husband have two married daughters and four grandchildren, including grandtwins as well as a great-grandson and a great-granddaughter. She and her husband enjoy the Disney parks as often as possible.
I tried, really tried not to get nauseous at Angie’s story.
In these times of turmoil, we also need to spit out the distasteful and destructive lies from the enemy of our soul.
Old Things R New 