What forgiving others is not

If we have experienced forgiveness from the Lord for our sins, it is automatically expected that we will forgive others who have done wrong to us. "Bearing with one another, and forgiving each other, whoever has a complaint against anyone; just as the Lord forgave you, so also should you" (Co.3:13). God forgives us out of His grace, as an undeserved gift to us, when we acknowledge our sins and turn to Him. As those who have received grace, knowing fully well that we do not deserve it, we lose all rights we think we may have to judge others. On the other hand, we learn to forgive others even though they do not deserve it (Lk.23:34).

It helps us to understand some common doubts people have in forgiving others. One is the idea that forgiving someone is as if we are making ourselves believe that their offence was trivial. This is especially hard to deal with when the offence was major and we are still suffering from its consequences. No. All we are saying is that as those who have received grace ourselves, we are letting them go free from our hold on them. Remember, our forgiveness will not get them forgiveness from God. We are passing them on to God to deal with them, to whom they will have to give an account (Ro.12:19).

Another mistake is when people wait for their emotions towards the others to cool down before they can feel they have forgiven. Feelings come when we realise the injustice or the harm done to us and see the other person seeming to get away with it. We cannot deal with these feelings by trying to put them down or ignore them, because as long as these ideas remain in our mind, these feelings will come up. But when we make the decision to forgive them before God, and we begin to accept the fact that we have forgiven them, these feeling will slowly begin to disappear. When we keep reminding ourselves that we have forgiven them, whenever these feelings come up, our feelings will cool down.

We may have heard people saying that we must forgive and forget. What is actually possible is to recollect things less and less, because we have already forgiven them, and afterwards that memory comes up less and less. But if we try to forget, that activity itself will keep reminding us. Our brain cannot actually forget anything, and so what we need to do is to stop remembering them.

Many people who have not actually thought about this matter tell others that once they have forgiven someone, they should treat that person as if nothing is wrong. When we forgive someone that is before God from our side. But in order to have fellowship with that person, the offence that has taken place must be set right first. It depends on the other person also. Our forgiving by itself will not complete the healing.

Some people get confused after forgiving someone when they see that person going around as if nothing is wrong. But we must remember that we are responsible only for our actions, and leave the other person to deal with God.