Peter approached Jesus and said, “How many times do I have to forgive my fellow believer who keeps offending me? Seven times?” Jesus answered, “Not seven times, Peter, but seventy times seven times! Matthew 18:21-22 (TPT)
Letting Go – Forgive Series – Part 3
Go to PART 1 | PART 2 | PART 3 | PART 4 | PART 5 | PART 6
Jesus wasn’t giving Peter a numerical benchmark, teaching him to keep score. He said ‘seventy times seven’ in a way that we would answer our children when they ask, “are we there yet?” with “we’ll get there when we get there.” It’s not a question of how many chances will we get and how many do we have to give. Forgiveness is always a challenge, not only because of the situation itself – the break of trust and the hurt – but the frequency with which it occurs. I bet we all have people in our lives who seem to break our trust and hearts consistently.
Here’s a hard truth I’ve learned about myself: for every person who is like that in my life, I’m like that in someone else’s. People let me down. And yes, I let other people down too. From God to friends, to families, to strangers, to enemies… I am in need of forgiveness just as much as people are in need of mine.
Back in Genesis, Jacob bowed before Esau seven times (read yesterday's devotion), not because it was a magical number, but because he bowed seven times. Seventy times seven is just a way of saying, the number doesn’t make any difference. The difference, the change, the growth, and the gold comes through the wrestle. It’s a process we go through, a practice we must partake in to experience.
Jacob told us this by the way he walked from the midnight wrestle onwards. The blessing was in the wounding.
Is forgiveness hard? Is asking for forgiveness hard? If it’s a wrestle for you, then let it be a wrestle. Don’t run from it, hide from it or pretend it isn’t there – engage it, wrestle it out within yourself until it changes the way you live, until it blesses you.
In “The Art of Letting Go” Richard Rohr said:
“To let go of something is to admit it. You have to own it. Letting go is different than turning it against yourself; different than projecting it onto others. Letting go means that the denied, repressed, rejected parts of yourself, which are nonetheless true, are seen for what they are; but you refuse to turn them against yourself or against others. This is not denial or pretend, but actual transformation.
The religious word for this letting go is forgiveness. You see the imperfect moment for what it is, and you hand it over to God. You refuse to let any negative storyline or self-serving agenda define your life. This is a very, very different way of living; it implies that you see your mistakes, your dark side, but you do not identify with either your superiority or your inferiority.
Forgiveness is of one piece. Those who give it can also receive it. Those who receive it can pass forgiveness on. You are a conduit, and your only job is not to stop the flow. What comes around will also go around. The art of letting go is really the secret of happiness and freedom.”
Is asking for forgiveness hard? Leave us your comments below.
Go to Part 4 – The Debt »
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