MK forum

Thank you, all of you for your input about forgiveness...VERY helpful, Especially you Raz...beautiful description of how you "let Les Emory go."

I agree that true forgiveness cannot be chained to the other's response. Trust or continued association has to be, though. Forgiveness is based not upon the other's reaction, but rather upon God's actions through what Christ did on the cross . . .a past event that continues to have reverberating consequences today (Thank God!). I hope you understand what I mean by that.

When God commands us to forgive other's trespasses as God, in Christ, has forgiven you, the focus is on freeing yourself from the spirit of bitterness and resentment that can stifle your soul and do you incalculable harm, in some respects, even more than the initial offense committed against you.

So many times we confuse (and conflate) forgiveness with reconciliation; but the two are not synonomous even though the latter can come out of the former. Reconciliation is dependent more upon the offender recognizing his sin as such, and walking differently (the act of repentance). The more I live, the more evidence I see that God's command to forgive others has more to do with preserving my relationship with Him rather than an imperative to ALWAYS be reconciled with the offender, thereby chaining my forgiveness to the offender's response (when oftentimes the offender could care less!).

Is it good to be reconciled to one's brother/sister in Christ. Absolutely! Yet, I fear that many have made such a "god" out of reconciliation that we have glossed over what true reconciliation is all about. The unfortunate result of that "glossing over" has been to distort what repentance truly means thereby also distorting what forgiveness truly entails and what it truly means.

Picky, yes. Pendantic, absolutely. Clearly dividing God's Word . . .priceless. (My apologies to VISA and its commercials! LOL)

So many times we confuse (and conflate) forgiveness with reconciliation; but the two are not synonomous even though the latter can come out of the former.

In the spirit of being "picky", I'll even correct my spelling: "synonymous" not "synonomous" LOL

Sheesh . . . .

Publius

A Perfect dividing of the word of God. I agree with you 100% there is a definte difference between forgiveness and reconciliation biblically speaking and it amazes me how much it gets confused and misunderstood. It is very possible to have forgivenss without reconciliation because as you have said reconciliation is dependent on the other person.