Have you ever been around someone who was so bitter and miserable that it literally showed on his or her face as a permanent disposition?  You know the look…stern, hurt and rejected?  I know this face well; it’s the face of unforgiveness.  I have quite a few people who are close to my heart who have chosen to be held hostage by this poison.  I don’t say that lightly because I’ve heard the stories of betrayal, rejection, neglect and insult.  I’ve wept them, prayed with them and listened over and over to the recollection of the injury…I’ve literally and physically felt their pain and in some cases identified with them on a personal level. 

When I was a child, my sister and I were playing outside on a hot summer day and my cousins came over to show us a hornet’s nest in a nearby cow pasture.  We had no idea that they intended on beating it with a stick when we got there which resulted in a mad run for our lives. Unfortunately, I was stung by one of the hornets.  I killed it but not before it left it’s stinger inside of my arm. I remember angrily stomping the dead hornet several times.  I wouldn’t let them pull the stinger out, I lamented over that bee sting all afternoon.  We iced it and my Papaw Paige gave us some chewing tobacco to slab on it (I know, grouch- an old wives tale)! It eased the pain somewhat but there was still a horrible burning and piercing pain right at the stinger site. I didn’t want to pull it out because I was afraid of intensifying the pain and because I wanted to show my parents the full impact of my injury that night when they got home from work. Although in excruciating pain I somehow fell asleep before they arrived home.  The next morning, my mother tried to arouse and awakened me. When I wasn’t able to respond to her appropriately, they rushed me to the emergency room.  I was delirious with fever and my arm had ballooned twice in size.  The stinger, once visible, was embedded in my flesh, which had become unrecognizable due to an infection.  The doctor had to surgically remove the stinger and treat me with antibiotics.  I remember hearing him tell my mother that if she had waited a couple of more hours, that I could have died from infection.  The thing that I was holding on to was literally infectioning me beyond recognition and slowly killing me…just like unforgiveness. 

.... ... “If you are holding unforgiveness in your heart, let it go- stop drinking the poison…pull the stinger out! Don’t continue to believe the lie that ‘no one knows how you feel’.”

Ironically, when we are injured by a person for a wrongdoing against us and chose not to release them of their transgression we are creating a ‘bond’ with them.  Like a puppet, we have an attachment to this person and whenever we are around them, see them or think about them…our strings of attachment are jerked and we release the same negative feelings of hurt, rejection and betrayal into our system.  We think that we can compartmentalize this area of hurt, but just like the bee sting, it will eventually become systemic and overflow in others areas.  To carry around unforgiveness becomes consuming.  It is impossible to walk in the spirit when you are feeding your flesh the poison of unforgiveness.  The only person to losing out is you. 

Don’t get me wrong; I don’t want to minimize the realness of hurt and betrayal.  I’ve been there, more times than I would ever want to say.  I know what it’s like to hurt so bad that it hurts to breathe.  My heart has been crushed, my faith has wavered and I have been mad at God for allowing certain circumstances in my life.  Just like when I was a child, I wanted to stay there, in that moment of hurt—I wanted a trophy or stinger to show for my affliction. I think God that I have a low tolerance for pain, I’ve spent too many years trying to figure out the ‘whys’ in my life.  I love being free, not bonded and I’m grateful that I can still keep my heart open because God has shown me that He is my Healer, that He know the plans for my life, that He Loves me and that He is for me.

This is a challenge, a plea and an invitation to you.  If you are holding unforgiveness in your heart, let it go- stop drinking the poison…pull the stinger out!  Don’t continue to believe the lie that ‘no one knows how you feel’.  Isaiah 53:3-5 3He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering. Like one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not. 4Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted. 5But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.

Jesus’crucifixion gives us the best example of forgiveness known to man. Jesus was innocent and blameless, yet he was wrongfully accused, beat, lied on and tortured. In the midst of his pain, looking at all of the people who had a week earlier praised Him in the streets and where now mocking Him and calling for His death; looking down from the cross and seeing His disciples who were too afraid to be associated with Him, looking on either side of Him and being crucified between thieves, and then ultimately having God the Father turn his back on Him because He was bearing all of our sins through eternity---in the midst of that He profoundly and lovely stated, Luke 23:34 “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” And they divided up his clothes by casting lots.

I’m not an expert on forgiveness and I hate lighthearted clichés, like “Just get over it!”  Whatever ‘it’ is—it’s real for you.  The stinger was not my imagination-- it was real.  It was how I handled ‘it’ after it injured me- is what caused the infection.  I’ve been a puppet before, by the grace of God; He gave me the strength to cut those strings because He wants to be the only one leading and guiding me.  Sometimes we don’t forgive because we think that we have to have a full reconciliation (going back to the same standing prior to the offense) with the offender and that’s not true.  Sometimes you have to set up boundaries (not walls).  You may be waiting on an apology that will never come because: the other party denies it, has a different perception of the event, doesn’t care about the injury or they may have died.  You have to choose to forgive regardless of an apology or reconciliation.  If you can reconcile-to God be the glory! If you can’t reconcile then resolve the situation in your heart and give yourself the gift of forgiveness.  Jesus Christ once crucified covered ‘it’ all.   His atonement was final.  Pride and selfishness is the only thing that makes us want to crawl on a cross and be crucified.  We are to carry His cross, not be self-crucified.  He came that we might have life and have it more abundantly.  Stop blocking all of the wonderful plans and opportunities that He has for you---love freely and forgive quickly.