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forgiveness

There is lots of discussion to be had on the voice of God. What He supposedly sounds like and how do we know when it is actually Him talking.
I guess it is different for everyone, but for me it is usually a quiet assurance. Something placed in my head that doesn't seem like it came from the rest of me. Some advice or direction that is going to feel suprisingly good when I act on it.
Sometimes it is so random and out of place I know it is God.

The other day I had one of those moments. We were riding in the car and my thoughts were drifting. I caught a little bit of bitterness in my thoughts about a friend. I swear God decided now would be a good time to speak up.

"Forgive her."

This totally threw me off. I had already.

Without going into much back story, but still filling you in on enough for this to make sense.....let's back track a bit. Once I had this friend and we had a bit of a falling out or apart. I was left with really hurt feelings. This isn't the first or last friend that I have "broken up" with or drifted away but for some reason it hurt more than most. We both contributed to our mess and we never quite managed to patch things up the way they were. And it wasn't for lack of trying. She was slightly wiser and understood that things were to never be the way they were. I kept trying to make them. Even now, years later...sometimes I still do.

I forgave her outloud, silently and all kinds of ways for the initial hurts. We still stay in touch, sort of. We aren't close and don't call each other weekly and chat for hours. But there are occasional emails or texts and we occasionally remember birthdays. Which to be honest is as much as I have going with some of my old friends that I am on good terms with. But every once in a while a hurt will sneak in. And hang out and eat at me for awhile.

So on Hwy 161 when God says forgive her, I am at a bit of a loss. We covered that already God. Years ago. Did you forget?
No child. Forgive her for now. For not conforming to your expectations.
You see I forgave the initial hurts but never quite adjusted what I was hoping for. Even when the terms were good I managed to feel a bit rejected with every contact. I needed to forgive the current. And it wasn't even anything she was doing. I was.

Just because we forgive someone for something they did does not mean it will make it any better. It might. I just forgave a time frame or situation. Not the actual culprit. My own heart. My own hopes and expectations and desires that weren't being met and weren't going to be met here.

So I did as God said. I felt a bit silly becuase I wasn't even really sure if I meant it, or if it was something I needed to do, or if I was just making up nonsense again.

It was silent and only took seconds but suddenly I felt lighter.
It didn't really "fix" anything. And there was no booming voice or soothing reassurance, but sometimes God talks like that.
In quiet relief.
On Highway 161.

Comments

Corinne Cunningham said…
He works in mysterious ways...
Thank you for sharing this.
March 2, 2010 at 4:40 PM
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