Forgiveness ... a Package, and a Dirty Blanket by Laura Erickson When I set to pondering on the theme of forgiveness, I remembered the ways the Lord has helped me to forgive others. I believe the key to this is love, a love deep enough to see past the surface to the heart. When we truly love another person, half the battle is already won. Jesus says in John 13:34 and 35, “A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.” He was speaking this to his disciples at the last supper before his death. In the three years of his ministry he had lived a life of love for them, and now he was about to die for them. They loved him, but he now called them to, “Love one another, as I have loved you.” These words Jesus speaks also to us today. This love only Jesus can give us, and we must set our will to get it. This kind of love is spoken of in 1 Corinthians 13:5 “Charity...is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil (or keeps no record of wrongs—NIV).” To forgive we need to harbor no ill feelings, forgive and forget the wrongs as soon as we receive them. Now, don’t think I am perfect in this, for I am not; but my Lord is helping and leading me to that end. It is easy to hold grudges and blame others for everything that goes wrong, but are we to walk the easy road? No, the highway of holiness is forgiving, as Christ forgave you. Don’t you think since Jesus forgave us so much, we ought to be freely willing to forgive the wrongs of others? Jesus loves us so much; may we love our brother. One experience I had on this line was on a day last fall. It was a beautiful sunny afternoon, and so I decided to ride my horse down the lane. As I turned onto the road the UPS truck drove up, stopped, and handed a package to our neighbor who drove up just then. When he had zoomed off, the neighbor called to me and asked if I would be able to take the package, since it was for us. I eagerly took it and rode back up to the house, carefully balancing the box in front of me. It was seldom that we received a box from UPS, and this one we had been waiting for especially. I hurried with it into the house and asked Mom if we could wait to open it until after I had done my chores. Earlier I had found the horse blanket trampled in the hay by the goats and quite dirty, so I went out to clean it. I hadn’t been happy about the job and was upset because my sister-cousin, Skye, had put the goats where they could get to the blanket. Upon finding it quite impossible to clean, I went back to the house to ask Mommy what to do. Being short on grace already, I was doubly aggravated to find Skye looking through the contents of the opened package on my return. It didn’t help anything to find that they didn’t share my distress about getting the blanket cleaned, but suggested that I not worry about it. That was the last straw, and biting my lip I fled form the house quite upset at everyone, especially Skye “whose fault it all was”, and full of self-pity for poor me. For a few minutes I fought tears of resentment and anger, but as that quieted down, the Lord showed me how wrong my attitude was. I prayed to be able to look past the faults and love Skye. Then I began to see things more clearly. For one, it had been my fault, not Skye’s, that the blanket had got trampled on. I had left it where it could easily fall into the goat’s stall. Secondly, I really had no right to decide about when the box should be opened, for part of it was Skye’s anyway. And lastly, the suggestion they gave to not worry about the blanket was with my good in mind. I had been looking on the situation in the wrong light and so had a great struggle, when I could have received grace from my Father and enjoyed a much better afternoon. When we are struggling with being able to forgive someone, let us call upon Jesus to be able to love them more. “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do,” Jesus said on the cross, for he loved them. The Lord is just waiting for us to call. He has great storehouses of grace, love, and strength for us if we just ask him for it. Call to Jesus, he is ever ready to help us. - Laura Erickson - Turner, OR YWSH Main Page