Forgiveness Therapy (Part 4)

"Do you want to be made well?" (John 5: 6b)

Here are some quotes that can be helpful in reflecting on the healing nature of forgiveness:

Dough Easterday: "Forgiveness is getting your heart right with God. The people who have wronged you are still responsible before God for what they've done. You're not alleviating them of their responsibility. You're simply transferring it to God where it actually belongs. If you require them to answer to you, you have just the same amount of problems they do."

Harold Graham: "When you forgive, it seems like you're taking that person off the hook. But what you're really doing is taking him or her off your hook and allowing God to put that person on His hook. As long as you have that person on your hook, you block God from that person and you also block God from you."

Mohandas Gandhi: "The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong."

Catherine Ponder: “When you hold resentment toward another, you are bound to that person or condition by an emotional link that is stronger than steel. Forgiveness is the only way to dissolve that link and get free.”

Dr. Robert Abarno: "If you've been obedient to God's Word and have forgiven the other person and he or she fails to forgive you, the other person has the problem and has to deal with God. You're free."

Doug Schmidt: "There is a point where your involvement in the process stops. After you have offered forgiveness and the opportunity for repentance, you are released from that burden. You don't have to keep offering forgiveness, especially if it keeps getting rejected or mocked. There's a point where you say, 'I've done all that I can legitimately do and now I'm released from my obligation.'"

Acts 13: 38-39 NLT: "Brothers, listen! In this man Jesus there is forgiveness for your sins. Everyone who believes in him is freed from all guilt and declared right with God."