Forgiveness does not mean that we will cease to hurt.\u00c2\u00a0 The wounds are deep, and we may hurt for a very long time.\u00c2\u00a0 Just because we continue to experience emotional pain does not mean that we have failed to forgive.<\/p>\n
Forgiveness does not mean that we will forget….\u00c2\u00a0 No, we remember, but in forgiving we no longer use the memory against others.<\/p>\n
Forgiveness is not pretending that the offense did not really matter.\u00c2\u00a0 It did matter, and it does matter, and there is no use pretending otherwise.\u00c2\u00a0 The offense is real, but when we forgive, the offense no longer controls our behavior.<\/p>\n
Forgiveness is not acting as if things are just the same as before the offense.\u00c2\u00a0 We must face the fact that things will never be the same.\u00c2\u00a0 By the grace of God they can be a thousand times better, but they will never again be the same.<\/p>\n
What then is forgiveness?\u00c2\u00a0 It is a miracle of grace whereby the offense no longer separates….\u00c2\u00a0 Forgiveness means that the power of love that holds us together is greater than the power of the offense that separates us.\u00c2\u00a0 That is forgiveness.\u00c2\u00a0 In forgiveness we are releasing our offenders so that they are no longer bound to us.\u00c2\u00a0 In a very real sense we are freeing them to receive God’s grace.\u00c2\u00a0 We are also inviting our offenders back into the circle of fellowship.<\/p>\n
— Richard J. Foster, Prayer, <\/em>p. 187-188<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Forgiveness does not mean that we will cease to hurt.\u00c2\u00a0 The wounds are deep, and we may hurt for a very long time.\u00c2\u00a0 Just because we continue to experience emotional pain does not mean that we have failed to forgive. Forgiveness does not mean that we will forget….\u00c2\u00a0 No, we remember, but in forgiving we […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,21,27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-347","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-forgiveness","category-healing","category-relationships"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=347"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=347"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=347"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=347"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}