Forgiveness and the Guarded Heart ~ By Diana Weems

May 17, 2010

Since coming to the Lord after being away from Him for much of my adulthood I have learned a very valuable lesson that forgiveness is a powerful component to living a life of freedom that God has designed for us.  As a new Christian in 2000, I found it so hard to forgive those who had hurt me.  I was bitter and angry and self-sufficient to the core.  I believe of those three, self-sufficiency is the worst because it keeps us from reaching out for help.  I had an iron wall around my spirit that would not allow anyone near my “soft spot”.   As long as I could provide for myself I did not need to be vulnerable nor need anyone, not even God. Because of that tough resolve to do it on my own, I was driven to succeed in the world and prove to everyone that I had what it takes to be someone.  I must confess that I was tenacious and persistent – everything the world respects and admires.  The only problem was, that deep down inside I was a miserable, lonely and very fearful little girl looking for her father’s affirmation.  After living years in this state of brokenness,  I finally admitted my fear and reached out to God, and that is when I received my first miracle as a new believer.  My Father in Heaven heard my cry!   He stepped into my life and began to nurture me and call my heart to His.  I truly believe when someone uses their free will to call out for Jesus, His mercy is nothing less than a pure miracle. What a marvelous and merciful God we serve!  The Lord says in Matthew 18:13 that he rejoices more over the one sheep that was lost than the ninety-nine that did not go astray. 

As the Lord began ministering to me in my brokenness, he began revealing His truth to me.  I cried out to the Lord and had a hunger to know Him, but honestly, the words of the Bible were just that – words on a page with no meaning.  Romans 1:18-20 says that God reveals himself through everything that he made, and through invisible qualities his eternal power and divine nature is revealed to us.  His word is written on our hearts.  As sure as God’s promises are, I began to receive his revealed truth through the Bible and Holy Spirit revelation.  The Word became real to me.  As His word was revealed I came to understand God’s design and purpose on my life.  The words of  1 Peter 2:2 “Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up in your salvation, now that you have tasted that the Lord is good”.

I wanted the freedom that the Word of God promises.  Isaiah 61 says that Jesus came to comfort the brokenhearted and to proclaim that captives will be released and prisoners will be freed.  In John 8:32, Jesus says:  “And you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free”.  Do you know how to receive the freedom of the Lord?  Through repentance and forgiveness.   To many, just hearing the word “forgiveness” is painful because we must dredge up hurtful events of the past.   It evokes fear, avoidance and also awakens pride, tools used by the enemy to keep us tied up in bondage.  But the Lord showed me that by trusting in Him, he would take the pain associated with the process of forgiveness and lead me through a door that leads to wide open fields of grace.  This is the place where we can live, and move and have our being in Christ Jesus. (Acts 17:28).

Once I let Christ enter the wounded places of my heart, he began to break the chains of resentment, anger and bitterness that had bound me for so much of my life.  It is interesting to realize these emotions are like a chain reaction: hurt leads to resentment in our hearts that leads to bitterness and anger, and finally to unforgiveness.  This is where I found myself when I finally turned to the Lord.  Jesus was on the other side of my prison cell waiting to take me by the hand into His beautiful realm of freedom.  Gradually the iron wall around my heart began to topple and I was able to see the world in God’s light.  I began to realize what a darkness I had been living in, full of the cheap promises that the world has to offer.  In John 8:12, Jesus spoke to them again, saying, “I am the light of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life.”

There are two aspects of forgiveness: 1) forgiving others; and 2) forgiving yourself by receiving God’s forgiveness.  Since receiving the love of God,  I have found that it is so much easier to forgive others and ask others to forgive me.  By understanding my own hurts, I can now recognize the wounds in others and have compassion on them, realizing that God is still working His mercy in us all.  However, forgiving myself has been a different story.  I know that Satan is the great accuser working with all of his might to keep us bound in the guilt and shame of our past.  There is a spiritual battle being waged for our souls.  John Baker, author of Life’s Healing Choices, offers some wonderful advice on how to let go of our past mistakes.  He says that whenever we are being tormented by Satan about our past, we should begin to praise the Lord for his forgiveness of our sins and to begin to quote scriptures about forgiveness.  Praises like “Thank you, Jesus, for placing my sins as far as the east is from the west”.  “Thank you, Lord, that my sins have been thrown in the sea of forgetfulness.”  Once we begin to praise and thank God for His promise of forgiveness, the enemy will turn knowing that his tactic has failed and we are therefore able to live free in God’s grace. 

Receiving the Lord’s forgiveness is so essential to guarding our hearts.   When we do not trust the Lord to take away our sins and accept His forgiveness, we are weakened  to the attacks of the enemy and we step right back into that prison cell of defeat.  Forgiveness is so powerful that it must be embraced by every believer in order to enter into a life of freedom.  Once we are able to receive forgiveness from the Lord, He leads us down the road to repentance.  This is the painful, but essential part of healing.  It requires an intimacy with Christ so that we will trust in Him.  The first time I received a true dose of repentance, the Holy Spirit showed me how I had hurt two very dear people in my life.  I cried nonstop for a full hour.  The pain was excruciating but after finally opening my heart to God and releasing the pent up guilt and shame that had festered, I received an indescribable sense of peace and love that I had never experienced before.  I felt completely cleansed. In Isaiah 1: 17-19 I, the LORD, invites you to come and talk it over. Your sins are scarlet red, but they will be whiter than snow or wool.  That is repentance that leads to forgiveness!  There have been many other times of repentance when the Lord deals with my past in order to heal me.  It is a cleansing gift that He offers to me if I set aside the fear of facing my past and willingly take His hand and trust in His promise to forgive me. 

As I have grown in the Lord and he helps me to receive His forgiveness and when I am quick to forgive others, He has reminded me of why I am forgiven and healed.  He gently whisper to me “Diana, if you love me, you will feed my sheep”.  I encourage you this day to forgive and be forgiven.  For the Lord loves you dearly and is waiting for you in His field of grace! 

Thank you, Father, God for offering your son, Jesus, as a living sacrifice, paving the way to your mercy, forgiveness and freedom for all who call upon His name.