HeartLift

Forgiveness: How to Forgive

Three Angels Broadcasting Network

Program transcript

Participants: Jill Morikone

Home

Series Code: HLFT

Program Code: HLFT000004A


00:27 Hello, and welcome to Heart Lift.
00:29 I'm Jill Morikone and I'm so glad
00:31 that you've joined us today.
00:33 We're on a journey toward healing,
00:35 toward wholeness,
00:36 toward the transformation and forgiveness
00:39 that the Lord Jesus Christ
00:41 wants to pour into my heart and into yours,
00:44 as woman of God, as His special daughters.
00:48 If you missed the last couple of programs,
00:51 were in the middle of our journey
00:52 dealing with forgiveness.
00:55 Last program we talked about the seed,
00:57 the word of God that He wants to plant
01:00 into each one of our hearts.
01:02 We talked about how the seed is sown on the wayside.
01:05 And sometimes we become resistant,
01:07 hardened to the work of the Holy Spirit.
01:10 God says, He wants us to open up our hearts.
01:13 He wants us to surrender.
01:16 So that He can come in
01:17 and begin to break up that fallow ground.
01:21 Sometimes we might not be resistant or hardened,
01:24 but the seed is trampled on in our hearts.
01:29 Maybe the seeds been trampled on
01:31 in your heart through Satan confusing the character of God.
01:35 Maybe it's been done through some sort of abuse or pain
01:38 that you have experienced in your life.
01:41 Today, I'm excited about this program
01:44 because we're going to look at the keys,
01:46 the steps that we can take to experience forgiveness,
01:51 to be able to truly, and from our heart
01:54 forgive those who have hurt us.
01:57 Our scripture is found in Ephesians Chapter 4.
02:01 Ephesians 4: 31.
02:05 The Bible says, "Let all bitterness, wrath,
02:09 anger, clamor and evil speaking
02:12 be put away from you with all malice.
02:15 And be kind one to another, tenderhearted,
02:19 forgiving one another,
02:21 even as God in Christ forgave you."
02:25 Let's pray.
02:26 Father, we come before You and we thank You.
02:30 We thank you for the forgiveness
02:31 You have poured into our hearts.
02:34 And Lord, right now we come before You
02:36 with our bitterness, with the issues we have
02:40 with our brothers and sisters
02:41 and we say we can't take it out.
02:43 We can't get rid of it.
02:46 But we ask You to release us from that.
02:50 And we open up our hearts to the work
02:52 Your Holy Spirit wants to do in us.
02:56 And we thank You,
02:57 in the precious and holy name of Jesus.
02:59 Amen.
03:02 A sharp scream interrupted me
03:05 as I was in the kitchen working on my dishes.
03:09 When I work on the dishes,
03:11 there's a window right above the kitchen sink.
03:14 And I peered out. But I couldn't see anything.
03:17 And then all of a sudden the scream came again.
03:21 I didn't know if it was a person screaming.
03:25 It sounded a little bit like a baby crying.
03:28 But we live in the country so I know
03:30 we really don't have any close neighbors.
03:32 I had no idea what that sound was.
03:35 I ran to the front door, I threw it open.
03:38 I went outside.
03:39 And there stood our cat,
03:42 our darling Pebbles on the ground
03:46 with something brown and furry in her mouth.
03:50 And she was shaking her head from side to side.
03:54 I ran down the steps and I said,
03:56 "Pebbles, drop that now."
03:59 And amazingly, she obeyed.
04:02 That's kind of rare for her. She dropped it.
04:05 And I went over and I looked and it was a baby bunny.
04:10 It lay there, limp.
04:12 It's a little wet side is heaving in the grass.
04:15 Pebbles wandered off.
04:17 She wasn't really interested at all in eating.
04:20 She wasn't hungry.
04:21 It was just the thrill of the chase.
04:23 She wandered off and I tried to approach the bunny
04:26 and said, "I'm so sorry you got hurt."
04:29 And I looked at him and even as I did,
04:31 I scared him by me, coming up.
04:34 And he started to run away.
04:36 He was itty-bitty may be this big.
04:38 As he tried to run I realize that
04:41 she had snapped his spinalcord I guess,
04:44 in the shaking.
04:46 Because his back end didn't work.
04:48 He couldn't make the back legs work.
04:51 All he did was pull up his head with his front legs
04:53 and he dragged his little hindquarters
04:56 into the shade of my lilies.
05:00 And I didn't want to follow him
05:01 because I didn't want to scare him more
05:04 and so I did the only thing I knew how to do.
05:07 I knelt there in the grass and prayed.
05:10 Tears falling on my jeans.
05:13 The thought came,
05:14 you could put him out of his misery.
05:16 But as soon as that thought came, it vanished
05:18 because I couldn't do that.
05:22 And so as I prayed,
05:23 his little front legs quit running,
05:26 his little sides quit heaving.
05:29 And he lay still. He was dead.
05:33 Just as I realized that my kitty cat Pebbles came up
05:36 and she rubbed her face against my knee
05:40 and I thought you just killed that bunny rabbit.
05:43 And soon as I had that thought, I thought it was instinctual.
05:47 She was trained to kill since kittenhood.
05:52 So I reached out. And I began to pet her.
05:55 And as I did, it was like I felt God speak to my heart.
06:00 And He said. That's exactly how I feel.
06:03 When my children hurt each other.
06:06 I love them both.
06:08 The gossiper and the one gossiped about.
06:12 The murderer and the one murdered.
06:15 The child molester and the one molested.
06:21 I shuttered How is that even possible.
06:24 But God wasn't finished yet.
06:27 He said, "That's how I can love you Jill,
06:29 my precious daughter.
06:31 Even when you disobey,
06:33 even when you walk outside of my will,
06:38 even when you turn your back on me.
06:41 Since I have forgiven you don't you think
06:45 you could love and forgive your brothers and sisters?"
06:50 I don't know what pain is bottled up
06:52 in your heart right now.
06:55 Maybe someone lied about you or they belittled you.
06:58 Maybe you're experiencing abuse or some other trauma.
07:03 Forgiveness does not mean that what the person did was right.
07:07 I want to be clear about that.
07:08 It does not mean what the person did was right.
07:11 It simply frees us
07:13 from constantly being damaged by that person.
07:17 Forgiveness sets us free.
07:21 We want to go to a self evaluation.
07:23 How do I react towards those who hurt me?
07:27 Am I still holding on to bitterness?
07:30 We have four different options here and there again,
07:33 as always, I want to encourage you to be honest.
07:36 Just simply put down
07:38 where you feel you are right now.
07:41 Number one.
07:43 "I feel physically sick
07:45 when a certain person crosses my path.
07:48 I can't stand to see them, to be around them
07:51 or even to think about them.
07:54 Why should I forgive them? It was all their fault anyway.
07:58 My bitterness burns fiercely."
08:02 Maybe this is where you feel you are right now.
08:04 What about number two.
08:06 "I've tried to forgive the person who hurt me
08:10 but I can't seem to let it go.
08:12 Every time I see them,
08:13 all my resentments come to the surface.
08:16 My bitterness is smoldering."
08:20 I would say in my own experience, usually.
08:22 I would probably be at number two
08:24 where I know I should forgive and I've tried to forgive.
08:29 But I can't.
08:30 And my bitterness just-- it has me tightly held,
08:34 clutched in its grasp.
08:36 Maybe you're at number three.
08:38 "There are times I feel free from the spirit of bitterness,
08:42 times when I truly believe I am forgiven.
08:46 Then, suddenly, something will come up
08:48 that reminds me of that person,
08:49 and I realize there is still unforgiveness inside.
08:53 My bitterness is buried."
08:56 Or maybe you're at number four.
08:58 "I walk in complete love and forgiveness
09:01 toward those who have hurt me.
09:04 The moment a hurtful thought arises,
09:06 I surrender to Jesus and He fills me with His peace.
09:11 There is no root of bitterness left in my heart.
09:16 No matter where you feel you are today,
09:18 none of that really matters.
09:20 God takes us wherever we're at.
09:23 So you don't have to feel like I should be over here.
09:26 That doesn't matter.
09:27 Wherever we are, God says I take you.
09:30 I can transform you.
09:33 So how do we forgive?
09:35 How do we let go of that pain and that bitterness
09:39 that is bottled up inside?
09:41 In my own experience, I've found five keys,
09:45 five steps that have helped and enabled me
09:48 to break free from that bondage,
09:51 that cycle of bitterness.
09:53 And the first one is to ask for God's forgiveness.
09:57 If you're taking notes number one,
09:59 ask for God's forgiveness.
10:02 We go to God and we ask forgiveness for ourself.
10:05 1 John 1: 9
10:06 "If we confess our sins,
10:08 He's faithful and just to forgive us
10:10 and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."
10:13 We've already addressed in our previous program
10:15 how we can experience walk by faith,
10:18 truly believe that we are forgiven.
10:22 But we don't just ask God for forgiveness for us.
10:25 We ask for Him to give us
10:27 His forgiveness for other people.
10:30 For those people who have hurt us.
10:34 Remember Jesus when he was on the cross,
10:37 when He was, before He went to the cross,
10:39 I should say, when they went up there
10:41 on Golgotha's hill, He laid out on the cross,
10:45 stretched out his arms.
10:48 And they, as they drove those spikes
10:50 into His hands and into His feet,
10:54 He said, we see this in Luke 23: 34.
10:59 "Father, forgive them.
11:02 For they do not know what they're doing."
11:05 He chose to forgive
11:07 and He asked God's forgiveness over them.
11:12 Number one is to ask God for His forgiveness.
11:16 We can't conjure up forgiveness ourselves.
11:19 And we can't seek to create forgiveness,
11:23 or to even feel that forgiveness
11:25 because it doesn't come natural to us.
11:27 We are human. We're sinful.
11:29 But God, by the power of His Holy Spirit,
11:32 when we ask Him,
11:33 can pour His forgiveness into our lives.
11:37 Number two is to pray for that person.
11:40 Now I'm not talking about a simple prayer,
11:43 "Lord, I just ask that you blessed Mary today
11:46 in Jesus' name, amen."
11:47 We're not talking about that type of prayer.
11:50 The type of prayer I'm talking about is radical,
11:53 it's painful but it produces amazing results.
11:59 There was a woman I will call. Janie.
12:01 That's not her real name but we'll call her Janie.
12:04 We were friends after a sort.
12:07 I never quite felt free to be me.
12:09 I always felt a little bit like I was on egg shells with her.
12:13 Perhaps you've experienced this or felt this
12:16 with one of your friends or acquaintances.
12:19 And I remember one day I was walking into her room.
12:22 And as I walked into the room, she had her back to me.
12:26 And there, in the other side of the room
12:28 she was talking to a whole group of people.
12:32 I say a whole group because it seemed dramatic to me.
12:35 There was probably ten people.
12:38 She had her back to me she's talking to ten people.
12:41 And just as I came into the room I realized,
12:44 she's talking about me.
12:46 Words poured forth, critical words,
12:50 belittling words, cutting words.
12:55 And I stood frozen, rooted to the spot.
12:59 I didn't even know what to do with it
13:01 and I went home, I prayed.
13:05 And I went to God. And I said.
13:07 I don't even know what to do with this.
13:08 I want to ask for your forgiveness
13:10 but I don't even know how do experience
13:13 Your forgiveness in this situation.
13:16 And I thought, as a good Christian,
13:20 I was handling it well
13:21 because I did not gossip about her to someone else.
13:24 I didn't talk about her.
13:26 I just kept it, bottled up and buried inside.
13:30 In fact, my bitterness was bottled up,
13:33 it was buried so deeply
13:36 that I think even I didn't sense it.
13:38 One day I was doing dishes.
13:40 And above our kitchen sink is a window.
13:44 And I like to put my favorite scriptures
13:47 or the scriptures I'm working on memorizing
13:49 taped to that window.
13:52 So the Scripture I was working on at that point was Hebrews.
13:56 Hebrews 12.
13:58 And so I was working on my memorization of Hebrews.
14:01 I was scrubbing plates in the kitchen.
14:03 And it begins with this. I learned it in King James.
14:06 "Follow peace with all men and holiness.
14:09 Without which no man shall see the Lord."
14:13 And as I was reciting that, working on memorizing it.
14:17 I'm scrub and plates and I thought.
14:19 Thank you, Jesus, that I'm walking in peace
14:22 toward my brothers and sisters.
14:25 My bitterness, my anger against Janie
14:28 was buried so deeply, I didn't even know it existed.
14:32 Then I went to the next verse.
14:34 It says, "Looking diligently
14:36 lest any fail of the grace of Christ;
14:39 lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you,
14:43 and thereby many be defiled."
14:47 As soon as I read that scripture,
14:49 it was like God spoke to my heart.
14:52 And He said, "Jill, my precious daughter,
14:56 you've got bitterness bottled up in your heart.
14:59 If you don't let me take it, it's going to ruin,
15:04 ruin your marriage,
15:06 and it's going to ruin your ministry."
15:09 And I said, "God.
15:11 I don't want it but I don't even know how to get rid of it.
15:13 I can't take it.
15:15 I can't yank it out and give it to You.
15:18 What am I supposed to do?"
15:20 And so He led me on this journey
15:22 of step number two, pray for that person.
15:25 And I began a radical prayer for Janie.
15:29 Every day, I knelt down and I prayed.
15:32 Now I have to be honest with you.
15:34 In the beginning I felt very fake.
15:37 It felt fake. I wanted revenge on her.
15:40 And it felt fake for me to be saying,
15:42 "God, I pray that You will bless Janie.
15:44 Bless her and her husband and their marriage and home.
15:48 Bless their children.
15:50 Father, I pray that you would bless her
15:53 with financial blessings.
15:54 I pray that you would expand her ministry
15:57 that today she would feel special hug
15:59 and a special sense of Your presence.
16:02 I pray that You would have many people
16:05 come into the kingdom of heaven as a result of her ministry."
16:08 The whole time I prayed this prayer.
16:11 I felt fake because it didn't match my feelings.
16:15 But remember, our feelings are no criterion for anything.
16:18 All that matters is we bring our thoughts into line
16:22 with the Word of God.
16:23 And so I prayed this. Day one, no change.
16:26 Day two, no change. Day three, no change.
16:31 Along about day four of five, the incredible thing happened.
16:35 God changed my heart.
16:37 It was amazing I was praying for her.
16:40 And that morning, as I was praying for her,
16:42 it was like God released
16:45 and took that weight off my chest
16:48 and gave me in its place peace and even love for Janie.
16:53 Number one, we go to God.
16:55 We ask God for His forgiveness for ourselves
16:58 and for the person who has hurt us.
17:00 And number two,
17:02 pray for the person who has hurt you.
17:05 This is incredible.
17:07 And I know you're going to feel fake in the beginning.
17:09 But as you experience this, as you pray for them,
17:14 it's gonna bring tremendous results.
17:16 Number three, surrender the desire for revenge.
17:21 Trust God to bring out good in the end.
17:24 Romans 8: 28.
17:26 "We know that all things work together for good
17:29 to those who love God,
17:30 to those who are called according to His purpose."
17:34 Now this scripture does not say that all things are good.
17:37 Of course, they're not.
17:38 We experience very painful things in our lives.
17:42 But it does say God can turn whatever is bad,
17:46 whatever is evil,
17:48 whatever we have experienced from the enemy,
17:50 He can turn it out for good.
17:52 I also like Romans 12: 19.
17:55 Jesus says, "Vengeance is mine.
17:58 I will repay."
17:59 Says the Lord.
18:01 We can trust God to bring justice.
18:03 We can trust him to even those scores of justice in the end.
18:08 Surrender is essential.
18:11 We pray for the person
18:12 but then we have to surrender those feelings in our heart,
18:15 those feelings of bitterness, those that desire for revenge.
18:21 My sister has four little boys and her house is very active.
18:25 She lives in the mountains of North Carolina.
18:28 When this story occurred she only had three boys.
18:31 Her husband works nights.
18:34 And he's a nurse and so she's alone
18:36 with the boys at night.
18:38 Well, this one particular night she heard, beep, beep, beep.
18:43 You know what that means?
18:44 "The National Weather Service in Paducah, Kentucky,"
18:46 is what ours would say here, has issued a--
18:50 Now they might see a thunderstorm watch,
18:52 thunderstorm warning.
18:53 This time it was a tornado warning.
18:56 That means a funnel cloud activity
18:58 has been spotted in your area.
19:01 She jumped out of bed.
19:02 She ran to the boys' rooms, she grabbed the first son.
19:05 Now he's sleeping. It's the middle of the night.
19:08 Grab the first son, she ran underneath the house.
19:13 They have a crawl space
19:15 and she deposited him under the house.
19:17 That would be the safest place for that.
19:18 She dashed back up stairs grab the next son,
19:22 ran underneath the house, deposited him under the house.
19:26 Dashed upstairs for son number three,
19:28 ran underneath and put him under the house.
19:31 Now the amazing thing to me
19:33 is that none of the boys woke up
19:37 during that flight to shelter,
19:39 during the jostling from their mom,
19:41 none of them woke up.
19:43 And to me, that is a picture of surrender.
19:47 If I am totally surrender to Jesus,
19:50 if I say "God, take my feelings of revenge,
19:53 I know I can trust You for that, take them."
19:56 If I do that with God, it would be like I'm asleep.
20:01 I'm totally at peace.
20:04 Because I'm trusting my Heavenly Father.
20:06 Number one, we go to God and ask for forgiveness.
20:09 Number two, we pray for that person
20:14 and blessings over their life.
20:15 Number three, we surrender the desire for revenge.
20:19 Number four, we choose.
20:21 Choose to process steps number two and three.
20:24 That is the prayer
20:25 and surrendering the desire for revenge
20:28 until God changes your heart.
20:30 In addition, we choose
20:32 not to bring up the offense again
20:34 in judgmental or accusatory way.
20:37 We don't bring up the offense again to other people.
20:40 We don't gossip about the person who has hurt us.
20:44 Number two, we don't bring up the offense again
20:48 to the offender to the person who hurt us.
20:51 This is especially true say, in a marriage
20:53 and it's easy to bring up all the past hurts.
20:56 No, we don't bring that up again.
21:00 Number three, we don't bring it up to ourselves.
21:03 We choose not to dwell on the offense.
21:07 For me personally, this is probably my biggest battle.
21:10 Because my thoughts can run like a hamster,
21:12 in a hamster cage,
21:14 going back over and over the pain
21:17 and God says, "No, break that cycle."
21:20 Choose to pray for the person.
21:21 Choose to surrender the desire for revenge and those thoughts.
21:26 Choose to surrender that.
21:27 Number five, allow God to change your feelings.
21:32 Feelings don't change overnight.
21:34 But allow God to change your feelings in His time.
21:38 I want to touch briefly on forgiveness versus trust.
21:42 Forgiveness does not mean
21:43 we allow the person to keep abusing us.
21:45 I want to be clear on that.
21:47 We still, we can pray for that
21:49 we can be relieved from that bitterness.
21:51 But we still need to be careful who we trust.
21:55 So I want to give that as a caution for you.
21:56 Be careful who you trust, who you can trust.
22:00 I hope that the keys that we have shared today,
22:03 that we have discussed,
22:05 the Lord Jesus can work in your heart and life,
22:08 to bring about a radical transformation,
22:11 to bring about peace, and even joy
22:15 to release you from those chains of bitterness
22:18 and unforgiveness for Satan has you bound.
22:21 We're going to take a short break right now
22:23 and we will be back with an application,
22:25 something you can do this week.


Home

Revised 2018-09-12