The Struggle to Forgive

An E-mail sent to friends and member of Ranch Community Fellowship on October 16.

The Struggle to Forgive
By Pastor Ed Wandling

Have you ever struggled with forgiving someone – I mean really forgiving them and not just saying you’ve forgiven them? It’s a common struggle and a major threat to receiving and living the fulfilling and significant life God wants to give us. Who do we forgive? What should we forgive? When do we forgive, and how do we forgive? These are questions with which we all struggle. These questions are among the most important questions we will ever ask. Our answers and our application of those answers in how we live our lives will most certainly be the determining factor in whether or not we live lives of fulfillment or lives of misery.

Jesus taught us to pray that God would forgive us in the same way we forgive others. Those are strong and terrifying words, for those of who have been hurt so deeply that we either won’t or can’t extend forgiveness. And even if we can mentally bring ourselves to forgive, often our emotions don’t seem to get the message. See if the following scenario seems all too familiar.

You’re driving down the highway thinking of nothing in particular. One thought leads to another and all of sudden you notice your heart is beating faster, your breathing is more vigorous, and your grip on the steering wheel is way tighter than it needs to be. You realize your wandering thoughts have found their way to that person or those people who hurt you. In your mind you see yourself saying or doing things to “even the score.” Some of those things are so violent you are surprised and ashamed that you could even think them. When you come out of your trance, well – let’s just say you are not in a positive mental state. Unfortunately you are left with a reservoir of yucky emotions that negatively impact everything and everyone around you. Your ability to enjoy life, at least for the moment, is gone.

Sound familiar? That’s an example of how, even though we have decided with our head to forgive, our hearts don’t always follow. We get drawn into that vortex of darkness where all vitality and zest for life is sucked out of us. It happens before we know it, and it is the guerilla warrior that attacks the heart to rob us of the joy God wants us to have. This enemy of God’s heart in us must be defeated!

Over the next two to three weeks in our both our Sunday 10:30 worship service and our 9:00 discussion, we are going to be talking about how to nurture and sustain a heart of forgiveness. I’ve been looking forward to bringing this teaching as God has used it in the past to help people find freedom and catapult into a whole new level of victorious and fulfilling living. It’s important, so if it’s in your power to make a decision to be with us over the next several Sundays or to be somewhere else, for your sake you need to decide to be with us.

The Stronghold of Unforgiveness

This is a copy of an e-mail sent to members and friends of Ranch Community Fellowship on October 23, 2008.

The Stronghold of Unforgiveness

By Pastor Ed Wandling

"The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds [emphasis added]. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ." (2 Corinthians 10:4-5, NIV)

This is one of the most familiar verses among Christians, but have you ever asked what is meant by “stronghold?” The context tells us it is about thought patterns. The words use in verse five that help us understand the nature of a stronghold are “argument…. pretension [meaning opinions],” and “thought.” A stronghold is a way of thinking that is different compared to God’s way of thinking. Ed Silvoso describes it this way.

A stronghold is a mindset impregnated with hopelessness that causes the believer to accept as unchangeable something that he or she knows is contrary to the will of God.

This is precisely where we are when we do not forgive. We know we are to forgive, but because the wound is so deep or the offense is so unjustifiable, we cannot or will not bring ourselves to do so. We have no hope that we could or would ever extend forgiveness. So we have accepted a position that is contrary to the will of God, and it is eating away at the meaningful life God wants us to have.

One reason we do not forgive is our definition of forgiveness. Our misunderstandings of what forgiveness is and what it is not prevent us for experiencing the joy God has for us in this area. We need a Biblical understanding of what it means to forgive.

This Sunday at RCF, in our current message series entitled “Guard Your Heart,” I will continue to teach about forgiveness. An unwillingness to forgive is among the most common strongholds believers face. All of us struggle with it. Many of us are gripped with it. You are not alone in your struggle. Come this Sunday as together we lay this down at the foot of the cross. Let’s let Jesus, by the power of his most holy Spirit, set us free.

Developing Your God-Given Gift

"For God did not give us a spirit of timidity [fear], but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline." (2 Timothy 1:7, NIV) [1]

I was meditating on this verse before going to bed tonight. It's a another one of those Christian favorites to which many of us often turn. I began to wonder to what the "For" was there for. So often we pull this verse out any time we are afraid of something or struggling with self-discipline issues, but I realize now the Holy Spirit had a more specific purpose in mind when I looked at the verse that immediately precedes this one.

"For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands." (2 Timothy 1:6, NIV)[1]

Through Paul I think God may be telling us how to use and a develop the gifts he has placed within us. To use those gifts it takes an exercise of strength (power). They are to be exercised in love for without love they amount to nothing. (1 Corinthians 13) It also requires self-discipline to develop the gifts and to use them at their proper time. The good news is that God has not only gifted us, but he has empowered us with the abilities we need to "fan" those gifts into a "flame:" power, love, and self-discipline. That's awesome!

[1] The Holy Bible : New International Version. 1996, c1984 (electronic ed.). Grand Rapids: Zondervan. [1] The Holy Bible : New International Version. 1996, c1984 (electronic ed.). Grand Rapids: Zondervan.