Forgiveness

I struggle with keeping grudges against people. Those whom a I barely know or who I've not served are easy to forgive. I feel like they don't owe me anything save for common courtesy, so when that's denied, it's understandable since I know human selfishness is present in all of us. It's not right, of course, and I sometimes still get upset when it happens, but I can forgive it fairly quickly and easily.

It's when I've become close to someone and they hurt me that I keep a grudge. When I'm close to someone, I try to find ways to serve them and I actually get frustrated when I can't. And when I serve someone, part of me, in the back of my mind, thinks that they owe me more than just common courtesy, that they owe me some measure of love in return.

I guess it's the same thing as when you help someone move, you expect a meal or something. If you don't get it, you feel a little shorted, but it's only a few hours of your time, so it's not a big deal. But if you worked a job for years and did great at it and then your boss just stopped paying you and started giving you trashy assignments and mistreating you, that would be a lot worse.

I keep trying to tell myself that the people I've been close to who have disappointed me are just like those whom I don't know in that they're human, and all of us are selfish at our cores. The problem is that this part of me has a hard time shouting over the part that argues that I wouldn't treat someone like they've treated me and, to be perfectly honest, I can't think of a case where I in the last seven years.

What brought all this on? In my post on 10/29, I mention that I'd been going through a rough time. The person who caused this just sent me a letter (her second attempt to reconcile) and I am about to read it and respond. I responded to the first one poorly, mostly because I was hurting and feeling so insecure. I actually got more upset about that letter later than the original offense because her reason for the offense came out in it. So now I'm wondering whether it is right to be reconciled with her and to what degree.

I can make the choice to forgive her now, but it is still, unfortunately, not my heart's will to do so. But does forgiveness mean reconciliation? When Jesus told the parable of the king who'd lent a subject a large amount of money and then forgave it, only to have that subject take another by the throat over a pittance, did the king grant the subject another large loan just as soon as he'd forgiven him? No. Had that subject forgiven his debtor, we don't really know whether the king would have ever lent the subject money again.

And yet...in the parable of the prodigal son, the father welcomes the prodigal son home with a feast and open arms. Maybe it's easier for God to do this than it is for us because He knows when we're going to betray Him ahead of time so He's never surprised or disappointed. Maybe it's easier because God cannot be hurt by anything we do. Maybe it's easier because He sees the end result of everything so clearly while we don't even see the present clearly.

But does that give us the right to not even attempt reconciliation? I honestly don't know. How can I trust someone again who lied to me and pretended to be my close friend for five months?

And this is, I think, where God has to come in to the picture. I know that my sins against God outweigh hers toward me and that God has willingly forgiven me and so I should willingly forgive her. God welcomes me back time after time after time with open arms and here I have told her that I don't want to see her or speak to her again.

I realize this post is rather out of line considering the stated purpose of this blog, but this is one area where even though I may have the answer, I can't seem to live or make myself even want to. God, please help me in this. Where I am weak (which is a shockingly large number of areas), please be strong and help me.