The Two Directions of Forgiveness

Andrea Griffith: Are there any women in the room that you would describe yourself as a handy woman?

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: This is Andrea Griffith, she was speaking to the women attending a recent conference sponsored by Revive Our Hearts. Andrea says she and her husband are opposites when it comes to being handy around the house.

Andrea: I tend to break things, and so he has to fix things. Right? So I find these tools sometimes just lying around our house. Recently I found this. Does anybody have any idea what this is? Any of the handy women, do you know what this is?

Nancy: What you can't see is at this point Andrea is holding up a large builder’s framing square.

Andrea: When I look at this, I think, Oh, it's the letter L, for love. I'm hoping my husband has some more metal letters lying around somewhere, and he can spell out the word “love”!

Nancy: Tools have purposes, and Andrea explains what this square is for.

Andrea: If you are building a home or if you are building a playhouse or treehouse or whatever, this is an important tool. Because how you use this when you build something, we have to have the horizontal straight. And it tells us if the horizontal is straight. And if it is, what you are trying to build vertically, maybe a wall or whatever it is that you want to build vertically, it’s going to be straight, too, because the horizontal is straight.

Nancy: Today we’ll hear how that square illustrates different components of interpersonal relationships when someone has been hurt by another person. It’s what Andrea Griffith refers to as the two directions of forgiveness.

Dannah: This is Revive Our Hearts with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth, author of Choosing Forgiveness: Moving from Hurt to Hope, for Friday, July 8, 2022. I’m Dannah Gresh.

If you are expecting to hear more of Nancy's study through the book of Habakkuk, don't worry. We're just taking a short break today and next week. Then Nancy will wrap up that wonderful series. 

So, Nancy, would you consider yourself a handy woman?

Nancy: Not at all! In fact, just today I had to text my sweet husband who was out running an errand to say, "Honey, I can't get the freezer door to close." I had tried for like fifteen minutes. I felt better when Robert got home, and it took him about fifteen minutes to get it to close. We realized there was a Pyrex pan that was sticking out just enough that it was keeping the door from closing.

So, no, I'm not a handy woman.

Dannah: That is like way below the par of handy right there. (laughter)

I'm probably not handy either. Recently, I ordered rockers for our twin baby grandgirls. It said "easy assembly." But Bob and I put them together last night, and I'm telling you, the word "easy" did not come to mind at any point in the process.

Nancy: Yeah, if I see "some assembly required," that's not on my to-buy list.

Dannah: I will pay extra next time.

I supposed we should talk about the matter at hand. You mentioned earlier that tool, that square, has something to do with forgiving others?

Nancy: It does, and Andrea will explain that in just a moment. It was a graphic and memorable object lesson.

But first let me introduce her to our audience today. Andrea has been a dear friend for many years. She and her husband Trent served with Life Action Ministries, the parent organization of Revive Our Hearts. Then, for more than a decade, Trent was the lead pastor of a church just down the road from our ministry center here in Niles, Michigan.

Andrea was a speaker at a Revive Our Hearts event not long ago. Our theme was all about seeking the Lord for personal revival. She helped us see what she called “the two directions of forgiveness.”

Dannah: Be sure to keep that framing square pictured in your mind, because Andrea refers to it several times in her message. Sometimes she holds it level, and other times it’s crooked and cock-eyed. Let’s listen together. Here’s Andrea Griffith, speaking to several thousand women at Revive '19.

Andrea Griffith: And here’s the truth: When our vertical is right for the first time, we have the opportunity for the horizontal to be right. If my builder's square is like this, if my vertical is not right with God, is there any way for my horizontal to be correct? There is no way. We've got to get the vertical right so that then our horizontal will be right.

If you have your Bibles, go ahead and turn to Ephesians chapter 4. I love the book of Ephesians. Paul has been pouring out all through Ephesians 1 all of the blessings. Think of our builder's square. God has lavished His grace on us and chosen us for this. And then all of a sudden when we get to Ephesians 4, he turns it out. He takes all the blessing that God gives us vertically, and he bends that blessing out to us on a horizontal level.

So if you are at Ephesians chapter 4, verse 1, say, “Go.” All right.

I therefore a prisoner for the Lord, urge you [you may want to underline that word “urge”—I urge you] to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager [you may want to underline this word, eager] to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. (vv. 1–3)

Do you hear what Paul is saying? Paul is saying it matters how we treat each other. If we have been lavish with this grace of God, then we have got to bend the blessing of that grace out to each other. We are one in the Body of Christ, and we've got to let humility, patience, love, and gentleness bind our relationships together.

 

God loves us; we bend the love out. God is so generous to us; we are so generous to the people that we are around.

I hear your thinking out there. You're saying, “I would love to live in a world like that. Why don't we have a love like that? I would love to live in a world that looks like that.”

Well, you know what? God created that. He created a world just like that—perfect harmony, perfect unity. And guess what we did? We broke it. Right? Way back in Genesis chapter 3, we broke it, and sin entered the world. And ever since then, hurt has been coming toward us, and hurt has been coming from us because we’re living in a broken, fallen world.

Our hearts are broken. Our hearts are broken, and they’re bent towards sin, and we can't get it right. So what do we do? What do we do with the hurt? What do we do with the hurt that has come from us? What do we do with the hurt that has come to us?

I want to talk today about the two directions of forgiveness. What is that going to look like for us?

So there are times that hurt comes from us. Right? And we are seated in this seat. We are sitting in the seat of the offender. We don't always get it right. We mess up. We say wrong things. What do we do if we find ourselves in a place where hurt has come from our lives and into someone else's?

I want to look at two Scriptures with you. First of all, Matthew 5:23 and 24 says this: 

If you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift.

Jesus is speaking here to religious people. Jesus is speaking to church women, church ladies. He’s talking to people who are serving. They're giving. They're bringing an offering. They’re working behind the scenes. And Jesus says, “If you are there serving, and you remember that there is something between you and a brother or sister in Christ, just stop what you’re doing right there. First go and make that right. Reconcile this relationship.”

Ladies, He’s talking to us. He’s talking to us. We're giving. We're serving. We were leading a small group. Maybe we have a ministry that's on our heart that we're just giving our all to. And maybe in doing good things, we’re neglecting a very weighty matter of getting this relationship right.

God says, “It's not wrong to give. It’s great to give. It’s great to serve. But if in the midst of that you know that there is someone you have offended, go make that right first. Be reconciled to your brother or your sister.”

Acts 24:16, Paul is talking. He’s actually on trial. He’s in a court proceeding. And right in the middle of that he says this—Acts 24:16.

So I always take great pains to have a clear conscience toward both God and man.

Do you hear what Paul is saying? So Paul is right here in the middle of our builder's square. He’s right here. And he said, “I want a clear conscience between me and God and me and other people.”

What is a clear conscience? So Keisha was talking about the Seeking Him book. The definition of a clear conscience in our Seeking Him book is having no unconfessed sin between me and God or me and any other person.

That’s not easy. No wonder Paul say, “I take great pains.” If that’s going to be the reality of my life, I’m going to have to make that a priority. We’re not talking about walking around perfect, like we have to be these perfect women. No, Jesus lived out our perfection for us because He knew we never would. We can’t. We’ve got these broken and bent hearts.

So I’m not calling you to a standard of perfection. Jesus lived our perfection for us. I’m calling you to a standard of humility. I’m calling you to a sensitivity to the Holy Spirit that when we blow it, we are quick to seek forgiveness, we’re quick to acknowledge our offense.

This has been a powerful principle in my life. I have found myself in the seat of the offender many times. I grew up in church, but I did not get the gospel. I didn’t understand at all. It just kind of went right over my head.

As a result, I became a great liar because I knew what was right, but I wasn’t living what was right. I was a total hypocrite. And when I came to know the Lord at twenty-two, God started changing everything about me. He started working on the vertical, and I started learning about humility and grace and honest and so many areas that God wanted to get right. And then the Lord said, “All right. We’re getting this going. I want you to turn to the horizontal.”

I had so many people that I had offended. I needed to call my parents and seek their forgiveness for the ways that I’d lied and covered and deceived. I had friends in high school and college that saw me confessing, saying that I was a follower of Jesus, but watching how I lived and seeing the hypocrisy. And it broke my heart the way that I had maligned the name of Jesus because I was calling Him Lord but not living as Lord.

My list was so long. I called professors from my university, and said, “I’ve cheated on tests. Would you please forgive me?” My list was so long.

Some people scolded. Some people gave grace. And I had to start learning that their response was not my responsibility, but my obedience to Jesus is.

I don’t always get it right, and now I try to seek forgiveness as soon as I’ve wronged someone. One of the main reasons is because I don’t want that long list again. That wore me out. I don’t want that long list again. I want to keep short sin accounts that I’m asking as soon as I hear the Holy Spirit speak to my heart.

Even last week, our family made a decision that negatively impacted a friend of mine’s family, and I had to go to my friend and say, “Would you please forgive me for the way I told you about that decision. If I’d thought that through a little better and realized how it was going to impact your family, I could have worded that so much better. Would you please forgive me?”

We had been a little bit estranged for a few weeks. I didn’t know how it was going to go. She just grabbed my hands and said, “Andrea, God has already been meeting with me, and I was in the wrong.” We just got to pray there together as sisters in Christ. And she said, “Thank you for coming so that we could reconcile.”

What did Paul say? “I urge you to eagerly maintain the unity in the Spirit.”

Now, ladies, it doesn’t always go that well. That’s why I love Romans 12:18 that says, “If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.” If possible, so far as it depends on you.

As a pastor’s wife, I’ll get calls or hear from people that in some way we’ve offended them. Trent and I, my husband and I, we try to go, and we meet with them, and we talk to them, and we try to pray. Sometimes it just gets worse, and sometimes they leave the church. It’s painful because you know you’re one in the Body of Christ.

And then you see them later in the community, and it’s like your heart just jumps into your throat. What do you do? Romans 12:18, “If possible, so far as it depends on you.”

Have you taken responsibility for your 10%?

You say, “Andrea, they were 90% wrong. I was only 10% wrong.”

Okay. Have you taken responsibility for your 10%? Are you trying, as Paul is asking us, to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace?

So, even as I’ve been talking, the Holy Spirit may have been bringing someone to mind. Could you just write their name down? Is there someone you’ve offended that you’ve not gone back and made it right? Just write that down there on your paper.

I want to transition from the seat of the offender to the seat of the offended.

If you still have your Bibles open to Ephesians 4, you can just turn over one page. The seat of the offended is when we have had hurt come toward us. What do we do with the hurt that has come at us?

I know right now I am talking to women who have been hurt through abuse, through trauma. Some of you have been betrayed by a spouse or a friend, a boss. Some of you have had unfounded accusations thrown at you. What do you do with that?

Some of us in this room or in the sound of my voice through our livestream, you’re just hurting because you live in a broken and fallen world. It wasn’t intentional. Maybe you’ve lost a loved one. Maybe you’re dealing with the loss of a physical ability. It is painful. How do we move forward?

There are some women in this room that we are hurting because we’ve chosen sin. If the truth were known, we’re sitting in both seats because we’ve chosen sin. Women in this room, we’ve slept with many men. There may be some women in this room who have slept with women. There may be some women in this room, through out of the pain of your trauma, you’ve traumatized others. What do you do?

We run to the cross. We run to the gospel because the gospel tells us that every person who has ever repented and believed, God put all of our sin that we’ve committed, and all of the sin committed against us—do you know where it went? It went on the cross. It went on the cross with Jesus Christ.

God poured out His wrath on that sin, and Jesus who knew no sin, He became sin for us so that we might become the righteousness of Christ, 2 Corinthians 5:21.

What do we do? God’s only given us one way to deal with hurt. We forgive.

Let your eyes drop down to Ephesians 4 verses 31 and 32: 

Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you . . . Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ has forgiven you.

If we won't forgive, we will end up experiencing bitterness, wrath, and anger. God tells us to forgive. What does that mean? It means that we fully release the offender from his debt. We fully clean out the record.

You know when your school teacher would wipe off the blackboard just using the eraser, and if you looked really closely, you could still see the words. That's not what this is talking about. This is talking about when she took water and a sponge, and she wiped off the blackboard, and there was nothing left to see.

We don't bring up the offense against them anymore. Why? Because we've cleared the record. It’s gone. We don't hold it against them anymore.

Now there is a difference between trust and forgiveness. Trust may need to be rebuilt over time through consistent behavior. But forgiveness is commanded by God so that we don't stay caught.

One of my favorite verses on forgiveness is Hebrews chapter 12, verse15. It says, 

See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God. That no root of bitterness springs up and causes trouble and by it many are defiled.

Do you know what bitterness is? It's simply harbored hurt. It’s so easy to become bitter because it’s just when hurt comes into our lives, and we hold onto it. We don't let go. It’s harbored hurt.

That's why God says in Hebrews 12:15, “See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God.”

So this is what happens: A hurt comes into our life, and it's all we can handle. We're holding on to the hurt. It's all we can handle. And God says, “I have grace for that.” (He’s even been telling us. He tells us every time we open the Word. He’s probably prepared us for us even that day in our time with Him.) So hurt comes in. We’re holding it. And God is over here saying, “I have grace for that. I have grace. I want to pour My grace into that.”

If we say, “Yes, Lord, I'm going to set the hurt down. I'm open for all of Your grace. Yes, Lord, I want Your grace.” Then we obtain the grace of God, and we're free. We don't get caught in the bitterness, the anger the slander.

But this is what we typically do—this is what I do: “Lord, I just want to think about this hurt for a little bit. (laughter) I kind of want to feel this. Think it through. See how deeply I'm going to allow it to affect me. I'll just hold it right here.”

And guess what happens when we do that? We hold onto that hurt. We hold onto the bitterness.

And the verse tells us what happens. It says bitterness is a root issue. So we're holding onto it. We're just kind of smashing it down. We’re hoping nobody else sees it. But the verse tells us bitterness will always spring up in our lives.

Bitterness will spring up through our anger, through being overly sensitive. Our fault-finding, critical spirit is bitterness. So the bitterness will spring up. It says, “It will cause trouble and by it many will be defiled.”

Do you know who’s defiled by our bitterness? The ones who are closest to us—our husbands, our kids, our loved ones. Because our bitterness will spring up, it will cause trouble, and it will defile many.

The first thing the Lord had me do when I came to know Him when I was twenty-two was make this list. So many people that I needed to forgive, the hurt that I’d been harboring. So I made my list, and I literally went into a room (I didn't have a house of my own then). I found a prayer room in the church, and I just got before the Lord on my knees. I said, “God, I'm not getting up until I've released all these people from the debt I feel they owe me. I'm not getting up.”

I was there a long time. A lot of prayers—a long time. As I released each one, when I was finished, I took my list, and I burned it. That was so beneficial for me because every time I would remember the hurt, I would remember the time that I was on my knees before the Lord, and I would be able to say, “Nope, that's forgiven. I'm not going there again. I'm not letting those thoughts go in my head. We're done. That's forgiven.”

One of my biggest people I needed to forgive, I needed to learn how to accept the forgiveness that God had already given me on the cross. I was so bitter towards myself for the wrong choices I made and the sin that I’d chosen to involve myself in. I needed to run to the gospel, and remember that God had poured out all of His wrath on to Jesus so that I can now go free.

We have to receive the grace, the love, the forgiveness that God has already given us on the cross through Jesus. When the vertical is right, when we're understanding, when we're learning what Jesus did for us, we'll be free to treat others with that same love, forgiveness, and grace.

I don't know what hurts you’re harboring in here, or on our livestream. In a crowd this size, I can only imagine. But I wonder if I could just pray over you. God knows. God has seen.

Lord Jesus, I thank You for these women. I thank You for their soft, hungry, teachable hearts. God, I pray right now that You would give them the grace to forgive. God, when we realize how much we have been forgiven, we are set free to forgive all of those who have sinned against us.

God, there is nothing that has ever been done to us that we have not done to You on the cross.

Lord, I pray that You would open our spiritual eyes. God, I pray that You would give us grace, give us strength to forgive, to open the prison and walk free of our bitterness. It's in Jesus' name I pray all of these things, amen.

Dannah: Amen! Andrea Griffith has been helping us see how to deal with the bitter, angry things that can so easily crop up in our lives. Nancy, it’s through forgiveness.

Nancy: That’s right. I don't know that there is a topic more needed in our generation, maybe every generation, because we are human beings. Human beings sin—we sin against others, they sin against us. We get hurt. Andn then the temptation is to let that fester. When we do, we don't deal with it God's way. Then it is going to create major issues in our lives and in the lives of those around us.

I want to challenge you to consider making a list like Andrea did: think through everyone you need to ask forgiveness from, and everyone you need to forgive. Maybe you're thinking, I don't know how to make that list. Just ask the Lord. Ask Him to put the people in your mind. You don't have to go on a witch hunt. Just ask the Lord to show, and I believe he'll do that.

It might be quite a process, as it was for Andrea—as it has been for me at times. But you’ll find it to be so freeing to deal with these issues of hurt through the process of forgiveness! And don’t forget, our ability to forgive and be forgiven is all because of the forgiveness we’ve received through Jesus Christ.

What an incredible gift He has given us in that forgiveness. And what a freeing, joyful think it is to be able to extend that same forgiveness to those who have sinned against us.

Dannah: Thank you, Nancy. My heart is stirred about something. One of my first questions is, Is there a book that can help me do that? So if you need a book on how to do that, Nancy wrote one. I was just reading it last week. It's called  Choosing Forgiveness.

Nancy: In fact, Andrea Griffith helped review the manuscript of the book, and she gave some helpful input when I was working on it. The subtitle of this book which has been recently updated and reissued is Moving from Hurt to Hope. I love that subtitle because I think that when we get mired in unforgiveness and bitterness and hurt, it’s so easy to feel hopeless, like we’re always going to feel the pain of this wound.

But the process of choosing forgiveness is the means God has provided us to move beyond that hurt to true gospel hope. That's what I want for my own life and for every one of our listeners. We all have areas where we need to forgive, receive God's forgiveness, and then we need to learn how to extend it to others in the little things as well as those big things that maybe have come to define our lives. To know that we can move beyond the hurt and move into hope. That's what I want for you.

Dannah: Me too. This month, Nancy’s book Choosing Forgiveness is our way of saying thank you for your donation to Revive Our Hearts. The amount can be small or large, it doesn’t matter. Just contact us with your donation, request Nancy’s book on forgiveness, and we’ll send it your way. To make your donation, just visit ReviveOurHearts.com, or call us at 1-800-569-5959.

Nancy: As you were saying that I was thinking, there is not one of us, neither of us, we all need this message on forgiveness. My prayer and my hope is that God will use this book to set so many captives free, to help so many people turn from hurt to hope.

Then let me say, thank you so much for your support. We realize these are times of economic uncertainty. We don’t take your giving for granted. When you support this ministry, you’re helping us continue to reach women all around the world with the message of how the forgiveness of Christ can enable them to move from hurt to true hope. Thank you so much.

Dannah: Next week we’re going to continue looking into the subject of forgiveness and the freedom we can grant to others and find for ourselves, too. Have a wonderful weekend, and I hope you’ll be back Monday for Revive Our Hearts. 

Revive Our Hearts with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth, calling you to forgive and experience freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ.

All Scripture is taken from the ESV.