Forgive

Students, welcome to day 7 of our adventure. I hope you are figuring out who you are. I hope you are trying to be the best you you could possibly be. All of our assignments are designed to help us. Yesterday you had to think of five things that you like and five things that you don’t like. Back row I know you think that this is a silly assignment but in order to know who you are you have to know what you like and what you don’t like.

Let’s use me as a guinea pig. I like honesty, loyalty, humility, patience, and understanding. Now if you want to know what I don’t like did just think of the opposites of the five that I just listed. Help me out. What’s the opposite of honesty? What about loyalty? Now just do the same with patience, humility, and understanding. I know the back row is grumbling. Yes, it’s okay to like things like fast cars and fancy houses but I want to make the world a better place. I want to have a clean heart. If I clutter my heart with acquiring materialistic objects then I will not have room for the things that really matter. We’ve all done this. Thinking if I could just have the right clothes or the right car oh, I’ll be so happy.I would like myself because everybody else will like me too. This is where as humans we are tricked in today’s culture. Be careful. Think about it like this do you think more people will like you if you have fancy clothes or if you are just honest and true and dependable? You see where I’m going with this. Yes back row I will give you another chance to make a better list.

Today’s readings contained The Lord’s Prayer. This will teach us a lot about today’s lesson. What are the things that stick out in The Lord’s Prayer? Let’s look at Matthew 6:7-15. Get those highlighters out.

Jesus said to his disciples: “In praying, do not babble like the pagans, who think that they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them. Your Father knows what you need before you ask him.

“This is how you are to pray: / Our Father who art in heaven, / hallowed be thy name, / thy Kingdom come, /thy will be done, / on earth as it is in heaven. / Give us this day our daily bread; / and forgive us our trespasses, / as we forgive those who trespass against us; / and lead us not into temptation, / but deliver us from evil.

“If you forgive men their transgressions, your heavenly Father will forgive you. But if you do not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive your transgressions.”

The biggest or most important part of this I believe is that we have to forgive others. When we forgive others we are also forgiven. We are then giving peace and inturn we are receiving peace. What happens if we don’t forgive? Well, then God will not forgive us. Remember the list of things that I like? The opposite of honesty is someone who tells lies. How does it feel when someone lies to you? That’s right you get mad and you are filled with anger. Your feelings are hurt. You start plotting your revenge. After reading the Lord’s prayer, we know we have to forgive. The hurt and anger should lead us to prayer. A prayer for ourselves to be able to deal with the hurt and anger. A prayer for the person that hurt us. That means we cannot hold grudges. We have to learn to forgive despite all of the anger and hurt that we feel. This is so hard. Front row you are so smart. That’s right our homework today is to think of someone that we need to forgive. It could be a parent, a son or daughter, a sibling, or a friend. It may even be yourself. I find forgiving myself is one of the hardest things to do. Probably the hardest thing of all is admitting that you have done something wrong and need to reconcile with that person. Asking for forgiveness is one of the greatest lessons in humility. Your heart will be very glad you did. There’s no better time than now to forgive. So what are you waiting for?

Sal the Forgiving Gal

Sarah Anderson Alley

Quotes of the day:

We must develop and maintain the capacity to forgive. He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love. There is some good in the worst of us and some evil in the best of us. When we discover this, we are less prone to hate our enemies.

Martin Luther King Jr.

Mistakes are always forgivable, if one has the courage to admit them.

Bruce Lee

The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.

Ghandi