How To Forgive Everybody For Everything

Shannon came into the office one day in tears because she was disturbed by an experience she had.  Shannon was a professional, adult, Christian woman who was married with four children.  She explained that she was in the grocery store, walking down the isles where the soap was located, and suddenly the smell of a particular soap brought memories of childhood abuse to her mind. She mentioned that her perpetrator normally washed his hands with this particular soap before and after molesting her.  Shannon stated that she had tried so hard to get over this experience, but it kept coming back to disturb her. Then with a strong conviction of confidence she voiced, “I am more than a conquer in Christ Jesus, I can get over this.” Suddenly, I realized that her spiritual conviction was being challenged by her life experiences.  I wondered if Shannon had made the distinction between herself and her experiences.

Your life experiences affect you in many different ways, but they are not all of who you are. You and your experiences are different. Your ability to differentiate between yourself and your experience is crucial for your spiritual development. Women don’t use their mask to hide who they are. They use their mask to hide from their experience. So they attempt to forget the experience. The misconception is that when the experience is not forgotten the healing has not taken place. Shannon mentioned to me that she had tried so hard to forget her abuse. When I asked her why forgetting was so important, she put her head down and said, “Because I am forgetting those things which are behind me and reaching forth to the things which are before.”  Shannon, like so many of us, was trying to serve God while being affected by unresolved experiences in her life.  In “forgetting those things which were behind her”, she hid herself from those experiences and never really forgot them and probably never will. Forgetting does not bring about healing; Forgiveness does.

Experiences shape and influence how you perceive yourself and others. And since no one really likes bad experiences, we cover them in so many different ways. We act like we’re not angry when we are and we say we’ve forgiven when we haven’t. What would happen if you allowed experiences to simply be experiences and not allow them to define who you are?  It would probably make life a little easier. And besides, without experiences there is no life. Life is an experience and through it God unleashes his blessings. For example, every time you inhale it is a blessing from God. Each time you exhale grace has been extended to you. So as long as you are breathing you will have experiences. Some will be good and some will be bad, but none of them define who you are.  Not dealing with experiences that are displeasing to you can lead to difficulty in your personal and social life.  Healing begins when experiences are accepted and resolved, not forgotten or denied. Acceptance is a prerequisite for healing, just as repentance is a prerequisite for forgiveness and forgives does not have amnesia.

Here are a few suggestions to help you:

1) Make a list of your personal attributes and another list of your personal experiences.

2) Match your attributes with your experiences by drawing a line to each.

3) Determine which combinations are healthy and which are unhealthy.

4) Begin working on changing the unhealthy matches.

5) Pray and ask God to help you realize your redemption.