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I have in the past 45 minutes returned from church. I did not attend Sunday School because the sermon seemed to have touched me so deeply I didn’t want to be distracted from it.
I wanted to think and pray about it and a situation that has been very painful to me.
The sermon series is about our need for friends and our need to be friends to others.
All I could think of was my former blogging partner telling me in her last email to me that she did not accept my offer of forgiveness for what she had done to me because she felt she had done nothing.
I wasn’t totally innocent in the matter, but I did ask her forgiveness for any real or perceived hurt I had caused her. She has refused to forgive me and told me God told her to do it.
She thought I was trying to make peace with God when I was trying to make peace with her. I am at peace with God.
When I responded to her very long email she wrote these words back to me:
FYI - I knew you couldn’t do it!
My husband is right. You aren’t a Christian.
That’s why appealing to your Christian spirit won’t work.
I did not read this email. Nor will I - Get thee behind me, Satan!
These words cut to my very soul and have hurt me more than anything else in my life has ever hurt me, and I must get over them.
Riding home from church in tears, two verses came to me:
I tried to give my friendship and was slapped away numerous times. I was casting my pearls before swine and allowing them to be trampled under their feet by my many efforts at reconciliation.
She is neither a dog nor a swine, but using the analogy that’s exactly what I was doing.
God does not command us to be enemies, and my offer of friendship and reconciliation were sincere. She refused my offers.
The other verse is also from Matthew:
I shall now shake the dust off my feet and let the Lord sort it out whether it be here or in Heaven. Either way, He has shown me there is no fruit on that tree.
Cross-posted at The Barb Wire
Written by ~J~
Sue Says:
May 27th, 2007 at 11:57 amVisit Sue
J:
Friendship like trust is something which is earned not automatic. It is simple for those who wish to hurt others to invoke the name of God as their cover. I hope that is not the thinking of this particular person but I also hope you are ready to move past this unpleasant situation in your life.
~J~ Says:
May 27th, 2007 at 12:07 pmVisit ~J~
With God’s help and good friends I’m moving on.
Hootsbuddy Says:
May 27th, 2007 at 6:18 pmVisit Hootsbuddy
This is where the rubber hits the road. We have used the terms repentance and forgiveness together for so long it is easy to imagine they are coupled as two sides of the same coin. They are not. We can forgive in the absence of repentance and repent even though no forgiveness is received. After all the fluff is blown away the first step of forgiveness, as in the case of love, is receiving one’s forgiveness of one’s self. “…as we forgive those who trespass against us” presumes that we know at the core of our being what forgiveness means. How better to know than to forgive one’s self? It does not mean either forgetting or trying to escape consequences or restitution. It does mean, however, that we can no longer be held captive to blackmail for we can, through forgiveness, embrace truth. I hope this helps.
~J~ Says:
May 27th, 2007 at 8:20 pmVisit ~J~
Thank you, Hootsbuddy, and today I did forgive myself and I’ve asked God’s forgiveness for my part in this a long time ago. Thank you.
Barb Says:
May 28th, 2007 at 11:52 pmVisit Barb
I gave you a couple comments on this topic over at the Barb Wire.