forgiveness

When I first started this blog, forgiveness was an issue I and some of my friends were struggling with. For me, not forgiving has been an ongoing problem. When you are trying to address unjust systems (which I hope I would have done anyway if I had been aware of the issues), how do you separate the genuine desire for justice and fairness from the personal desire for revenge?

In an earlier blog, I said that "I'm sorry" seemed to be difficult words for some people. I personally don't find them particularly difficult. Neither do I find asking for forgiveness. But to say "I forgive you" to someone who has hurt you badly and not asked for your forgiveness - for me, that is very difficult.

I was at a big church thing recently, as was someone I had had major issues with over the whole sequence of events that led to mrpastasmissus becoming an expastor. I had been doing my best to avoid them, and did so quite well, until the communion time. During the sessions we had heard alot about people who died for being obedient to God, and how what we really believe is shown by what we DO rather than what we say. So God took the opportunity to impress upon me that if I was serious about my faith, I needed to forgive this person. Not easy, I thought, but I can try (thinking I'll keep it all to myself and only God and I will know...) But that would have been getting off too lightly - I had to go over to this person and tell them "I forgive you".
I still don't know how I physically did it, but somehow it happened. They were extremely gracious about it, which helped alot.
The upshot of it is that it feels as though a weight has been lifted, and I am amazed that I did something which was so difficult for me without arguing (much!) with God.
Maybe I am getting a bit better at this whole following Jesus business?