Forgiving others – The Arrow Preacher

In your Heart, Christ or Scrooge?

Recently I was spoken to by someone who undoubtedly has a tremendous amount of pain in their heart. I understand completely why, but the truth is, how that pain is spreading is truly heart breaking. Recently I was told by that person a whole lot of negative things about me personally. Those things got me thinking about who I am and how I’m handling situations. Several months ago I made a choice to defend God when someone was angry with him. This wasn’t a good idea, and as I’ve said before, actions and words have consequences. While what I said was scripturally accurate and true, it was not helpful. In fact, as I found out, it may have been the worst thing I could have said in the moment. That person has not forgiven for what I said, and has doubled down, and has blamed me for being selfish, self-righteous, and essentially not empathetic, with a hint of opinionated. This left me dumbfounded and unsure of how someone could say these things to me whom I have given gifts too, over the last few months, and I have consistently written them to see how they are doing, if they need anything, showing nothing but kindness. Sadly, people who are in pain often lash out.

If you live life focused on just yourself, your heart I daresay is not with the Lord. If you make decisions without care of others, their feelings, or even their well-being, I would say you are missing out on love and your sin is making yourself on high, because that’s not God’s way. We are called to live in love and if we become selfish, we aren’t loving others, in fact you are loving self.

Are you allowing Jesus to shine through you? Do you feel badly when you hurt someone? Thankfully there is hope for our lives and there is a time for change and the time is now. In the season of the birth of our savior Jesus Christ, we can be like the Grinch or Ebenezer Scrooge. Lets’ take a look at these two characters for a moment.

Scrooge was a man who loathed people. He lived for himself, his success, and cared nothing for the poor, the sick, or even the family close to him. Do we as Scrooge had, allow ourselves to be wrapped in our own chains we make in our lives? Scrooge was gifted a chance to change his selfish ways. Scrooge is shown his past, present, and future in an attempt to warn him of his fate. Scrooge awakes with a new found zest for life. The three spirits were able to accomplish their goals and from that day forward Scrooge was a different man. He became a kind man, full of generosity and love in his heart. So what was it that saved him? Love, and grace. It’s the love and grace we get from Jesus that saved Scrooge because he saw others living life in love and grace towards others.

The Grinch, the bane of Whoville. The Grinch hated all things Christmas. He hated the lights, the songs, the smiles, everything that the villagers of Whoville loved. Everyone in Whoville was afraid of the Grinch, everyone but Cindyloo Who. She went and showed kindness, and grace to the Grinch. After he attempted to steal Christmas and the villagers celebrated and sang anyway, without the lights, and tinsel, and presents, Christmas came. Grinch realized that the spirit of Christmas wasn’t the stuff, but the heart. Cindyloo touched his heart and in love, and in grace, the Grinch changed his ways. As the story goes, his heart grew three sizes that day.

We all make mistakes, and we all say and do stupid things sometimes. Are we willing to forgive when someone makes attempts to make it right? Or, are we living in anger, and bitterness? I look to my life and realize that I have not always said or done the right things, but it’s Jesus that saves me, through love and mercy. As far as I know, I have tried to forgive those who’ve wronged me, and I have tried to make right my mistakes I’ve made towards others.

Colossians 3:16-17 (NKJV) “16 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. 17 And whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.” We must learn to live our lives in joy, and in anything we do or say, do so in a way pleasing to the Lord. Mistakes will happen, and words will slip. Someone will feel wronged by your words or actions.

Romans 12:18 (NKJV) “18 If it is possible, as much as depends on you, live peaceably with all men.” We have a choice how we act, and how we respond. Christ tells us we will be persecuted in his name, but those who attack us, or teat us unkindly, we are still called to love EVERYONE, and live in peace.

I am sorry for what I’ve said, and I’ve done everything I possibly could to make it right. If Jesus dwells in your heart, wrong doings should tug at your conscience and you should be driven to make things right. This Christmas season remember why we celebrate. Remember that it’s love, and grace, and good will towards men/women. We were given a gift that silent night, and we should live our every day with Christ in our hearts. Willing to forgive everyone for the trespasses, and share love, grace, and mercy with everyone we encounter.

Broken and a year of penance September 18th

We feel broken and battered. The days that pass feel like an eternity and the weeks that pass are a struggle to rationalize the life lived, and why so much pain has befallen the young man. All his life he wanted to feel needed. A life that till then he had been left, he had been hurt, and he had been betrayed by those who were closest to him. His fear would get the better of him. The day came when the women he loved would walk away, she would choose another over him and the life he had worked so hard to build would fracture and crumble to the ground like a sand castle against the waves.

The fear and panic that took hold of him that fateful day would reverberate through his entire life and just like a ripple in the water, every single corner of his life would become distorted. He would loose the girl, he’d loose his job, he’d loose his closest friends, he’d loose his credibility, he’d loose his house, and when the dust settled even a year later his life would still be in shambles. He would struggle to gain ground, but the whole he dug himself would be slick and the mud soaked hole would swallow him whole.

He panicked and in a moment of weakness his fight would finally come to an end. He panicked at the thought of loosing his love. He couldn’t see a happy life without her. It was his fault and he screwed up. The judgment and punishment for that he decided for himself was beyond anything anyone would ever have dreamt for him. He faced the punishment in the wake of his devotion and couldn’t stand to loose someone else he loved with all his heart. Every day he relives the horrible tragedy. Every day he begs for forgiveness for what she saw, for what she heard. Every day he asks for forgiveness, but the truth is, he wonders if he’s been able to forgive himself. How could he live with himself for the pain he caused. Just like the stone into the water sent out the waves in his own life, so does the stone affect those close to him also. The tragedy touched the lives of his friends, his family, his church, his job, everyone that knew him now faced the unfortunate truth. He was weak. His weakness had no valid excuse. His need for punishment, his desire to endure the hardships in the wake of his own admission of guilt for everything that had transpired, he became the very thing he fought so hard against, Sin. In an act of pure cowardice, he became the sin eater for not only himself but for the women he loved.

Could he suffer enough for the both of them and take that pain to the grave? While on the surface he played out the exact moment in his head, and in his head he saw survival, deep down beneath the surface he had to know, even if only in the subconscious that his life could end right there on those very steps. The truth didn’t matter at the time. He felt nothing but hallow, nothing but despair, and in that moment without hope all sense of rationalism, all sense of hope, of worth, ripped through him in the symbolism of the bullet. The hole physically made symbolized the struggle within. The near total blood loss, the breaking of bone, the damage done by something so small, so innocent looking, would be the agent of death. The agonizing pain, the sharpness of fractured bones, the suck of air from his lungs, the energy that gives life now laying in a pool on the ground. No longer just a symbol he had given up all he was for all of her. How could one man feel so much for one woman? The answer was in Christ for the church. Perverted as it may have been, he loved her so much, his failure, his punishment, his taking the sins he had committed, all the sins she had committed upon himself, and in a moment of sheer emptiness the bullet symbolized the self-Flagellant: “a person who scourges himself or herself as a public penance” A self display of pain as penance for wrong doing. An old archaic practice that in a moment of desperation became as prevalent as it once was in the 14^th century. No longer bound by reason the sum of a life hidden, expunged from history, directed the storm to the cross through the heart and leave nothing left in it’s wake but destruction.

Sadly time cannot be undone, and the decisions made are cemented in horror and tragedy. Memories can be haunting and painful but they don’t have to destroy us. Psalms 34:18 “The LORD [is] nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit.” No matter the struggle we face we have to keep the faith. The faith is all he has when the world beat him down to the brink of death. When a man would choose a fate worse then death to take on the pain and suffering of himself and loved ones, he has no where to go but up. When looking at the end the only end we can consider is that of Revelation 21:4 “And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.” The end of our day is the end of our own pain. The end of time is also the end of suffering. As in all things the truth is often the most obvious. “Living is not for the weak.” (Anatoli, Arrow)

He’s not forgiven by those he hurt, and still the shot rings loudly in the dark at night. The mistakes made cannot be undone, and as he wishes every day he could take it back, every day he can’t a little piece of him suffers from the fate he brought upon himself. Every day the scars itch and the leg tingles as a daily reminder of the mistake that will haunt him forever. Every day he must wake with the aches and pains in the shoulder that remind him he’s still alive. The screams at night still haunt him, and the blood that still clings to the dog tags he wore that day. His blood, the blood that was spilt to take upon the wrongs of the world he knew, and so desperately clung too. The reminders every day of his failures hold most evident the new and daily truth, he has the power to intervene in others lives. Does this tragedy have to end with nothing but pain or suffering or can he use it to reach out to others? Can one man make a difference in the lives of others? Every day he lives to try and do one thing, to pay his penance. He can’t do it as himself so he turned himself into someone else, something else. He became a symbol. He doesn’t hide behind the mask, he embraces the darkness that was within, and he uses it in a force to enact change in others. Perhaps one day that mask may come off and he’d do enough good to make up for all the bad. The works to craft an identity to focus the thoughts, influenced by life, influenced by the light, a penance to right the wrongs.