Forgive Us Our Trespasses As We Forgive Those Who

Sometimes even the most obedient child of God transgresses the Father’s Law. When we ask Him to pardon us, He does. What we also need to do is forgive those who have done something to hurt us.

The book of Matthew has Jesus telling the disciples, “If you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive you.” (Matthew 6:14-15)

Forgiving another person is hard. But we have to do it in order to progress in our lives. Not forgiving someone who has hurt us allows that person to have control over our lives. We can become caught up remembering the hurtful action and stagnate in our personal growth. We don’t do what we did before the incident. We may lose out on some good experiences because we remember what that person said and how much it hurt. We find ourselves acting very carefully around others because we don’t want that one person to know they hurt us. We don’t share the event with others because we know they are friends with you and this one that hurt you. They might believe that person did nothing wrong; then you’d have issues with at least two people.

But, Jesus tells us to also forgive the ones who hurt us as we ask God to forgive us. God’s followers don’t view this as an option but as a command.