Elizabeth Laing Thompson loves meeting women in the messy places of faith, the places where
emotions fly, insecurity whispers, and shame points its crooked finger. In her new book When a
Friendship Falls Apart: Finding God’s Path for Healing, Forgiveness, and (Maybe) Help Letting
Go, Elizabeth comes alongside readers as they process the thorny pain of a strained or broken
friendship. It’s a grace to welcome Elizabeth back to the farm’s table today…

Guest Post by Elizabeth Laing Thompson

I’m sitting cross-legged and blanket-draped on my bed, praying. Praying about the broken friendship for the I’ve-lost-count time. Anger blazes, hot as ever, and I try to work myself through it . . . again:

Jesus calls you to forgive.

“Forgive as the Lord forgave you”: generously, completely, without expecting an apology or restitution (Colossians 3:13).

Let it go.

Let. It. Go.

After struggling to shake free from the strident voice of Idina Menzel, my mind hitches on two words:

Apology.

Restitution.

I start exploring those words in prayer: Lord, if they would only apologize, I could forgive. If they set things right, I could move on.

And the truth strikes, lightning-bolting my heart: I long for those healing talks, but if I’m being realistic, they’re not coming. And that means I have to let go without them. I have to decide to forgive. And I need to do it today.

It’s one thing to extol the lofty virtues of forgiveness on paper or from the pulpit, but when it’s time to practice forgiveness in real life, when we ourselves are cut by the jagged dagger of real-life hurt, we discover just how difficult forgiveness can be.

But as difficult as forgiveness is, sometimes we make it more challenging than it needs to be. What if we examine a few misconceptions about forgiveness, misconceptions that can be barriers to our willingness to get started?

Misconception 1: I can’t forgive unless the other person understands how much she hurt me.

Would it be ideal if the other person tried to grasp all the ways she hurt you, then apologized in a way that made you feel understood? Absolutely.

But you could be waiting a longtime—maybe forever. Meanwhile the anger and hurt you feel will continue eating away at your heart. And here’s a hard truth: even if they try, people who hurt us can never fully
understand how we feel. They can’t step inside our heads and hearts to access our memories and emotions.

“We can never fathom all Jesus suffered for us; we can never understand the Father’s anguish as he heard Jesus’ cries of pain. Thank God he doesn’t make us.“

When I’m struggling with this, I think about Romans 5:8: “While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” Jesus offered us a path to forgiveness while we were still unrepentant. He did not demand, “Until you understand the pain I suffered because of your sin, you can’t be forgiven!” If Jesus had done that, we would never have received forgiveness. We can never fathom all Jesus suffered for us; we can never understand the Father’s anguish as he heard Jesus’ cries of pain. Thank God he doesn’t make us.

Misconception 2: Forgiveness implies I approve of the person’s actions.

Sometimes we worry that if we forgive someone, we’re implying that what they did was okay—or at least not that bad. If someone has sinned against you, it wasn’t okay.

Forgiveness simply means we are letting go. We are refusing to allow bitterness and resentment to live inside us. We are not allowing another person’s actions or choices to dictate what we think or feel. We are leaving correction and rebuke, justice and vengeance in God’s hands, trusting that he will work on the other person’s heart (whether or not we ever see thatwork happening).

“At first, you may have to renew your decision every day, to remind yourself that you’ve already decided
to forgive.“

Misconception 3: Forgiveness is a onetime decision.

The initial decision to forgive is a powerful moment, but that’s just the beginning. At first, you may have to renew your decision every day, to remind yourself that you’ve already decided to forgive.

Even when our head knows we’ve forgiven someone, our feelings may be stuck in the old pattern. Angry, hurt feelings don’t go away overnight; they linger. Like caffeine, they buzz around in our veins long after we’ve finished our coffee. We may not feel differently toward the one who hurt us right away, but that doesn’t mean our initial decision to forgive was invalid. We have to stick to it. To reinforce it with thoughts and actions that promote grace and peace. Eventually, our emotions will catch up.

What if we imitated the Father’s generous heart, offering fresh mercies to people who have hurt us:

“Because of the LORD’s great love we are not consumed,
for his compassions never fail.
They are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
I say to myself, “The LORD is my portion;
therefore I will wait for him.”
Lamentations 3:22-24

What if we renewed our decision to forgive as often as we need to?

That day on my bed, I released all conditions and expectations. I simply knelt at the foot of the cross, remembering the grace I’d been shown, knowing I could never apologize enough or “make it right” with Jesus. It was time—past time—that I offered my “enemy” the unconditional grace Jesus had shown me. I couldn’t offer it in person, but I offered it in prayer, with the Spirit as my witness.

I’m not usually a mystical, “I felt the Lord” kind of pray-er, but as I prayed, I felt a physical release, the sense of something snapping inside. It was as if a cord that had tethered my heart to bitterness—chaining me to anger, hurt, and self-righteousness—had been cut by God’s holy hands.

And in that moment, my forgiveness was complete. I was set free. Painful as that situation once was, it no longer causes me pain. Over time it became a healed wound with a scar, but even the scar has faded, and most days I forget it’s there.

Wherever things stand today between you and a person who’s hurt you, I pray you choose to stand in a place of grace. A place where you are forgiven by God and have fully forgiven the people in your life.

What a place to stand—a place of peace and freedom.

What a victory—a triumph over Satan and sin, resentment and regret.

And no one can take that victory from you. A broken relationship may have stolen many things from you, but it cannot steal this. The power to forgive and the choice to forgive are yours.

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[ Our humble thanks to Tyndale for their partnership in today’s devotional. ]