Forgiveness Is for Your Freedom — Not Their Comfort

Forgiveness does not mean what happened was okay. Faith-based truth for women ready to choose their own freedom over someone else's hold on them.

The church taught you to forgive. What it sometimes forgot to tell you is what forgiveness actually means.

Because somewhere along the way forgiveness got confused with reconciliation. With pretending it did not happen. With making yourself available to the same person who hurt you. With performing peace you have not actually found yet because that is what a good Christian woman is supposed to do.

And so you either forced a forgiveness that was not real — which left the wound untreated underneath a spiritual bandage. Or you could not bring yourself to forgive because forgiving felt like agreeing with what was done to you.

Both responses make complete sense. And neither one is what God was actually asking for.

What forgiveness is not.

Forgiveness is not saying what happened was okay. It was not okay. It does not become okay because you forgive it. Some things that were done to you were wrong — plainly, clearly, undeniably wrong — and forgiveness does not change that verdict.

Forgiveness is not reconciliation. You can forgive someone completely and still never speak to them again. You can release someone from the debt they owe you without inviting them back into your life. Forgiveness and access are two separate things. You get to decide both independently.

Forgiveness is not forgetting. God does not ask you to pretend it did not happen. He asks you to release it. There is a difference between carrying something and learning from it.

Forgiveness is not weakness. It is one of the most disciplined and courageous things a human being can choose to do. It requires strength that does not come naturally — which is why it requires God.

What forgiveness actually is.

Forgiveness is a decision to release someone from the debt they owe you — not because they deserve it, not because they apologized, not because what they did was acceptable — but because you are no longer willing to let their actions live in your body and your spirit rent free.

Unforgiveness is not a punishment for them. Most of the time they have moved on completely. Unforgiveness is a punishment for you. It keeps you tied to a moment that is over. It keeps you in relationship with a wound that needs to heal. It keeps the person who hurt you in a position of power over your present that they have not earned.

Forgiveness cuts that tie. Not for their sake. For yours.

What to do when you are not ready.

If you are not ready to forgive — be honest about that. Do not perform forgiveness you have not actually chosen. Ask God to bring you to the place where you are willing. That is a prayer He will answer.

The willingness to be willing is enough of a starting place. You do not have to have arrived. You just have to be honest about where you are and open to where God can take you.

He is patient with the process. He knows what was done to you. He is not standing over you with a timer demanding you get over it faster.

He is walking alongside you — toward the freedom that forgiveness makes possible.

That freedom is for you. Not for them.

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"Bear with each other and forgive one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you." — Colossians 3:13