forgiveness

Each year in my Lenten thinking and meditations I work on the word "metamoia"---transform. I can't just "give up" something or "do" something for 6 weeks. I really need to ask God to transform so many of my human weaknesses.

One of the weaknesses I pray to transform is my inability to forgive. So often I think I have forgiven someone who has hurt me and then I find myself being angry all over again---especially when reminded by a particular situation or memory.

A recent Lenten meditation by Andrew M. Weyerman had some beautiful thoughts on this forgiveness thing.
"We often try to bury the past when we need to seek healing from the past...Healing is not possible by repressing the past."  He then quotes the astronaut John Glenn, "I am afraid to forget...What protrudes and does not fit in our past rises to haunt us and makes us spiritually unwell in the present."  Weyerman then continues, "The jagged edges protrude, the spirit is disturbed and the body fatigued...Healing from the past includes the kind of journey into the past where what was not cleanly forgotten is uncovered and experienced. Healing from the past involves opening the spirit to all light....Most of all healing from the past means rediscovering the reality of God's forgiveness of us....Nothing can be made up, redone, erased...Healing from the past then translates into the desire to be transformed by the Spirit into an honest, wise and gentle person."

I pray to forgive and that means owning the hurt I caused.

Is there someone you have difficulty forgiving? Does the "jagged edge protrude" and cause you to be unwell today?

I pray for all of us today.
Blessings-Penny







b