The Struggle of Forgiveness

Tonight I came to a realization that has been a long time in coming.
And it's not even something that I don't already know by heart. In fact, I think it is something I knew so well that it faded to the background, and became taken for granted.

I am forgiven. 

Completely, utterly, totally Forgiven, by the Great Holy Creator, by His Son Jesus.
He is the ultimate giver of forgiveness. His is the only kind that truly matters. To seek any other kind is so ludicrous. How can we do that? What drives us to seek more than what is already so much more than enough? So far beyond amazing and more than we could ever hope to earn? Given freely by God?

But we do. Or at least, I do.

I forget that Jesus forgave me, forgives me, and will always forgive me. That He does not look at me the way I tend to look at myself. And because of that, I should not look at myself as the wretch I often feel like. When I refuse to acknowledge His forgiveness, I'm saying His view is not good enough. I'm saying "That's alright if you forgive me, God, but I don't think I can." That's prideful. To think you're either not good enough or too good for Him. Either way, you're contradicting God, and what He says is pure and perfect. Like Peter did, actually.

Let me explain.

I have always had very low self-esteem. I never saw myself as much. I got told a lot of things that enforced these feelings. I compared myself to others I deemed better than myself, and saw getting all the attention, and I valued my own character less and less. I'm not trying to start a pity party here, it's just a fact. It's funny... something can be so very small, something someone says can slip from them just casually without a thought. They never know how it will affect another person, that it might stay with them for the rest of their life. This  has only taught me to be careful with my own words. Because I hate hurting people.

And yet that is what I did.

In the last year of my life, a lot of things have happened. Some things have been just so, so amazing and beautiful and beyond my wildest hopes. I love my life. God is showing me just how wonderful His plans are by letting me see my Future unfold.

Unfortunately, it seems to be human nature to let the clouds blot out the biggest rays of sunshine in our daily lives.

Besides my days of sunshine and a truly mind-blowing sweet sixteenth year, naturally some of these darker days also occurred. I watched some life-long friendships become very damaged by some stupid, thoughtless words. I've dished out hurt, and taken my own fair share. It was all egged on either by jealousy, or by spur-of-the-moment frustration, or pent-up emotions, or even irrational excitement. It is so easy to get carried away.

There was a boy involved: the first one to ever take some remote form of interest in me. There was another girl involved. There were two older women involved. There were whole families involved, in the end. That's what happens in these instances. Nothing ever stays small. And I believe in this case, it was the smaller issues that just gave vent to the bigger ones that had been bubbling under the surface for years. They had to blow sometime, and they did.

To make a long story short, I said some things about someone to someone else, because of premature trust, frustration, and the immature desire to impress. Looking back on it, those things were so not me. But I did them. Because I am like anybody else: I make mistakes. And often the same ones over and over.
The whole situation ended up involving way more people than in the beginning. It left me feeling guilt and horror at what I had done. Which, yes, may actually have been just a small thing when looked at by an outsider, but to me it wasn't. And to the other parties involved, it sure wasn't.

I prayed a lot during that time. And I have to say that without God and a very close friend, I would have completely broken apart during that time. I nearly did anyway.

I apologized to the person I had wronged. It was all I could really do. You can't undo history and take back words spoken. As much as I wanted to.
You can't wind the clock back ten years and change a choice you made that would lead up to this point and make everything go wrong. As much as I wanted to.
But, you know, now I am actually thankful for that, because without that one little "wrong choice" way back in the past, I wouldn't be exactly where I am now, in the right place.

But in the long run, my point here is that even now, over a year later, I am carrying around guilt and anger at myself. I see myself as a terrible person. I feel like a failure, because no matter how hard I try, I always find myself saying something I regret, or feeling an emotion I wish I never had capability of feeling. I just wish things could be the way they used to be. I wish I could drop all the resentment I feel, and that I could make everyone around me do the same.

But the truth is, tonight, I remembered I am forgiven. And I need to forgive myself. No matter who on this earth has or has not forgiven me, it doesn't matter. It will only make me wilt and wither as a person to carry that burden of guilt and regret around on my shoulders for the rest of my life. I need to stop worrying.

I am free to struggle through this.
But I am not struggling to be free.
So why struggle at all?
I'm giving it up, to God.

As I was thinking about this whole situation, that song The Struggle  by Tenth Avenue North came to me, and when I went to listen to it, I found it relates even better to my situation than I originally thought.

I was talking to my sister tonight, telling her how I felt. It was then that it came to me that all of the things I am feeling: the unforgiveness of myself, the despair, the anger, the guilt.... these are lies. These are things someone that is NOT God is pushing back on me, reminding me of, whispering nastily in my ear. Why? Why attack me with my past? Why now? Because that is what Satan does. He loves to wear you down with regret, to make you forget and doubt the most precious and basic gift Jesus bought: FORGIVENESS! For me.

Satan will do anything to steal our happiness. And I think he will only attack those he sees as the biggest threat, the ones he sees as getting too close to God for his comfort.

So I'm saying no.

I will not believe the lies. I will not live in the past.

I will live for God, and for the moment of now. I will accept His gift with honor and use it to the fullest.

As I am forgiven, I will forgive.
As I am loved, I will love.
I am new.
Every day.
A new start,  another chance.
Another step in the building, as my God shapes me and makes me, and calls me His work of art.

Thank God.