Stinger!

After a birthday weekend for our daughter and the long preparations for Easter Sunday, Ridley and I decompressed yesterday with some softball practice. To help my cute, all-star husband, I love to get out and throw the softball with him. He never acts like the challenge is that great, but I give it my all for him. After throwing several times, I decided to throw my hardest and started yelling, "STINGER". I told Ridley I wanted to throw the ball so hard that it would sting his hand right through the glove. (Yeah - Right!) At least we got to laugh each time as I repeated my "stinger" in my umpire voice.

Today, I had a great conversation with someone about a different kind of stinger. Unforgiveness! This is a doozy in the Bible. We all know the importance of forgiving others but I know I have found myself at times hiding behind unforgiveness in an effort to not allow hurt in again. As humans, our hearts want to play mistaken identity and trick us into believing that forgiving someone means what they did is okay. That is not the case. Forgiveness is part of healing and moving past the hurt. I was sharing in my conversation today that the unforgiveness we hide behind to avoid pain, actually causes us more pain that the risk of letting someone close again.

The other important thing to remember is that forgiveness may not be just a one time thing. It may be that you are in a situation where forgiveness is a daily thing. Regardless of the method or frequency of forgiveness, we have to mean it in our heart. We can't just say it with our lips as a healing procedure, but we must feel it all the way down in our heart so that it is the real deal.

The verse that I shared in my conversation today was from Ecclesiastes 7:14, "When times are good, be happy; but when times are bad, consider: God has made the one as well as the other." Basically, everything passes by God to get to us. That person who hurt you....God allowed it. That unkind word....God allowed it. That attack on your character.....God allowed it. That person who lied to you....God allowed it. It is often hard for us to understand what God is up to. I think we should quit trying to figure God out and just trust Him.

I have been trying to look at some recent challenges like this: God has allowed me to experience this either because of my choices or for a teachable moment. It might even be that I am a part of a God plan for someone else in those difficult moments. Isn't it just like God that we might heal through forgiving someone and then God might use that to minister to the person we are forgiving?

So I go back to this statement....Let's not focus on ourselves in the midst of our hurting, unfair and inconvenient moments. Let's focus on what God might be up to by allowing it to happen. I don't know about you, but I want to take notes and make sure I learn whatever God is intending so I don't have to go through it again.