FREEDOM TO FORGET

This is hard for me. We say, 'Forgive and Forget', but we struggle to forgive, and we really struggle to forget. Really struggle!
 
It is interesting how we genuinely forget wrongs we've done to others. But with offenses done to us, we freeze the frame and use it as a lens filter for all dealings with that person going forward. This is, actually, understandable. We were not made to be offended, to carry hurt. So to 'remember' offense, is natural.
 
There are some hurts in life that rank with Christ's suffering. Know this, and be free to own this. Paul in Philippians 3 looks to 'fellowship with Christ in his suffering'. Some of you have a very special place in the courts of God, when you bring what you have suffered and simply sit with Jesus in his suffering, in his loneliness, where the rest of us abandoned him. (Mt 26:43) God will exalt you, and heal you, honor and reward you for this faith. (Mt 20:16)
 
There are other hurts, lesser ones. These are ones that God has given us the right to 'forget'. I say 'right', because I think there is a part of us that feels we owe it to ourselves, maybe to others, to not forget, to not let go. We feel to 'forget' is to surrender under abuse that we should not, to lose a grip on our very selves. But actually, God has made a way for us to be hurt, even 'crucified', to lose battles, so to speak, but to win the war!
 
Because of what Jesus did - taking all sin on himself, and taking it to the grave - he has created a 'being' for us that is no longer defined by what we do, nor what is done to us. Paul writes, 'I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live...' (Gal 2:20) Paul also tells us that our lives are now 'hidden with Christ in God.' (Col 3:3)
 
In Jesus, we can truly let go of any offense done to us, and in doing so - in forgetting their sin the way God has forgotten our sin - we draw nearer to Christ, and we draw nearer to our truest, newest self in Christ.
​(Ps 103:12; Mt 6:9-13)