Our Saviour kneels down and gazes upon the darkest acts of our lives. But rather than recoil in horror, he reaches out in kindness and says, 'I can clean that if you want.' And from the basin of his grace, he scoops a palm full of mercy and washes our sin.
Max Lucado
Upwords
When we choose to forgive the victory is attainable. When bad things happen, good CAN come out of it! Romans 8:28 declares it is so! My life declares it is so and I am not alone in that statement. So many people have looked evil in the face and said, "I will find good in this." Some times the evil and bad things are changed or converted or whatever and sometimes it is US that is changed. But ALL things work for good and can bring about change for the good.
Elizabeth Fabiani
Website
A happy marriage is the union of two good forgivers.
Robert Quillen
If our greatest need had been information, God would have sent an educator. If our greatest need had been technology, God would have sent us a scientist. If our greatest need had been money, God would have sent us an economist. But since our greatest need was forgiveness, God sent us a Saviour.©
Roy Lessin
DaySpring Cards.
Love is an act of endless forgiveness.
Jean Vanier
Biography
It is impossible for a man to be freed from the habit of sin before he hates it, just as it is impossible to receive forgiveness before confessing his trespasses...
Ignatius
Biography
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Restoring Relationships: The Importance of Forgiving and Being Forgiven By Ralph A. Gwinn In the process of becoming like Christ, there is one essential element that is often overlooked. Because we never get to the place where we no longer sin against God and against one another, forgiveness is essential to maintaining forward motions. In a very real sense, each of us is God's "great work," and He continues to work to make us better likenesses of Christ, both as individuals and together as the Body of Christ. But God's "problem" is that we aren't always as eager for that likeness as He is, and so we drag our feet. Some people even refuse to let Him start the process with them. This book is an attempt to help us understand what is involved in forgiveness, with a view to enriching our lives with God and with one another. |
Forgiveness brings freedom - freedom from being controlled by the past, freedom from the emotional ties to the offender, freedom from the continual inner conflicts of bitterness and hate, freedom to become whole and enjoy the fullness of life.
Jeanette Vought
God forgave us without any merit on our part; therefore we must forgive others, whether or not we think they merit it.
Lehman Strauss
Biography
Forgiveness is me giving up my right to hurt you for hurting me.
Anonymous
God has cast our confessed sins into the depths of the sea, and He's even put a 'No Fishing' sign over the spot.
Dwight L. Moody
Biography
Everything you do in revenge against a brother who has harmed you will come back to your mind at the time of prayer.
Abba Nilus
Biography
To excuse what can really produce good excuses is not Christian charity; it is only fairness. To be a Christian means to forgive the inexcusable, because God has forgiven the inexcusable in you.
(Clive Staples) C. S. Lewis
Into The Wardrobe
A man who is wrathful with us is a sick man; we must apply a plaster to his heart - love; we must treat him kindly, speak to him gently, lovingly. And if there is not deeply-rooted malice against us within him, but only a temporary fit of anger, you will see how his heart, or his malice, will melt away through your kindness and love - how good will conquer evil. A Christian must always be kind, gracious, and wise in order to conquer evil by good.
John of Kronstadt
Brief Biography
IF we see a speck in a brother's eye, we must first see if there is a log in our own eye; perhaps that speck in our brother's eye is only a reflection of the beam in our own.
David Watson
An elder was asked by a certain soldier if God would forgive a sinner. And he said to him: "Tell me, beloved, if your cloak is torn, will you throw it away?" The soldier replied: "No. I will mend it and put it back on." The elder said to him: "If you take care of your cloak, will God not be merciful to His own image?"
Anonymous
A rattlesnake, if cornered, will sometimes become so angry it will bite itself. That is exactly what the harboring of hate and resentment against others is - a biting of oneself. We think that we are harming others in holding these spites and hates, but the deeper harm is to ourselves.
Eli E. Stanley
Biography
Unforgiveness is like a scratch on an old record. The song never goes on to the end, it keeps the beautiful music yet to be released unheard and all that resounds are the same old three or four chords again and again and again.
Katherine Walden
I Lift My Eyes Web Ministries
Forgiveness ought to be like a canceled note - torn in two and burned up, so that it can never be shown against one.
Henry Ward Beecher
Archives
I firmly believe a great many prayers are not answered because we are not willing to forgive someone.
Dwight L. Moody
Biography
Charles Williams has said of the Lord's Prayer, "No word in English carries a greater possibility of terror than the little word 'as' in that clause." What makes the 'as' so terrifying? The fact that Jesus plainly links our forgiven-ness by the Father with our forgiving-ness of fellow human beings. Jesus' next remark could not be more explicit: 'If you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.'
Philip Yancey
Biography
If I am content to heal a hurt slightly, saying "Peace, peace," where is no peace; if I forget the poignant word "Let love be without dissimulation" and blunt the edge of truth, speaking not right things but smooth things, then I know nothing of Calvary love.
Amy Carmichael
Biography and Bibliography
Those who say they will forgive but can't forget, simply bury the hatchet but leave the handle out for immediate use.
Dwight L Moody
Brief Biography
If I cast up a confessed, repented, and forsaken sin against another, and allow my remembrance of that sin to colour my thinking and feed my suspicions, then I know nothing of Calvary love.
Amy Carmichael
Biography And Bibliography
Such phrases as "I forgive you," "I release you from retribution for your deeds," are very powerful. They are words of your power. A tremendously powerful image is that you are anointed as a peacemaker. You have the power to bring peace into your world. That is enormous power. No longer the victim, you have reclaimed your agency (and sometimes the life of the offender).
Anonymous
Our wickedness shall not overpower the unspeakable goodness and mercy of God; our dullness shall not overpower God's wisdom, nor our infirmity God's omnipotence.
John of Kronstadt
Brief Biography
What then? Some one will say. We have been beguiled and are lost. Is there no salvation left? We have fallen: Is it not possible to rise again? We have been blinded: May we not recover our sight? We have become crippled: Can we never walk upright? In a word, we are dead: May we not rise again? He that woke Lazarus who was four days dead and already stank, shall He not, O man, much more easily raise thee who art alive? He who shed his precious Blood for us, shall Himself deliver us from sin. Let us not despair of ourselves, brethren; let us not abandon ourselves to a hopeless condition. For it is a fearful thing not to believe in a hope of repentance.
Cyril
But forgiveness is not an emotion... Forgiveness is an act of will, and the will can function regardless of the temperature of the heart.
Corrie Ten Boom
Corrie Ten Boom Museum
The rule is: we cannot really forgive ourselves unless we look at the failure in our past and call it by its right name.
Lewis B. Smedes
Obituary
Forgiveness to letting go of a bell rope. If you have ever seen a country church with a bell in the steeple, you will remember that to get the bell ringing you have to tug awhile. Once it has begun to ring, you merely maintain the momentum. As long as you keep pulling, the bell keeps ringing. Forgiveness is letting go of the rope. It is just that simple. But when you do so, the bell keeps ringing. Momentum is still at work.However, if you keep your hands off the rope, the bell will begin to slow and eventually stop.
Corrie Ten Boom
Corrie Ten Boom Museum
Forgiveness is the well from which we draw the water to wash others' feet.
D. Siler
Forgiveness is the fragrance that the flower leaves on the heel of the one that crushed it.
Anonymous
If we want other people to give us something that only God can give, we become a demon. We say, "Love me!" and before you know it we become violent and demanding and manipulative. It's so important that we keep forgiving one another - not once in a while, but every moment of life.
Henri J. M. Nouwen
Nouwen Centre
If someone has wronged you, and you get revenge, you will be pleased for a minute, If you forgive him, you will be happy forever.
Anonymous
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Forgiving & Reconciling: Bridges to Wholeness and Hope By Everett L. Worthington, Jr. Psychologist and counselor Everett Worthington, the leading Christian researcher on forgiveness, says that forgiving is a gift we give to others. When we offer forgiveness to others as an altruistic gift, it is more effective than when we forgive only for our own benefit in an effort to "get over" the hurt. True forgiveness is accomplished through a careful process of understanding both the offense and the offender, and taking active steps to forgiveness. In this insightful and practical book, Worthington provides a clinically proven strategy and a wealth of resources for moving toward forgiveness. |
I choose peace... I will live forgiven. I will forgive so that I may live.
Max Lucado
Upwords
There is no thirst of the soul so consuming as the desire for pardon. The sense of its bestowal is the starting-point of all goodness. It comes bringing with it, if not the freshness of innocence, yet a glow of inspiration that nerves feeble hands for hard tasks, a fire of hope that lights anew the old high ideal, so that it stands before the eye in clear relief, beckoning its to make it out, own. To be able to look into God's face, and know with the knowledge of faith that there is nothing between the soul and Him, is to experience the fullest peace the soul can know. Whatever else pardon may be, it is above all things admission into full fellowship with God.
Charles H. Brent
Brief Biography
Right now, this very second, this very moment that you spend reading these words is 'new'. How you choose to be a steward of that 'new slate' is up to you. My fervent prayer is that I never take for granted that gift of 'newness' and that I do all in his power granted to me to cherish the potential of 'all things new'. Relationships strained, mistakes made, I'll bring them to the cross so I can treasure the gift of newness he grants me every day. 1 Jn 1:9 NIV "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness."
Katherine Walden
I Lift My Eyes Web Ministries
Forgive, forget. Bear with the faults of others as you would have them bear with yours. Be patient and understanding. Life is too short to be vengeful or malicious.
Phillips Brooks
Biography
It takes a lot of emotional and psychological energy to keep a wound open, to keep a grudge alive. The longer I allow a wound to fester, the more bitterness, anger and self-pity poison my blood and eat at my heart.
Albert Haase
June 22, 2006
If slighted, slight the slight, and love the slighter.
Anonymous
What if thou hadst committed the sins of a thousand? What if thou hadst committed the sins of a million worlds? Christ's righteousness will cover, Christ's blood will cleanse thee from the guilt of all.
George Whitefield
The Essential George Whitefield
I had the choice to either grow up and find God in the situation or become bitter. I chose to find God. And I experienced freedom like I never knew before.
Heather Mercer - Christian Aid Worker who was imprisoned in Afghanistan, 2001.
The true Christian is like sandalwood, which imparts its fragrance to the axe which cuts it, without doing any harm in return.
Sadhu Sundar Singh
A Short Biography
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The Freedom and Power of Forgiveness By John MacArthur Do we have to forgive others unconditionally? Is it possible to forgive yourself? The answers from pop psychology are confusing at best, but MacArthur offers clarity---biblical clarity. By distinguishing between the world's way of handling forgiveness and God's way, MacArthur gives guidance that ultimately leads to inner peace and freedom from guilt. 256 pages, hardcover from Crossway Books. More Studies and Books on Forgiveness |
If a man wants God to hear his prayer quickly, then before he prays for anything else, even his own soul, when he stands and stretches out his hands toward God, he must pray with all his heart for his enemies. Through this action God will hear everything that he asks.
Abba Zeno
Forgiveness doesn't make the other person right, it makes you free.
Stormie Omartian
Website
Do not desire crosses, unless you have borne well those laid on you; it is an abuse to long after martyrdom while unable to bear an insult patiently.
Francis de Sales
Biography And Works
There are often bound to us, in the closest intimacy of social or family ties, natures hard and ungenial, with whom sympathy is impossible, and whose daily presence necessitates a constant conflict with an adverse influence. There are, too, enemies, - open or secret, - whose enmity we may feel yet cannot define. Our Lord, going before us in this hard way, showed us how we should walk. It will be appropriate to the solemn self-examination of the period of Lent to ask ourselves, Is there any false friend or covert enemy whom we must learn to tolerate, to forbear with, to pity and forgive? Can we in silent offices of love wash their (our enemies) feet as our master washed the feet of Judas? And, if we have no real enemies, are there any bound to us in the relations of life whose habits and ways are annoying and distasteful to us? Can we bear with them in love? Can we avoid harsh judgments, and harsh speech, and the making known to others our annoyance? The examination will probably teach us to feel the infinite distance between us and our divine Ideal, and change censoriousness of others into prayer for ourselves.
Jean Ingelow
Biography
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Choosing Forgiveness: Turning from Guilt, Bitterness, and Resentment Towards a Life of Wholeness and Peace By John Loren & Paula Sandford It may be natural to seek revenge, but the Sandfords demonstrate how God can provide you with supernatural grace to forgive and be forgiven! Discussing this antidote to sin and its healing effect on damaged relationships, they share biblical insights on this pivotal characteristic---and its necessity for the spiritual growth of believers. |
Heavenly Father: Teach us that love and forgiveness are essential bridges that span the chasms of resentment and bitterness. Also, teach us that feeling gratitude without expressing it is like wrapping a gift and not giving it.
Anonymous
In the midst of forgiving comes a celebration: we see the beauty of people who quite often are considered marginal by society. With forgiveness and celebration, community [fellowship] becomes the place where we call forth the gifts of other people, lift them up, and say, "You are the beloved daughter and the beloved son."
Henri J. M. Nouwen
Nouwen Centre
Forgiveness is the key which unlocks the door of resentment and the handcuffs of hatred. It breaks the chains of bitterness and the shackles of selfishness.
Corrie Ten Boom
Corrie Ten Boom Museum
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