What Forgiveness Looks Like

A follow up to Sunday's message on forgiveness... Scripture tells us to pray, "forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors"..

What does that look like to fully forgive? How do we know when we have truly forgiven? What does forgiveness look like? The answer will vary depending on the person involved & what they did to you. Here are a few helpful guidelines (shared from Ray Pritchard of Keep Believing Ministries):

When you have forgiven someone you: 

1. Face what they did & forgive them anyway.

2. Don’t keep bringing it up to them.

3. Don’t talk about it to others.

4. Show mercy instead of judgment.

5. Refuse to speak evil of others.

6. Choose not to dwell on it.

7. Pray for them.

8. Ask God to bless them.

9. Do not rejoice at their calamities.

10. Help them when you can.

In giving this list, I do not mean to imply that we must do all ten things every time before we can say we have truly forgiven another person. The presence or absence of repentance plays a critical role as well. We would do well to take this list & dwell on it, think about it, pray over it, & ask ourselves some hard questions.