Turning the Other Cheek.

Something that I've been thinking a lot about lately is the concept of forgiveness. This is something I'm struggling with in my thoughts right now as a write this. I feel like our wold is teaching us to take whatever's ours and to always even the score with someone that wrongs us. As Christians, we can easily buy in to this mentality. Heck, we can even convince ourselves that we have forgiven someone but we really haven't. Just because you aren't going to retaliate doesn't mean you have forgiven the person.

Forgiveness is an internal thing. It's something in your heart. It means burying the hatchet and loving the person. Why as Christians are we supposed to do this? In Matthew 18, "Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, 'Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me? Up to seven times?'

Jesus answered, 'I tell you, not seven times, but seventy times seven times." Jesus calls us Christians to forgive others, no matter how hard it may be. If Jesus tells us to do that, that's good enough for me, and that is something I want to follow. 

Another reason why forgiveness is so vital is because Jesus did it himself. Jesus is the author of salvation, and because of his forgiveness, we can have eternal life. Jesus is a model for us to try to follow. Obviously we can't be perfect but we need to try our best to live like Jesus. When Jesus was on the earth he was spit on, mocked, beaten, bruised and crucified. He did all that and turned the other cheek. He showed that we can forgive.

It can be so easy to carry a grudge. So how can we forgive? We need to ask the Lord for forgiveness. Because quite honestly I don't know if it is possible to forgive someone on our own doing. We need to ask the Lord to give us his vision and to be able to love others, even those that screw us over and make us miserable.

I also felt a little convicted of this when I saw the film 42, which I reviewed last week. In the film, Jackie Robinson has to turn the other cheek when he joins the MLB. He had to hold back and not fight back when people made fun of him for his race. Whether or not he was actually forgiving people I'm not sure. But this got me thinking more about forgiveness.

I would also like to add that right now, I am just journaling this stuff. It's something that is on my mind this second. Over the past week, I have faced many trials. I won't go in to details of those trials as I don't want to complain and bad-mouth people over the internet. However all I can say is right now I'm struggling. Something very bad happened to me today and I've been having a lot of trouble. So I guess this post is coming from a place of me crying out to God and be able to forgive people. Forgiveness isn't easy, and it can hurt. This is also a very real blog post as I am really opening up my heart and spilling out how I'm feeling.

I could use prayer with what is going on. I don't know how much I have to to add to this, but I was just posting this as an observation and something I really need to improve on my life and I think we all can improve on. Please be praying for me for the conflict that's been ongoing in my life and that I will be forgiving. 

As always, thank you for reading. This was one of my shorter posts and I will have more stuff for you guys tomorrow, but I am extremely grateful for those that read this. Hope you are doing well!