Love Forgives

This is week 5 of our "Love Out Loud" Youth Bible Study. This week's focus was "Love Forgives". Forgiveness is such a wonderful gift to recieve, but such a hard gift to give...but, is one of the truest forms of love.

When you have done something bad - I mean REALLY bad - to someone...said something ugly, did something to purposefully hurt them, disobeyed, got caught in a lie...and they forgive you (with no strings attached), how do you feel? Like a huge weight has been lifted off your shoulders, right?!?

Jesus showed us the ultimate gift of forgiveness by dying on the cross for us - He had done NOTHING wrong, but was sacrificed for all the wrong we have done and will continue to do. He had no resentment, no plans of revenge, no thoughts of how we would pay Him back...just abounding love to forgive us of all our sins. He prayed for us while He was being tortured for our sins. That's hard for my mind to wrap around sometimes! And, guess what? WE are supposed to love AND forgive others in the same way! Those that hurt our feelings, that have wronged us or our families, have said words that pierce our hearts...we love them, pray for them, and forgive them. WOW!!!!

Brad said something tonight that stuck in my mind - 'usually forgiving someone means forgiving them repeatedly'. When someone has really hurt us, and we supposedly forgave them...the next time you see them, what do you think about?? Yep - that thing they did or said (even though you already "forgave"). Unfortunately, forgiving doesn't mean forgetting. I looked up the meaning of forgiveness, and Webster defines it as "to cease to feel resentment against; to cancel an indebtedness or liability of". So, forgiving someone means forgiving them until you no longer have resentment - I don't know about you, but it takes me a lllloooooonnnnnngggggg time to get over stuff (just ask Brad!!!!)

So, the next time you're in a really tough situation where someone has hurt you to the core, show them the love of Christ - FORGIVE. That's LOVING OUT LOUD!