I wish to thank the writer of this devotional for sharing their heart so honestly.
But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
Romans 5: 8
Near the end of last year, I read a devotional which really spoke to me. The title was: Forgive, and set yourself free.
I’ve often not understood why some people choose not to forgive someone who has wronged them, and although I didn’t openly say I wasn’t going to forgive someone who hurt me, I hung on to some unforgiveness for many years.
Several years ago, I went to stay with my Aunt and Uncle for a few days. I’d stayed with them a few times over the years, and had many happy memories going back to my early childhood of fun times spent with them. On this particular occasion, my uncle told me how much more confident I’d become. He had always been someone who had believed in me, so I was pleased to receive his compliment. However, one day during that visit, when he and I were alone in the house, he tried to kiss me. I was terrified! He is a big man and I had no idea how to stop him, or of how far he would try to take things. I think I managed to squeak out some angry sounding words through my fear, and he stopped. This was not my first experience of an older man trying to get closer to me than I wanted, and my uncle knew of my previous experiences and had seemed angry that such a thing should have happened to me. This made his attempt to kiss me even more difficult to deal with.
I did my best not to be alone with him again during that visit, but I also didn’t want my Aunt to know what had happened, as I didn’t want to hurt her, and also feared she would reject me and I would lose that part of my family.
When I returned home, I told a few people close to me what had happened. I remember making them promise they wouldn’t try to do or say anything about it. I didn’t want to stay angry with my uncle, and when I became a Christian, I knew I should forgive him. I even thought I had.
Years went by, family gatherings came and went. I occasionally went to them, but only if I thought I could avoid him. I started missing opportunities to meet my aunt, in case he was with her. I saw all this as just keeping myself safe. I truly believed I’d forgiven him. I didn’t have any desire for revenge in any way, so surely I wasn’t holding anything against him.
Then I read the devotional and knew I was holding on to unforgiveness. I was missing out on a relationship with my aunt and other members of the family. I didn’t have any rite to continue to avoid this man. It wasn’t a Christ-like thing to do. I was treating my uncle unfairly, and I was allowing hardness to grow inside me. Jesus has already forgiven my sins, so why could I not forgive my uncle?
When I was a child, I made a huge snowball with my granddad. We compacted it, then rolled it some more to make it bigger, then abandoned it on the doorstep as I’d got quite attached to that big white ball. The snow around it melted, but my lovely snowball I wanted to keep turned to ice. That solid ball of ice stayed around for weeks, until my mum smashed it up.
so how did I shatter the sphere of hardness inside of me? It started with a lot of prayer. I knew I couldn’t do it on my own. Jesus was the only one who could help me shatter my snowball I’d been carrying around so long. Let me tell you, a ball of ice is heavy when it’s compacted.
I knew I had to tell my uncle I had forgiven him. This was not going to be easy. How would I find the opportunity after so many years of avoiding him? But God is good. On three occasions I was supposed to meet my Aunt and uncle, but three times something happened to prevent the meeting. I found myself longing to see them and be able to tell my uncle I’d forgiven him. This wasn’t just something I wanted to tick off my to do list, I was desperate for the chance to forgive him.
The day finally arrived. I met them in a café. I’d been praying for an opportunity to speak to my uncle, so when my aunt left the table for a few minutes, I asked the Lord for the right words, then turned to my uncle and said, “I’ll take this opportunity to tell you that I forgive you.” I didn’t feel afraid at all and my voice even sounded confident to me, so I know The Holy Spirit was guiding me. I didn’t know what his response would be. Would he have forgotten what he did? Would he make out he didn’t know what I was talking about, or try to deny it? He did none of those. He was obviously shocked, then he thanked me. There was no time, nor no need to discuss it further. It has been laid to rest in the past. I could never have done it on my own, but Jesus gently guided me every step of the way.
Since then, I’ve been able to speak to my Aunt and uncle on the phone, and also tell them more about my relationship with Jesus. This could not have happened if I hadn’t walked through the process of forgiveness. I feel so much lighter now I’m not carrying around that ball of ice inside me. That snowball has been shattered and the slivers of ice allowed to melt away.
Icy snowballs come in many forms, but God is bigger than all of them and he is strong enough to shatter the hardest ice ball and melt away the slivers. We need to ask him to reveal our snowballs to us, then we need to ask his guidance on how to shatter each of them. If they are left inside us, they can only get bigger.