The Pondify Podcast

Nigel Warner: . That's I suspect that something you're trying to point towards and correct me if I'm wrong, because I don't want to put words into your mouth at all, but it is a matter of. Our forgiving of other people is our intention. Yes. It doesn't matter what they do or have done. Yeah. It's a choice on our behalf.
Yes. I hate this. He's turning into confessions of Nigel. I apologize for this. When I was 14, my dad died. My dad didn't die on purpose. He was a man of God. He was a good man. And I still had to forgive him. because he left me. It wasn't his fault. In so many ways, there is no reason that you can [00:30:00] think of that he needed forgiving, but I needed to forgive him.
I don't forgive just because the other person needs me to forgive. I forgive because I need to forgive. Because when I forgive, it's an overflow of God's heart and an understanding that he's forgiven me. Yeah. Is that fair? I wasn't putting words
Ruth Kirkland: in your mouth. That is absolutely perfect, Nigel. I couldn't have said it better myself.
Matt Squirrell: And the other question is what if the person that's hurt you doesn't think they do need to be forgiven for anything?
Ollie: This one's a bit tricky, I think, because a lot of Jesus teaching in scripture Is actually framed in the context of somebody comes to you and asks for forgiveness. What do you do next? But I think you can apply a lot of what he said to this circumstance as well and say I don't forgive because the person has asked me nicely.
I don't forgive because of how Apologetic they seem when they come to ask [00:31:00] me. I don't forgive because they really want a relationship restored I forgive because god has forgiven me. That's the That is the ultimate driver and that is there regardless of whether the person Is contrite regardless of whether the person recognizes even that they've hurt me I think it can be helpful in lots and lots of circumstances to actually open a conversation with somebody and say Maybe you don't realize what you did.
There was really painful and really hurtful to me. And in terms of restoring a relationship that can be really valuable I think but ultimately our driving motivation for forgiveness is not somebody else's apology it's the forgiveness that we receive from the father.
Nigel Warner: I think it's also worth saying that Another person can benefit from our forgiveness if they accept forgiveness If they accept that they did something that required forgiveness, they benefit, they're blessed by that because relationship is restored and when relationships are restored, good things happen.
I think it's worth pointing that out.
Matt Squirrell: But [00:32:00] the other thing is though that when someone has. Received that forgiveness. What if it just makes no difference? What if they just continue To sin against us. What do we do then?
Ruth Kirkland: It probably depends on what the sin is as well. If they're Like Olly said, if it's something where you're being hurt or emotionally abused or whatever, then I guess you forgive, but you don't put yourself back in that situation,
Nigel Warner: that's good, that's really good.
Ruth Kirkland: Yeah, if somebody comes round your house and steals your stuff, you don't necessarily invite them back but you can forgive them and maintain the relationship in other ways. I
Nigel Warner: forgive you, here's a key. Ha! I think that's the whole thing about it doesn't make what they do is right, and this is an excuse what they do.
I can think of an example of my continued forgiveness, which I may need to be edited out, depends on how it goes. I'm a father of five children, and my children, despite how it looks from the outside, are far from perfect. [00:33:00] And they keep doing stuff for which I have to forgive them. Now, I love them and I don't take a moment to forgive them most of the time.
It's got harder as they've got older. And when they start to do things intentionally, that makes it really difficult. Now I'm sharing this in the hope that somebody is listening to this and thinking, Oh yeah, I'm not. And not to say Nigel is just a rat bag because I am, but I'm not. But I find it really hard to forgive my children time and again, especially when they know something drives me up the wall.
I'm sure no one else here has had that issue. I
Matt Squirrell: suppose that's me and my habitual sin with God. That's the way that, I'm just pleased that he isn't God the ratbag.
Nigel Warner: Okay, what if the person I need to forgive is me? Now I know you're all perfect. [00:34:00] But I have done some really stupid things in my life. And the results of those things haven't always been great. And I've had to learn to live with that and forgive myself for being such an idiot. What, how do we do that?
Ollie: We've touched on this a little bit in the sense that we said that I think all of us agreed that there have been occasions where we've walked into church on a Sunday morning and we're just not quite sure of where we stand before God.
And I think that kind of I know I've done something stupid Firstly do I am I in a position to genuinely accept that jesus has forgiven me? And then if he forgives me am I in a position to forgive me as well? And all of the other things that we've talked about this evening It's a process, right?
And I think there are some things that we might do and think immediately afterwards. Oh, man That was stupid, but it's not that big a deal and we get over it pretty quickly and then there are other things that we Might do that. We live with the consequences of for some [00:35:00] time and to forgive yourself for those things is It can be hard and it's a long we were talking earlier about the kind of, the way that, that living with unforgiveness twists you up and messes you up and I think all of this is to do with guilt really.
So once you have, once you invite guilt in, either holding someone else guilty for something they've done for you or holding yourself guilty for something you've done it colors everything that you then see. So the smallest thing that you then do. Gets added on to the pile of the guilt that's already there and the smallest thing that anybody else does against you gets added on to that And that kind of that black word guilt that's still there is Crippling toxic and I think it's yeah, it's not easy to get rid of it and it's not easy to root out Why is this thing still here?
If I believe with part of me that Jesus has forgiven me and therefore that I should be forgiven myself But then there's other this other little [00:36:00] Bit of me that just isn't quite so sure. And that is a process of coming back to Jesus, coming back to the Gospel, looking again at what he's done.
Ruth Kirkland: I think the thing also that I love about God's forgiveness is that it enables you to be more you because you know that you're already sinful and you're capable of wrong things. And you can just say, that's okay, God, because I know that you've forgiven me. So that has hugely helped me on my parenting journey, because I'm not the perfect parent by any means.
And there were times where I've sat with non Christian friends and I've realized that actually I'm quite gracious to myself, because I know that God forgives me and has a lot of grace for me in my journey as a parent, as I go back to him and ask him for help and take on the next step.
Whereas I find that a lot of these other friends, they do really struggle to forgive themselves or they really try to be perfect parents and [00:37:00] it puts on an awful lot of pressure. Whereas I can admit that I get it wrong all the time, but that God loves me still and that he's for me and that he's helping me.
And that has been like, I find that incredible. Like God's forgiveness in that way enables me to be me and be vulnerable with people.
Matt Squirrell: Just to help you, Ruth when Esther and I were going through the adoption process and we went on our parenting courses, we were told that to be considered a good parent, you only have to get it right one third of the time.
Now, I'm pretty sure you probably get it a lot more than that. So there's a bit of social worker
Ruth Kirkland: comfort for you as well. Thank you,
Nigel Warner: Matt. But it does raise a question. Just to follow on from that, you talked a little bit earlier, Ruth, about, okay, sometimes God's done supernatural stuff to deal with the unforgiveness.
The times when God doesn't do that supernatural stuff, how do the people sitting here work through, work themselves through that to come to a point before God when they can forgive?
Ruth Kirkland: For me, it's been really slowly. It's been [00:38:00] starting by saying, please God help me want to forgive. So I know I saying it's not a good place to be where you don't want to forgive, you have to.
So it's literally been saying, God, would you just give me the desire to forgive? And then. Asking that of God spending time with Jesus, and then slowly that desire has come, and then when I have felt that, I'm at that place where God is helping me it's like making a choice, making a decision that I want to forgive, but that If I'm hurt again or I see that person and they haven't reacted in a right way, it's like taking it back to God and taking the pain back to God and saying, I might need to cry this through, I might need to pray this through with a friend, like God free me filling myself with Jesus, with Bible verses with all that is good with the wisdom of people so that I can then make the next step.
It's like peeling back layer after layer and then I guess I've come to a point where seeing that person [00:39:00] like sometimes I felt like a physical pain and it's like seeing that person hasn't caused that pain anymore or I have been able to want to. Speak to them or want to start a relationship with them.
It's like also choosing to bless them or speak well of them. So it's to act as if I have forgiven and to almost allow God to bring the feelings afterwards. I know there's a whole jumble there, but yeah,
Nigel Warner: it's a very helpful jumble.
Ruth Kirkland: Thank you. But it's taken me time.
Ollie: I think guilt loves secrecy and loves privacy and often this area of how do I forgive myself, these are the things we least want to talk to other people about.
And maybe they're the things that it's most powerful to talk to other people about. I think you mentioned there about sometimes... I just need to get somebody that I really trust and I just need to tell them i'm really struggling with this I remember an occasion quite a few years ago now actually and had a conversation with a guy after church I don't really know how it came about because I didn't really know this fellow that well, [00:40:00] but there was something in me There was some guilt in me and I started talking to him about it And I don't know why it was like the floodgates had opened and I just told him everything And at the end of it, he said, Oh man you've got it bad, haven't you?
And I looked at him and said, yeah, I have. It's really, I feel really guilty about this. And he said no. I don't mean your sin is bad. What you've got bad is this sense of guilt in you. You need to know the forgiveness of Jesus. And at that, like it was instantaneous that it broke. And he, all he had done in that moment was to say, look at Jesus, that was all he'd done.
But the fact that it was shared, the guilt was exposed there was something really therapeutic and healing about that. And I'm sure God was in that moment and he was somebody who had a prophetic gift and I'm sure he was speaking with the authority of God at that point but actually I think the sharing of it was really powerful as well.
And. We've got to be willing to talk to each other about this stuff safely, with people that we trust, but it's massive. Is it [00:41:00] just me,
Matt Squirrell: or does anyone else here find that they have to re forgive those who they've walked through the process of forgiveness?
Ruth Kirkland: No, it's not just you, Matt. I've had times where I've been at the front and I have prayed through with someone and felt yes!
That's done and then maybe a week after that person has done something else and then I've been like oh gosh I don't think I've forgiven them yet and I've had to go back and so no it's not just you.
Matt Squirrell: I don't mean when people have done things again, I mean for the same thing. So I have a particular situation where I find that I go through this process of forgiveness.
I I pray for them. I, the way that I forgive is I, it's like I picture someone on a boat and and I push them out into the forgiveness. The Ocean of God's Forgiveness. And I can't remember the name of the lady. Do you know we, there was a lady who came to church.
I [00:42:00] remember. A few years ago, and she told, she gave this testimony of I was like, wow. How could she forgive that person for what they did? And then she walked through this process of putting them in that boat in your mind. And pushing them out onto, to God's Ocean of Forgiveness. And you have to say.
What they've done, first of all, name it and claim it, so to speak, and then say, you know what, I choose to no longer want to get you back. I choose to hand that over to God. But I find myself maybe once a year, once every two years, having to go through that process again with that particular person. The freedom comes.
But then, I don't know, it's like the some, something happens and the pain brings itself up again. Once again, is that just me? You're looking very strangely at me. Oh.
Ruth Kirkland: I'm not sure I've experienced that.
Nigel Warner: It's not just you. There is a tool that's really helpful in this and I've found really helpful.
Because I am a, [00:43:00] I'm a processor and I think things through from 47 directions all the time, which is just a nightmare when you've got stuff that you've got to get rid of. But. The freedom in Christ course has this amazing, I'm not going to quote it exactly, but this amazing prayer where it says effectively, I choose to forgive that person.
I choose not to hold on to anything, even if I have a right to hold on to it and I give them to God and I pray the best for them. And that is whilst it. It would be really lovely when I pray that if there was a choir of angels and the sound of clarion bells to say it's happened It's an ongoing thing It takes time And particularly when a hurt is so deep that you just you can't deal with it all at once It's just bit by bit Doing that time and again It can begin to feel even a little false, but actually it's not.
It's really [00:44:00] important to speak out those words. And as you said earlier, I need to just correct you. You said name it and claim it when it came to the thing they've done. Name it and don't claim it. Don't claim it. Just name it. That's fine because we don't want to hold on to it. But absolutely. It's the process.
Ollie: I think there are amazing stories. And every shed a couple already of occasions where God breaks in miraculously, incredibly, and there is a kind of sh like a, like an earthquake shift in our ability to forgive. And I think that's massive. So much of the Christian walk is about a day by day, step by step.
Transformation it's not I came to faith. I was immediately the perfect saintly form and everything that I did was perfect and everything that I didn't do was all the stuff that I shouldn't do all of what happens it through our Christian walk is that God is so merciful and so gracious with us.
He knows. How long it takes us to get our head around [00:45:00] stuff. And there is a process and he is incredibly patient with us. And I don't really see why forgiveness should be any different from the rest of the Christian walk, which is a process. And so it will be step by step. And there are occasions where.
You think you've forgiven so well, let me rephrase that there are occasions where I think i've forgiven someone And actually feel pretty pleased with myself for forgiving them and then it comes back up and I think So did I forgive them or did I not and in some ways I think you get too stuck in worrying about that just all right, so Resentment has reappeared.
I don't know where it's come from I don't know what else in my week has led to me resenting that person again but it was the right thing to do to forgive them it's the right thing to do to forgive them and that is a process of Spotting bitterness spotting resentment spotting guilt and rooting it out and saying i'm not having it.
I want to deal with that. And it's ongoing and probably lifelong.
Ruth Kirkland: I I went, that's really [00:46:00] good at Olly. Sorry, I don't want to just quickly change the subject or go on to my own thing. But I went on a really interesting children's SOZO course once, and a woman there was talking about forgiveness and she was talking about how she was training her children to grow up.
As good forgivers, and what she said was every evening they would sit around a bin and they would write down the names on pieces of paper of people who had hurt them that day. And then they would screw them up and put them in the bin. And she basically said that because carrying unforgiveness causes so much harm.
Like I think some people even say it can make you ill, can't it? Like stress on your body or depression or whatever. What she was doing was trying to enable them to almost get into a habit of not storing anything or keeping anything on them, but literally day by day, forgiving people who would hurt them.
And I did think, wow, that is a really. [00:47:00] Good way of, dealing with that, of growing your children in that and explaining how important it is to forgive. I think it's
Nigel Warner: really important to say that, actually, I know that people who are involved in the healing ministry find that stomach problems can often come from an unforgiveness, that there are symptoms, and I know doctors have found there are symptoms from people who have particularly held on to stuff and have got that.
It is worth noting that people can suffer for unforgiveness. Yeah.
Ruth Kirkland: Funny enough, Matt, she talked about letting go of a balloon. Pushing your boat out into the sea, maybe, isn't that strange?
Ollie: We've said... We have some understanding of why we're called to forgive we have some understanding of the fact that it's good for us to do that it's a reflection of what God's done for us, and yeah, it's hard, and yet sometimes we try and we're not very good at it, or at least we're not very successful, and after trying for a little while, oh, that resentment creeps [00:48:00] up and it struck me that we're not the first people to feel these kind of frustrations This is from Romans seven chapter 15.
I just, I love the frustration in this because it's I experienced this frustration that Paul says, I don't understand what I do for what I wanna do, I don't do, but what I hate I do, and I do what I don't want to do. And if I do what I don't want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it's no longer myself who do it, but it's the sin living in me.
And I think that's just such a helpful way of considering the position that we can find ourselves in where we have been Saved by Jesus, we're following him, and yet, we still find ourselves struggling with the things that, that we feel like, Oh, Christians shouldn't be struggling with these things. And that kind of frustration of, Oh, why am I finding it so hard to forgive?
I know how much he's forgiven of me. Why am I finding it so hard to forgive [00:49:00] myself or to forgive others? I know what I want to do, but I seem to be doing the exact opposite of that. And that can lead us, I think, quite easily to a point where we look at ourselves and make that about. Who we are in our identity of am I really a Christian at all because I can't forgive and forgiving is a thing that Christians do And that becomes very personal very quickly and what Paul does in that passage which is brilliant is to say as a completely saved Saint in the kingdom He looks at me and he sees righteousness And when I do these things that I don't want to do anymore or don't do the very things that I do want to do That's not actually the redeemed me doing that anymore.
That's sin that's left in this world that is doing that. And I think when we start to separate those things that we do that are not of God from our identity, then we start to get some understanding of the fact that although this stuff is commanded of us, [00:50:00] it's not that the times that we try to forgive and find it hard are not things that are gonna separate us from the love of God.
And we need to understand that because of the frustrations that we've been talking about, it can be really hard to forgive people. And when that sin come, when that kind of guilt and bitterness creeps back up and rears its head again, it can be easy to say, oh man, why is this keeping on happening to me?
Where's this and that sense of frustration. We need to know how to deal with that. We need to know how to handle that frustration of, I've, I'm trying to do the stuff Jesus told me to do. It's really hard and I keep messing it up.
Nigel Warner: I think that's really good. I think I find that passage really interesting because it's one of the most human passages that Paul writes and he, Paul's not the only one. I love the fact that Peter is a recurring idiot. He's an amazing man, but he's a recurring idiot. So at the beginning, he [00:51:00] tells Jesus to go away because he's an impulsive man.
And he tells him to go away. Then he tells Jesus not to do stuff. Then he denies Jesus. Then he doesn't go to dinner at Cornelius, his house, unless God tells him, then Paul tells him off and on time and time again in the gospels and in the acts of the apostles, Peter being. And it's really easy for us to look at the saints in the Bible and think, Oh, they were perfect.
They are, they had it all sorted out. No, we are really like them because we haven't got it completely sorted out either. And I think Paul talks in another place, but I just want more than anything for you to comprehend how big and deep and wide and amazing God's love is for you. And it's that comprehension of the truth.
Of the fullness and the absolute all encompassing nature of the love of God and the forgiveness of God that we spend our whole lives [00:52:00] coming to terms with and I find that incredibly freeing because I don't have to know the answer and I really don't have to have it perfectly down and I am far more forgiven, far more understanding of my forgiveness than I was before.
10 years ago, 10 minutes ago, perhaps, because we've been talking so much, but I will be better in 10 years time and one day I will stand before my Lord And I will understand truly Who he is What it means and I just I can't comprehend it but it's really interesting
Ollie: The bible promises that When all of this is done Jesus is going to present us before the Father and he's going to present us as blameless. And I look at my life now and I think, I don't get it yet. And there is a real [00:53:00] beauty in knowing that one day I'm going to have a full grasp of the gospel because I'm going to know what it feels like to be presented blameless.
Nigel Warner: I want to bring it back, if it's okay, to that passage which says, if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your Heavenly Father will forgive you, but if you don't, your Heavenly Father won't forgive you. I want to re ask that question, because I know that was one of the most important questions for people after the sermon, was, if I haven't forgiven, does that mean I'm not a Christian?
And I think we need to re, we need to emphasize first of all, no, it doesn't mean you're not a Christian. What it means is you haven't understood the fullness of God's forgiveness yet. Because when we understand God's forgiveness, we can at least decide to choose to try and forgive even if we can't forgive fully.
Matt Squirrell: I love what Ruth said earlier about Actually asking God to help us to forgive He's so good at giving gifts Like he's given us the gift [00:54:00] of salvation He's given us the gift of faith And we can ask him to help us to forgive others like What an amazing god like It just He just gives so many good gifts.
And so yeah, I'm thankful that actually he allows me to give that gift of forgiveness to others as well. We're going on this process of sanctification. And so if we're going to look more and more like Jesus, I suppose we might as well start somewhere.
Ruth Kirkland: I'm just thinking, I'm sorry, my mind just wondered, Matt, why you were saying that.
it's
Matt Squirrell: okay.
Ruth Kirkland: But I know you love me, it's okay. But I was just thinking about Corrie Ten Boom and how she tells the story of how she talked about forgiveness to lots of people around the world. And then she was, I can't remember if she was in Germany or in a certain place and one of the former guards from the what was [00:55:00] it?
The yeah, prisoner of war camp that was it Ravensbrück? I can't remember where she was, but came up to her and basically said, I've asked, I've become a Christian and I've asked God if one of my former inmates would forgive me. And she particularly remembered him. He'd been quite cruel, and she and her sister, who had since died there, had to parade in front of him naked, and she just remembered all the horrors of war, and she said he held out his hand to her, and she couldn't take it.
And inside she was just like, Oh God, I can't forgive him. And then she says something like, but Jesus can. And she said, as she went to take his hand, she just felt the love of God surge through her arm. And she was able to take his hand and say, like my brother of course I forgive you.
And I just think that's incredible. And we're so blessed with, we. just don't know how amazing it is sometimes to have a god who has these limitless resources [00:56:00] that he can give to us in times of need. I
Nigel Warner: think that's a really good book recommendation if nothing else. I don't know whether anyone here has read it but The Hiding Place by Corrie Ten Boom which is quite an old book now.
Corrie Ten Boom was a holocaust survivor and it was the concentration camp at Ravensbrook but That book is just wonderful read and it's so challenging to read it and to read about somebody who genuinely has every reason not to forgive someone in many ways. But it's just such a good story.
Really good. Really good.
Is there anything anyone wants to add? Did you want to add anything?
Ollie: I think just to say that we've said it a number of times this evening that forgiveness is a process and it's not done. And so it's not necessarily done immediately. And so the question that might be asked him in response to that passage is, okay, so I haven't forgiven. Therefore, [00:57:00] God can't forgive me.
What is that? What does that look like? And I think we, we need to recognize that our transformation as believers into his likeness is a step by step gradual process and being a Christian is about being a disciple. It's about following after him and it's a journey and we, wherever you are on that journey, if Jesus is your Lord, if you're following him, That means that you're in his kingdom and I think that's a really important distinction to make is to say if I'm not following him, if I'm not on a journey towards forgiveness, then maybe I need to examine my heart and say, have I accepted him as lords?
But if I'm on that journey wherever I am, if I'm at the point where I'm saying, I know I need to do this but I can't and I don't want to. I'm still going in the right direction at that point. And just one other thing is a lot of what we've been saying this evening. It's some kind of practical suggestions, I suppose this might help you to forgive, but ultimately forgiveness is God's business and the forgiveness that, that we received was completely [00:58:00] God's doing and I believe that a lot of the forgiveness that we can offer to other people is no more than overflow of his forgiveness in us that kind of we act more like a pathway for his forgiveness out and we're active in that and we're busy in that.
But this is an area that is so much more effective with if we're praying and if we're recognizing that it's god's doing
Nigel Warner: I just want to summarize. So this is the summary. Actually, this is our summary Of what Ali said in his sermon and what was going on. I think it's worth mentioning forgiveness in one's heart, recognizes first the offense is real to us. Second, we look to God for strength, love, and mercy. Our own strength is often not enough.
Third, forgiveness releases the offender from our bitterness and resentment and us. Fourth, God understands our grief and is available as a source of healing. Five, [00:59:00] reconciliation of a relationship, if appropriate, takes time. Six, it is okay, if possible, to remove ourselves from further harm's way. And seven, forgetting may not be immediately possible, if it ever is.
I think it's worth saying that as Oli's just said, it's a process and God is on that. Because it's God's business to forgive and if you're listening to this and you're feeling this stuff speaking to you I can't say again enough find someone you trust who loves you who has faith to talk to and to pray with because One of the things that the Bible says is what's in darkness needs to come out into the light and very often for forgiveness That's something that needs to happen Matt, you're gonna close.
Matt Squirrell: Yeah, thank you so much to Ollie and to Ruth for sharing your wisdom with us. We're really grateful. And also thank you to you, Nigel, as well for telling [01:00:00] us all about you. And no one better call him Ratbag. Otherwise we'll be cross with them.