We all live under different circumstances. So each individual faces different hardships of his own. However, the root of the pain is all the same, which is ‘rejection and contempt’. Whatever you are, if you are not accepted as you are, or if you are despised and humiliated, it leaves a huge scar in your heart. If the other party who hurts you is an intimate person in your life, the scar gets bigger and deeper. Therefore people try hard to make themselves not be rejected by others. Since all human beings have the desire to be loved, the fear of rejection is also tremendous.
Many people confess that they are not miserable because they are alone. Rather, they feel terrible because of the reason they are alone. People try to cover themselves up with something nice, so as not to be rejected. That kind of life seems like a show. They laugh outside, yet their inner person is crying with fear. One day God will approach this person and tell him how much he is loved. How will he react towards that word? He might be thankful when he hears this.
But something is not quite right. He can serve God through religious practices, but he cannot have an intimate relationship with God, sharing and exchanging feelings. So he feels uncomfortable deep inside of his heart.
Until our wounded inner self is healed, we simply worship and serve God as a religious practice. They are wandering around the church, but they never truly ‘love’ God. However, God healed us and made us into a new creature, not to worship him religiously because of fear. Instead, he wanted to have us as his loving children, or he wanted to have an intimate love relationship similar to a husband and a wife. That is God’s will, and just before Jesus died on the cross, he even prayed for us to have that kind of relationships with God in his last prayer.
John 17:21 that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.
This kind of close relationship does not mean only the change of legal status of believers. It requires a real transformation of feelings toward God in our hearts.
How can God heal the wounded emotions of human beings? How does he teach a loveless person what love is? How can he teach someone to trust God who has never been able to trust anyone before, and even trust other people? How can God soften one’s heart and give willingness to forgive others? We only can find an answer when we truly understand the meaning of Jesus’ incarnation.
** Why has Jesus come to this world?
first: He came to reconcile man(dead in transgressions) and God.
Ephesians2:1-5
As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath. But because of his great love for u, God who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions-it is by grace you have been saved.
Second: He came to experience all human conditions
He came as a real human with true humanity; a weak and hurtful nature needs comfort and consolations. He lived among us in exactly same circumstance as we do.
Hebrew4:15
For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are-yet was without sin.
Third: Jesus’ Character and the environment in which he lived
1) Birth –filthy stable
2) His family background
Mark 6:3
Isn’t this the carpenter? Isn’t this Mary’s son and the brother of James, Joseph, Judas and Simon? Aren’t his sisters here with us? And they took offense at him.
At that time, they gave a person’s name according to the father’s name. Since he was born by the virgin mother (Mary), people contemptuously called him ‘carpenter, son of Mary’ and they offended him.
3)Jesus in Isaiah 53
Isaiah 53:2-4
He grew up before him like a tender shoot, and like a root out of dry ground. He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by man, a man of sorrow, and familiar with suffering. Like one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows. Yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted.
Tender shoot: lack of self defense ability. It can be crushed easily in this world. Jesus came not as a powerful person, but as a weak and poor person just like one of us, and lived amongst us.
Dry ground: He lived in an environment like a wilderness, without any help. Jesus is the king of kings, yet he didn’t have any privileges.
Despised: He could be a friend with people who are suffering because he was despised and rejected, without beauty or majesty.
knows our sorrows :
Psalm22:6 But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by men and despised by the people.
He humbled himself to this low experience of human sufferings to become a perfect mediator and healer.
Hebrew2:17-18
For this reason he had to be made like his brothers in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that he might make atonement for the sins of the people. Because he himself suffered when he was tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.
6.Why must we forgive?
1) Unless you forgive others, you won’t experience God’s forgiveness.
2) If you are in despair due to an unforgiving heart, your mind cannot concentrate on Jesus. Instead, your mind will often be occupied by unpleasant behavior and attitudes toward others. Your heart gets hardened, and wounded emotions will become rooted deeply in your inner self.
3) If you do not forgive a person, your mind will be captivated by thoughts about that person. You will end up taking after the person, and hate two people instead of one. (Yourself and the person you didn’t forgive)
4) If you do not forgive, you cannot break the vicious cycle of sins. Have you ever noticed you are behaving exactly what you hated most from your parents towards your own children? Without being aware, you are copying what you didn’t want to imitate.
5) An unforgiving heart damages relationships with God, destroying God’s church.
6) When the wounds in your hearts worsen, you cannot continue to develop the gift of Holy Spirit
7) You cannot bear fruits of the Holy Spirit or enjoy abundant life.
7. Why is it so difficult to forgive?
1) When you are envious and jealous to the person, forgiving is not easy.
2) When you commit the same kind of sins, a sense of condemnation makes it even harder to forgive.
3) Due to the lack of knowledge of God’s character and promise,
you try to become a judge yourself and this kind of attitude hinders forgiveness.
4) When you do not truly understand God’s forgiveness, it is hard to forgive others.
5) It makes it hard to forgive if you are unsure about the result of forgiving. You fear that if you forgive the person, you might get hurt even more. However, forgiveness is the main tool to protecting yourself from the hurt you might get from the other person. Acts of forgiveness brings forth emotional healing, and it makes you get stronger for the future (if you face any hurtful situations). Forgiving is not easy, it is a hurdle to jump over. But, unless you pass this hurdle, we can never enter into healing and maturity. Our God who knows our weakness will help us to overcome this hurdle(forgiving).
8. Build the altar of forgiveness, right now!
1) Forgiving someone does not mean that you admit the person’s behavior to be righteous. Forgiveness means, you change your attitudes towards the person now. Instead of judging others yourself, hand over the right of judgment to God.
2) Even though you use your own will power to forgive someone, you might still have hurtful feelings remaining inside of you. Regardless of your feelings, you must choose to forgive. It is not being hypocritical. Denying yourself is the right act.
3) Pray now and ask the Holy Spirit to reveal whom you have to forgive. It might not be an obvious incident you should deal with. Instead, it could be an old and forgotten incident which needs sorting out and needs your forgiveness. You must pray to the Holy Spirit to discover what it is. Pray now.
4) Write down the names which strike your mind now. (Write in detail what to forgive.)
5) Remember God’s promise and pray now for forgiveness:
God command us to forgive.(Matthew 5:43-47)
He listens to our prayer when we pray according to his will(1John 5:14-15)
9) Believe. Act upon it. Pray for the person. Look at the person from Jesus’ point of view. Start loving the person with the love of Jesus. Now, the hidden well (which was rotting away inside you) is uncovered. Some wells are so deep and full of anger and sorrow, so it will take a long time to empty it. But you must believe that the cover is definitely taken away. The Holy Spirit will take all the dirt out of the well and fill it with pure living water of peace.
9. Three ways of forgiveness
1) Ask God to forgive your own sins.
2) Forgive yourself
3) Forgive the ones you hurt.
Fully obey the Holy Spirit. Only the Holy Spirit can give us a forgiving heart. Pray to fill your heart with mercy for others.
