Mistakes and Misunderstanding

Have you ever had a week in your life when you feel like you've been hit by a Mack truck? A time when poor decisions made in your (long ago)past come back to rear their ugly heads and say "gotcha"? Oh, the bucket load of guilt and the mind games of "if only" or "why God why?". They are wasted energy! If you have experienced these types of emotions, then you understand the level of exhaustion that comes with roller coaster emotions from such a thought pattern. That is where I am tonight. Ugh! Yep, I am a member of the human race all right. We make our plans and our mistakes only to reap the fruit of them. Thankfully, not all of my life has been filled with miss-steps and poor judgment, but when I was a young woman I could make some real life-altering mistakes. I am still reaping the bad fruit from some of them.

Without going into the sordid details and with that being said, there is hope! Yes indeed. Thank the Good Lord. God gives us forgiveness when we are truly sorry and tell Him so, and He gives us the power to forgive others who acted rashly and hurt us as well. The really hard part I have learned is to forgive myself! I absolutely hate to hurt anyone. I just die inside at the thought of causing another person pain, so when I find out that I have hurt someone, I cry a river full to tears and try to make amends. But what do I do when the person I hurt refuses to forgive me? What do I do now? Do I live my life feeling guilty that such a misunderstanding occurred? Is that what God wants me to do? Absolutely not! As I cried my river full of tears recently, knowing that a relationship has been lost, possibly forever, I remembered a favorite scripture I learned long ago. I believe this is what God wants us to do when faced with a past you want to forget. After you pray and receive His forgiveness and have done your best to repair the damage done, God says: Forgetting the past (what lies behind) and looking forward to what lies ahead, I strain (work at with God's help) to reach the end of my race and receive the prize for which God, through Christ Jesus, is calling me up to heaven. Philippians 3:13-14 (New Living Bible, paraphrased).