The Key to Joy!

The Key to Joy: It's all about "Relationships", "Communication" and "Forgiveness"!....

As my good friend Ron says, "It's all about relationships".

 With "social media"...it's about "friends", "connections" and "followers".

If you can't wait to get to the end of this post...It's all about Forgiveness!


Over the course of time, I have added, "Yes, and it's all about Communication."
Communication, Communication, Communication.

All about Relationships: Yes, with Jesus through God our Father...and then relationship with each other.

To develop any relationship, we need to listen and to communicate.

So it's all about Communication, Communication Communication.

With God, we communicate through Prayer.

With each other, we communicate in many ways.

But in any relationship...even with the best of Relationship and Communication, we mess up. It's called sin.

With God we can repent and ask for forgiveness.

So to complete the circle...I have added yes, and it's all about Forgiveness.
Forgiveness, Forgiveness, Forgiveness.

"To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover the prisoner was you." -Corrie ten Boom



Just as we can have a relationship with God, through Jesus Christ and with each other...We can communicate our love  and needs to Him and also to other...but in the process we have a tendency to mess up. But again, we can ask God for forgiveness...and as He has made His forgiveness available to us, we then also need to forgive each other.


Alot of times...when there is a lack of joy in our lives and we have forgiven others and ourselves...we might forget to forgive our parents for real or imaginary hurts. Perception is real. 



"Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and clearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the LORD forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity."  Romans 3:12-14

As Eugene H. Peterson says in The Message: Matthew 6: "In prayer there is a connection between what God does and what you do. You can't get forgiveness from God, for instance, without also forgiving others. If you refuse to do your part, you cut yourself off from God's part." 

"To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover the prisoner was you." -Corrie ten Boom

  So how can we NOT forgive others?

As we truly experience God's forgiveness and grace, it's then pretty easy to forgive others! Or at least it should be!

So, do we have joy?



If not, might be a good time to examine our relationships with others...our spouse, family members and maybe more important to examine our relationships with our parents...if we still have living parents. 

I also remember a verse from the Bible in Exodus 20:12  "Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the LORD your God is giving you."


So don't forget to forgive parents, even if they are long gone! Time is short, eternity is long.  

As Don Wilkerson says, "Never be defined by your past. It's a lesson not a life sentence.”

"To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover the prisoner was you." -Corrie ten Boom

 "Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity." Psalm 133:1
As Dietrich Bonhoeffer In Life Together says, "this is the Scriptures' praise of life together under the Word. But now we can rightly interpret the words "in unity" and say, "for brethren to dwell together through Christ."  For Jesus Christ alone is our unity. "He is our peace.
Through him alone do we have access to one another, joy in one another, and fellowship with one another."

A parent's greatest joy is found in this verse: "I have no greater joy than to hear that  my children are walking in the truth." 3 John:4

When we do that...we can truly have JOY!

Why I Get Up in the Morning

 To continue in my relationship with God, through His Son Jesus Christ, so that  I can:

1.     Be close to Him

2.     Worship Him

3.     Be a fragrant offering to Him

4.     To be a reflection of God into the world

5.     Be Holy as He is holy

6.     Show His love to the world…my family and neighbors

7.     Be an encouragement to people who He brings in my path

8.      

Pastor Matts sermon on August 25^th 2019  Prayer as Soul Shaping

     Prayer As -Soul Shaping With God.

Praying regularly for others

My limitations do NOT limit what God can do in prayer!

Colossians 1:9 

⁹ For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you. We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all the wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives,^[

Praying for knowledge of God’s will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding…

Praying to Live Worthy of the Lord

Colossians 1:10-14

 ¹⁰ so that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, ¹¹ being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, ¹² and giving joyful thanks to the Father, who has qualified you^[a] to share in the inheritance of his holy people in the kingdom of light. ¹³ For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, ¹⁴ in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

1                 Bear fruit of the Spirit

2                 Knowledge of God

3                 Patience

4                 Joy and gratitude

Bottom Line:

Living it out…not just knowledge or words, but Blooming Where I am planted …now.

A few thoughts on Forgiveness

Relections on "The Parable of the Unmerciful Servant: Matthew 18:21-35

My notes for a teaching at a local men's group.

Some questions we may want to ask ourselves about “Forgiveness” or just some
 thoughts for further Reflection! 

At HOME…Alone!.

1.    Have you  had good or bad experiences with forgiveness?

2.    Are you in the habit of forgiving people for ways in which they  have hurt you?

3.    Have others forgiven you for the ways you have hurt them?

4.    Do you recall any particular experiences of receiving God’s forgiveness?

5.    Who are the people in your life that you need to forgive?

6.    How do you see the effects of unforgiveness in your life?

7.    What are you fears about forgiving certain people?

8.    Do we have a list in our minds of people who have wronged us, mistreated us, hurt us or mistreated us? 

9.    Sometimes there is no “list”, but a undercurrent or “bitterness” in our lives…like a low grade fever, 100 degrees, not 103. Just an uneasy feeling that can poison our relationships….that eventually can erupt into some terrible actions….”As we think in our heart…so are we.”

10. Sometimes we are like a frog in the water…increasing the temp…and we don’t know what’s happening…we know what happened to the frog!

11.On our way to church…spouse, kids in car…

12.Matt: 18 is all about relationships…among brothers…and how to deal with sin. 

13.Then Peter asks How many times to forgive? 

14.Especially about his “brother”  Present relationship.

15.All about relationships.

16.All about communication

17.All about forgiveness.

18.Then JOY, Circles.

19.Eisenhower and his method. Crumpled paper in wastebasket.

20.He then forgot, but did he.

21.We can do the same.

22.How big is our wastebasket?

23.Are we really forgiving, or just forgetting for the moment…and the wastebasket get fuller and fuller. …Then we can get a paper shredder…smaller pieces…over a lifetime….what is happening?

24.Our families, churches.

25.Forgiveness. Seven times or seventy x seven….It’s really unlimited forgiveness.

26.We are to overflow with forgiveness.

27.The reason I forgive is because of the Lord’s forgiving me, not because of the person who hurt me!

28.It is impossible to receive forgiveness from God and NOT give it to another. 

29.An unforgiving spirit. Do we have one and maybe don’t even know it?

30.S.I McMillen in his book None of These Diseases, says,
"The moment I start hating a man I become his slave. He even controls my thoughts, I can’t escape his tyrannical grasp on my minds. When the waiter serves me steak it might as well be stale bread and water. The man I hate will not permit me to enjoy it.” Obviously as Christian men, we don’t or won’t admit that we hate someone.  What is hate?

31.Dislike or….?

32.Some bottom line thoughts.

33.The source of forgiveness is Gods forgiveness.

34.Until we see ourselves as truly and deeply sinful, we will see nothing else clearly.   Wow!

35.The refusal to forgive is costly. 

36.What did your sin do to God?

37.Think about it!

38.Not a once and for all event. 

39.Need to forgive daily. 

40.The secret of forgiveness is grace.

41.Grace received means grace given.

42.“Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.” Eph 4:32

43.Forgiveness is the great evidence that we have become new creatures in Christ and that the Spirit of Christ lives within us. 

44.The cross is where we receive forgiveness and where we learn to forgive. 

45.Who do we need to bring to the cross,? Spouse, parent, child, friend, neighbor, pastor, one of the men here?

 

More on Forgiveness

   Spiritual Laws & Forgiveness 

You can see my posts on TWITTER 

Reflections on The Parable of "The Unforgiving Servant." Matthew: 18:21-35

Why did Peter ask the question?

Was he repeatedly hurt by a brother? Or is this just a story that Jesus told to illustrate a point or teaching?

The obvious lesson of the parable is “Unlimited Forgiveness”

We can all agree on that!  Right? Ok?

But there may or can be more to the story as Paul Harvey used to say.

Something specific that the LORD wants THIS group to understand.

When we are repeatedly hurt…and really do forgive the person…are we immediately healed of the hurt?

Not necessarily!

Example of friend who was repeatedly hurt…and forgave the people…but had a sort of “low grade fever”. As he said.  Not really incapacitated, but like feeling alittle under the weather so to speak. 

Divorce, estranged family members, etc.

Some things are easy to forgive. But there may be bigger things that we haven’t fully dealt with. Maybe don’t know how to or what to do next.

Process:

1.    Need to see the person, not just in light of how he or she hurt, wronged us,…, but through God’s eyes.

2.    Then we can/may see him or her as the wounded and weak one he or she really is.

3.    Whether the person unintentionally or intentionally hurt us, the process is the same.

4.    Forgiving people who hurt us on a day to day basis enables us to forgive those who have deeply wounded us. Not just a one time event.

5.    Healing starts with asking Jesus into this process and into our heart and mind. Only Jesus can heal completely.

A few steps:

6.    Name the ways you were hurt and the sin done to you.

7.    Perception vs. Reality…

8.    Tell God how you feel. Speak from your heart.

9.    Ask Him to show you what He does with the sin that was done against or to you.

10.Ask Him to cleanse and heal you. 

11.Now, choose to forgive the person.

12.Easier said than done. You already have forgiven the person,,,right?

13.Ask God to forgive the person.

14.Now confess to the Lord the sin (your sin) of holding onto unforgiveness and it’s effects on you…all these years. 

15.Relationships MAY be restored…not maybe not always.

16.Reconciliation is NOT always possible.

17.It may take time…

18.Forgiveness has been started.

19.Healing may take time.

20.With Jesus living in us and empowering us to forgive…we can then forgive those who have hurt us. 

21.“Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors…Mat. 6:12

22.Unforgiveness effects our relationship with God and others.

23.It’s NOT just an issue we have with one particular brother…

24.It effects ALL our relationships. Our spouses, children, parents especially, and the our co workers, neighbors, friends, relatives, CHURCH members!

What is Sin? Real or imaginary? Perception is Reality!

   

1.   Who are the people in your life you need to forgive?

2.   How do you see the effects of unforgiveness in your life?

3.   Any fears about forgiving?

 Forgiveness is the great evidence that we have become new creatures in Christ and that the Spirit of Christ lives within us. 

·        Personal Reflection

·         

·        Sometimes we think we have already dealt with a person or an issue, yet it comes creeping back into our hearts. That’s because there can be layers of unforgiveness, especially if the offense was severe or happened over a long period of time.

·        Sometimes we may hold unforgiveness, bitterness and even resentment in our hearts towards a person. We may even hold some bitterness toward God for allowing some things to happen in our lives. 

·         

·        Even after we may have consciously forgiven someone, we may still have recurring memories of the situation...

·         

·         "To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover the prisoner was you." -Corrie ten Boom

·        Closing prayer:  

·         

·         

·        Heavenly Father, I ask that You heal now the wounded places in my (our) soul(s). Heal my memory of those offenses so that I can look back on them realistically, knowing that they were hurtful but also knowing that You Lord, have healed the hurt. And use those experiences for the healing of others that I have come in contact with. 

Some other thoughts on forgiveness

 

The Key to Joy!

 

Spiritual Laws & Forgiveness 

 

You can see my posts on Twitter.