Guest writer Mary Roberts lives in Tulsa, Oklahoma with her husband Zachary and their son.
Today I was thinking about things… I was raised to respect others and treat others the way I would want them to treat me. I was taught wrong is always wrong no matter how many people are doing it. I was taught no matter what someone does to you, never stoop down to their low. Always be nice even when they are far from it. I may not have very many close friends but that’s OK. My dad was my best friend and I’ve learn so much from him in the 21yrs I had with him. I am a lot like him today because I spent so much time learning how to treat others by the way he treated others. I may have a delicate heart. I will always look for the good in others. I will always be truthful. I will always try and help others and never look for something in return. I will do my best to do as I am asked, and do it without complaining. Unfortunately, I have been taken advantage of and been called naive because of some of the things I have just listed. I have a gentle spirit and sometimes get my feelings hurt easy or get upset because of the way people treat each other. I feel like God has always given me compassion for others because no matter what they’ve done or what has been done to them I feel their pain or my heart hurts for what they have went through.
Hillsong’s song Hosanna says it perfectly:
Heal my heart and make it clean
Open up my eyes to the things unseen
Show me how to love like You have loved me
Break my heart for what breaks Yours
Everything I am for Your Kingdom’s cause
As I walk from earth into eternity
This is the compassion for people God has laid on my heart from an early age. I was blessed to have such a loving home that I never understood why people are so hateful.
I remember one night I was placed in a situation I had never seen first hand. And it was someone being brutally, verbally abused and I didn’t know what to do. I remember driving home bawling because my heart hurt so much for that person and I didn’t understand how someone could be so hateful. And then later when that person treats you just as bad as they were treated, you realize you are not sorry for yourself, you are sorry for them. They have been hurt so much all they know to do know is hurt others and hold hate in their hearts when things don’t go as planned. But I still forgave them even though they tried to publicly humiliate me and hurt me just because they were feeling hurt. I still wonder how people hold so much hate and unforgiveness in their hearts because it would tear me apart. But again that is just who I am. This scripture hits home for me in this situation. “Love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you.” (Matthew 5:44) I’ve realized that all I can do is pray for those who hurt me and let them go. Forgiveness is easy, trusting again is not. We can cannot help ourselves until we learn to forgive others and look past it. No matter who has hurt you in life you must forgive and move on.
Holding hate and unforgiveness will only cause you to hurt others as you have been hurt. It will keep you from a life of happiness. And you will become someone you never imagined you could become. In the end you will regret all the hurtful things you have done by simply choosing to not forgive. I pray that this touches someone and they learn to forgive what or who ever has come against them. Life is too short to hold on to things and live a life of unforgiveness. Learn to love others no matter what they have done. And live a life of love.
