The minuses of unforgiveness

Forgive others as God forgave you. Forgive those who trespass against you so the Lord will also forgive you.

Starting a sermon on Philemon, the pastor talked about forgiveness. The book is about a slave that ran away from his master — most likely stealing money from Philemon to make his way. But Paul saw a change in the slave Onesimus when he became a Christian. So Paul asked Philemon to forgive his slave, to welcome Onesimus home as a brother.

Forgiveness is a difficult concept. Perhaps the way to look at it is not how good forgiveness is, but how bad unforgiveness is. Not forgiving makes us stressed, bitter, depressed. It keeps us up at night. Vengeance from unforgiveness leads to hatred and death.

Watching “Sons of Anarchy,” the lives of the bikers deteriorate because of hatred, unforgiveness and vengeance. This quote might be the perfect ending to a discussion of the need of forgiveness.

“I realized that in my downward spiral of hopelessness I was actually falling into a huge hole created by my absence of basic human graces. The most obvious is forgiveness. If I was wronged by anyone, in or out of the club, I had to be compensated by money or blood. There was no turning the other cheek. When relationships become a ledger of profit and loss, you have no friends, no loved ones, just pluses and minuses. You are absolutely alone.” - John Teller, “Sons of Anarchy”