The Power of Forgiveness
As it applies to marriage.
I believe the power of forgiveness can heal and strengthen any and every relationship including the most challenging one — marriage.
It should be the most challenging because it is potentially the most intimate.
I slipped the word potentially into the last sentence because it often is not.
Sometimes marriage is the best window into seeing there is a barrier to intimacy — to knowing and being known at the heart and soul level. Sometimes one or both are unable to be honest enough with the other to reveal who they really are. And sometimes the attempt is not reciprocated.
I’m not blaming anyone here.
We each arrive here in this present moment from different paths of experience. Therefore we all think different thoughts and in different ways. Reading another’s mind is not an option, it’s a parlor trick at best. This means each of us brings baggage and expectations into marriage even we almost certainly do not completely understand. So, we come with certain expectations the other does not know. This means the possibilities for hurt and disappointment are 100%.
This also means that marriage is the perfect place for growth and maturating one’s own character, assuming anyone is willing to grow deeper into living a grace-filled life.
I am not necessarily saying that living in a forgiving attitude will save every marriage, but it will deepen the relationship between any individual and God when they turn their lives and all possible outcomes over to his management. Sadly for some, what I am describing is not an instant solution to fix anything. It is a life journey into recovery from our own pains and foibles into becoming a calmer happier person.
This result predictably occurs because we find that forgiveness comes from and through God first, in the same way love does. We create neither. These are unmerited gifts from our loving Heavenly Father.
On a practical level, this means those often consuming thoughts about wishing our spouse only did this or that are replaced by thoughts about gratitude for how loved we are by God — that he would give us so many blessings — including our opportunities to bless our spouse while at the same time walking free from any expectations that he or she will meet needs only God alone can provide.
Of course this requires faith, but only a mustard seed’s worth is needed.
The apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith!”
And the Lord said, “If you had faith like a grain of mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.
Luke 17:5-6 (ESV)
