Forgive or not to Forgive?

We've all been hurt or offended by the actions or words of another person right? We've all been in the situation where we have had a hard time letting go of those feelings of hurt and pain caused by other people and sometimes even ourselves right? We are completely justified in harboring feelings of pain, hurt, hatred, self-loathing, and sometimes even grudges that come as a result of being wronged by another person right? Wrong!

The Savior teaches us in Doctrine and Covenants 64:10, "I, the Lord, will forgive whom I will forgive, but of you it is required to forgive all men."  That scripture is pretty clear- there really is no room for argument. The Savior commands us to forgive everyone, no exceptions. That doesn't mean that we should forgive everyone except for your neighbor Bob who said something to you 5 years ago that offended you, your family, your dog, and your ancestors all the way back to Adam. He makes it very clear that we must forgive all men. This also includes forgiving ourselves. I know this is much easier said than done. I would like to discuss two things in this blog. 1. The need to forgive others, and 2. The need to forgive ourselves.

1. The need to forgive others:

I know it is not easy to forgive those who have hurt us. I know that because I have been there before. We all have. I would like to share some thoughts from a talk called "Remember Lot's Wife" by Elder Jeffrey R. Holland that literally changed my perspective on forgiveness and the part that forgiveness plays in the Atonement. This talk really helped me realize that I was guilty of the greater sin when I didn't forgive and forget those who wronged me.

Elder Holland began by relating the story of Lot and his wife. They were asked to flee from Sodom and Gomorrah because it was going to be destroyed. The Lord told them to, "Escape for thy life...look not behind thee..." We all know how the story ends. Lot and his wife make it out of the city in the nick of time, but then Lot's wife "looked back" and was turned into a pillar of salt. In Luke 17:32 we are cautioned to "Remember Lot's wife."

What does all this have to do with forgiving others? Let me tell you. All too often we "look back" and dwell on the mistakes of others. We don't want to move on or forget something that someone has done to us. Elder Holland says, "There is something in us, at least in too many of us, that particularly fails to forgive and forget earlier mistakes in life-either mistakes we ourselves have made or the mistakes of others. That is not good. It is not Christian. It stands in terrible opposition to the grandeur and majesty of the Atonement of Christ. To be tied to earlier mistakes-our own or other people’s-is the worst kind of wallowing in the past from which we are called to cease and desist."

He later goes on to say, "When something is over and done with, when it has been repented of as fully as it can be repented of, when life has moved on as it should and a lot of other wonderfully good things have happened since then, it is not right to go back and open up some ancient wound that the Son of God Himself died trying to heal.



My best friend and I at Bear Lake
after a serious mud fight! It was a mess!



Let people repent. Let people grow. Believe that people can change and improve. Is that faith? Yes! Is that hope? Yes! Is it charity? Yes! Above all, it is charity, the pure love of Christ. If something is buried in the past, leave it buried. Don’t keep going back with your little sand pail and beach shovel to dig it up, wave it around, and then throw it at someone, saying, “Hey! Do you remember this?” Splat!



Well, guess what? That is probably going to result in some ugly morsel being dug up out of your landfill with the reply, “Yeah, I remember it. Do you remember this?” Splat.

And soon enough everyone comes out of that exchange dirty and muddy and unhappy and hurt, when what God, our Father in Heaven, pleads for is cleanliness and kindness and happiness and healing."

2. The need to forgive ourselves:

I think all of us are guilty of this one. It is difficult to forgive ourselves. All too often, it is way easier to look past and forgive the shortcomings of other people than our own. President Howard W. Hunter said, "It has always struck me as being sad that those among us who would not think of reprimanding our neighbor, much less a total stranger, for mistakes that have been made or weaknesses that might be evident, will nevertheless be cruel and unforgiving to themselves. When the scriptures say to judge righteously, that means with fairness and compassion and charity. That's how we must judge ourselves. We need to be patient and forgiving of ourselves, just as we must be patient and forgiving of others."

Why are we so hard on ourselves? Why can we forgive others so easily, but we cannot look past our own faults and shortcomings. No body is perfect. The Atonement of Jesus Christ is just as much for me, as it is for you, and everyone else. All we need to do it repent and move on. We need to allow the Atonement to work in our own lives.

Elder Holland continues in his talk by saying, "The proviso, of course, is that repentance has to be sincere, but when it is and when honest effort is being made to progress, we are guilty of the greater sin if we keep remembering and recalling and rebashing someone with their earlier mistakes—and that “someone” might be ourselves. We can be so hard on ourselves, often much more so than with others!

Forgive, and do that which is harder than to forgive: Forget. And when it comes to mind again, forget it again."

"Forgetting is part of forgiving. But forgiving oneself involves a special kind of forgetting. We don't forget the sin and its effects; rather, the memory ceases to be part of how we see ourselves. We must keep sin in its proper perspective. Satan would convince us that we are defined by our sins. The Savior, in contrast, would have us understand that we have sins that need to be cleansed, but we are much more than those stains ( "Forgiving Oneself" by Elder D. Chad Richardson, March 2007 Ensign)."

"You can remember just enough to avoid repeating the mistake, but then put the rest of it all on the dung heap Paul spoke of to those Philippians. Dismiss the destructive and keep dismissing it until the beauty of the Atonement of Christ has revealed to you your bright future and the bright future of your family and your friends and your neighbors. God doesn’t care nearly as much about where you have been as He does about where you are and, with His help, where you are willing to go. That is the thing Lot’s wife didn’t get—and neither did Laman and Lemuel and a host of others in the scriptures ("Remember Lot's Wife" by Elder Jeffrey R. Holland)."

Like I said before, this is all easier said than done, but is it possible? YES! President Packer taught: "Save for the exception of the very few who defect perdition, there is no habit, no addiction, no rebellion, no transgression, no apostasy, no crime exempted from the promise of complete forgiveness. That is the promise of the Atonement of Christ."

I know that the Atonement of Jesus Christ is real. It is powerful. It covers all things. Nothing is outside of the healing power of the Atonement. "The Atonement not only benefits the sinner but also benefits those sinned against-that is, the victims. By forgiving those who trespass against us."

I challenge all of us to be like the Anti-Nephi-Lehies of the Book of Mormon, bury your weapons of war, and leave them buried. Use the Atonement. Forgive yourself, and forgive others. President James E. Faust said, "Forgiveness is freeing up and putting to better use the energy once consumed by holding grudges, harboring resentments, and nursing unhealed wounds. It is rediscovering the strengths we always had and relocating our limitless capacity to understand and accept other people and ourselves." I just want to add my testimony, that I know that we are freed from a terrible burden when we allow forgiveness into our lives and when we apply the Atonement to our lives. We are happier. We are stronger. We are better people.