Picture this: A large wooden table set with delight. Ten chairs gathered around close. The fire place has sparked a warm host of love. You look around. Now the picture gets uncomfortable. Those gathered around the table are not friends. They are not people you would have chosen to be at your dinner party. They are enemies. They are those who have gossiped about you. Those that have held a great anger toward you and haven't found forgiveness. Those filling the chairs are those very people who have let you down. Those who have discouraged you. Those very people who have brought pain, burning hot, searing red pain into your life.
It's time..
Now is the time to sit down with them and break bread. It's time to forgive and retire the anger that boils from your heart. It's time to look into those eyes that have brought tears to your own and forgive. It's time to let go and let God. It's time to erase yesterday from your vivid memory and it's time to create new for this day, right here and right now.
Too much time has been wasted in anger. Resentment is setting your heart in stone. Guilt is causing you to fall in your own ruin. It's time to tear down the walls of the ancient city that has surrounded your life. Hang that white flag in surrender and give the same forgiveness and grace that you search for today in your own heart with Christ.
It's time..
Do I want to sit at a table filled with enemies? No..but I don't want to give Satan more room in my life. I want the Lord to use me and take my life as His own. In order for me to truly live in harmony with Christ I must let go. I must see those around me with new eyes. I must love with a new heart.
It's time to pray for those who call us enemy. It's time to rush heaven's gates with prayers of peace and forgiveness. Oh, what the Lord can do with a heart willing to give Him room.
It's time to pray for those who call us enemy. It's time to rush heaven's gates with prayers of peace and forgiveness. Oh, what the Lord can do with a heart willing to give Him room.
We can't just walk away. Before we walk away we must make right what has been so wrong in our heart. We must forgive those who have hurt us. Why? Is this forgiveness for them? Are we overlooking the hurt? No. Forgiveness isn't saying the wrong was okay. It's allowing healing for ourselves. In the forgiveness we find leads to a pure love in our Savior.
There isn't room for anger in our heart. Picture that table. Can you see the smiles? Can you feel the joy? That can only happen when we make a change. When we make the choice to let go of the hurt and allow God room to move in us. He brings beauty from ash. When Jesus sits down everything changes.
There isn't any area in our life that God cannot use for His glory. But He needs us to be empty of all anger, bitterness and resentment. There is no gain in us keeping hold of such hurts. Only in letting go can we find victory.
God sets a table before us. He chooses who enters and who is allowed to sit next to us. He can take the messest table and create one of classic beauty.
It's time..
Are you tired of the struggle? Are you tired of the pain and the fight? Our battle has already been won. The victory belongs to Jesus Christ. It's time to release the chains of anger and replace them with a peace from Christ.
It's time to look upon our neighbor with love. A love that is not our own, but is far beyond anything we could do on our own.
It's time to allow Christ to live through us. Forgivess can be found. Through Christ everything is possible. Just think of what can happen when the anger is removed and the table is set with grace.
Today is the day to find freedom. It's the day to unwrap all Jesus has for us. Let it go, sweet friend. Die to that anger and allow God to release in you a new freedom. A change of heart.
It is through Christ and only Him that we can find true forgiveness. It's when we see beyond ourselves and the situation that He can create beauty by letting go. Sometimes the person we need to forgive the most is ourselves.
Life isn't to keep score and hold on to pain. Life is to be lived wrapped in a God love like no other. Today is the day. Sit at the table and let go.
"Love prospers when a fault is forgiven, but dwelling on it separates close friends." Proverbs 17:9
"Oh, what joy for those whose disobedience is forgiven, whose sin is put out of sight! Yes, what joy for those whose record the Lord has cleared of guilt, whose lives are lived in complete honesty!" Psalm 32:1-2
