Pastor Rick's Daily Hope

Rick Warren: None of us can earn our way into heaven because eternal life is a free gift when you accept Jesus as the Lord of your life.

Guest (Male): Hey everybody, this is Pastor Rick's Daily Hope. Today, Rick Warren continues a series called Good News About Grace. You can't truly understand the Christian life until you understand grace. It's at the heart of your faith and your relationship with God. In this series, you're going to discover how to not only understand grace, but how to experience it and the joy that it brings. Now let's get right to the final part of a message called Offering Grace.

Rick Warren: The second part of real forgiveness is relinquishing. It's relinquishing my right to get even. Now, that's the heart of genuine forgiveness: relinquishing my right to get even.

Romans 12:19 says this. Let's read it aloud. "Never avenge yourselves. Leave that to God, for He has said that He will repay those who deserve it." Notice here, He says don't try to get even. Don't try to retaliate. Don't seek revenge. Leave that up to God.

Wait a minute, Rick. You're telling me that if I forgive them, that means that I give up all my right to get even? I'm saying that's exactly what forgiveness is. You give up your right to get even. You absorb the pain yourself without having to retaliate. You say, but that's unfair. You're exactly right. Who said forgiveness is fair? Fairness—there's a word for fairness; it's called justice. Justice is fair. Forgiveness is grace.

You don't deserve forgiveness. You deserve justice. Aren't you glad that God doesn't give you everything you deserve? None of us would be here if that were true. We always want justice in everybody else's life, but we don't want it in our own.

God is gracious to us, and He wants us to be gracious to others. So you say, I give up my right to get even. Why? Well, notice it says here, leave that to God, the vengeance part. He has said He will repay those who deserve it. Life is not fair, but one day God's going to settle the score. One day God is going to close the books. He's going to balance the ledger. He's going to even the odds. He's going to right the wrongs that we see. Some things you do see justice in this world, but there are a lot of things you don't see justice in.

God is a God of justice, and He is going to even the score one day. He says, I'm going to even the score one day, so leave it in my hands. Who can get better justice, you or God? Who can do a better job of divvying out equal payment for sins due? God can. So He says, let me handle it, let me be the person to do that, and you just relax and in the meantime, let me fill you with my grace. Let me put your heart at peace because when you're holding on to a hurt, you're only hurting yourself.

Relinquish the right to get even. Number three: Genuine forgiveness is responding to evil with good. Genuine forgiveness is responding to evil with good. Let's look at this verse, Luke 6. "Do good to those who hate you. Bless those who curse you and pray for those who mistreat you."

How can you tell when you've really released somebody who's hurt you? How can you tell when you've genuinely forgiven them? You can pray for God to bless them. That's how. When you come to the point that you can actually pray, God bless that person who hurt me, you'll know forgiveness is complete in your heart.

When you can look at their hurt and not just at your own. I've said many times that hurt people hurt people, and that we hurt other people because we're hurting ourselves. When somebody hurts you, it's because most likely they're hurting on the inside. When you have genuinely forgiven a person, you can look past the ways that they've hurt you, and you can see how they're hurting and how that hurt was part of the reason they chose to hurt you. Out of their hurt, they began to hurt others. When you can look at their hurt, you know you've genuinely forgiven.

When you can pray for God to bless them, when you can do good to those who hate you, when you can bless those who curse you, you're responding to evil with good. Rick, how in the world could I ever do that? That's impossible. I couldn't do that for that person who's hurt me. You can't unless you do one thing, and that is allow the love of God to penetrate every fiber of your life. Because only the love of God can cause you to do something like that. 1 Corinthians 13:5 says, "Love keeps no record of wrongs." Read it with me. "No record of wrongs."

A guy was having a big argument with his wife and the next morning went to the office and he said, last night my wife got historical. And his friend said, don't you mean hysterical? He said, no, historical. She told me everything I've ever done wrong. Do you ever do that? I do. And the Bible says that when I do it, I'm being hateful. I'm not doing it in love. Love keeps no record of wrong. That doesn't mean you forget the wrongs. It means you just don't use them as ammunition. It means you don't pull them out and use them to retaliate.

Most of us want to forgive for a hurt, but we want to hold on to it too and stockpile it so that later on if we do something wrong and we get accused, we can say, well, you did this. The Bible says that when you do that, you're being hateful because love keeps no record of wrongs. There's a fourth thing that's part of genuine forgiveness: repeating the process as long as necessary. You do these things over and over because forgiveness is not a one-shot event.

How long do you have to keep forgiving a person? You have to do it as long as the feeling of revenge keeps coming back. Peter asked that question of Jesus. Peter said, Lord, how often should I forgive somebody who sins against me? Seven times? Peter's thinking he's being really magnanimous here because Jewish law said you had to forgive a person three times. So he doubles it and throws one in for good measure. Seven times, Lord? And Jesus goes, Peter, not quite. How about seventy times seven?

The point is for infinity. For as long as it takes. Until you've let it go. You have to keep forgiving that person over and over until the pain stops and the desire to get revenge goes away. You can come to service or you can pray in a quiet time and you can say, dear Jesus Christ, I know that this bitterness is bad for me, and I know I need to forgive them, and so Lord, I forgive that person. Five minutes later, you want to kill them again. You have to say it again. When the memory comes back, you say it again and again. Seventy times seven.

You just keep doing it until the pain goes away. If they really hurt you, it's going to take more than once because the memory's going to keep coming back. You have to repeat the process as long as necessary. It's a process. Some of you are saying, I've forgiven them. Why do I still hurt? Because it hasn't happened yet. You've got to keep forgiving them. Every time you hurt, you go back over in your mind and say, God, I forgive them again until you know that you've released them.

It is not always advisable. It's not always practical. In fact, it's not even always possible to go to your offender and tell them that you forgive them. Times may have changed. They may not even remember the event or they never even knew what happened. Maybe they've remarried. They may be dead for that matter. There are many reasons why sometimes you cannot go back to a person and offer forgiveness in person.

So what do you do? One thing you can do is use the technique of the empty chair, where you imagine that offender sitting down in that empty chair and then you tell them how it felt. This is why I've hated you all these years. This is why I resent you. This is why I've felt hurt. You pour out your heart to that chair and then you say, because of Jesus Christ and because of His grace in my own life, I'm letting you go. I'm setting you free. I'm releasing you. I'm not going to bring it up again. I'm not going to hold it against you. Not because you deserve it, because they don't deserve it.

Forgiveness is grace. I'm doing it because Jesus says to do it, and I'm letting it go. Maybe you need to write a letter, and you need to pour out in that letter: this is how I've hurt all these years, and this is what's bothered me for all these months, but I'm letting it go. I want you to know that I forgive you. Then maybe you don't mail that letter. Some people you do need to go directly to, but sometimes it's not the best thing. You might get a mature Christian to advise you on whether you ought to go directly or write a letter that you never send.

That sounds pretty simple, but it certainly isn't easy. Genuine forgiveness is never easy. I have no doubt that in a crowd this size, a lot of you are carrying some deep wounds. You're carrying some pain that you've carried for months, maybe even years. When you think about that person who hurt you through betrayal or rejection, it's still as fresh as if it happened this morning. The pain is still there. You still hurt. You're still filled with resentment.

So what do you do? How are you going to get on with your life? Rick, why in the world should I forgive that person who hurt me so much? You have no idea how much they hurt me. I don't. Why in the world should I offer grace to that person? You ought to do it for three reasons. Number one: I need to be gracious to others because God has been gracious to me. In fact, He is gracious on a moment-by-moment basis.

If you can't forgive, you need to just pause a minute and realize how much God has already forgiven you. You will never have to forgive anyone else more than Jesus Christ has already forgiven you. Not a chance. You will never have to forgive anyone more than God has already forgiven you. Maybe what you need to do is just stop for a minute and reconsider that you haven't always gotten what you deserved either. God has been gracious with you. Because we've been forgiven by Christ, we are compelled to forgive those who hurt us.

The second reason is because the alternative is bitterness. We know that one doesn't work. Scientists tell us the most unhealthy emotion there is is the emotion of resentment. It always hurts you more than anybody else. It's like taking cancer or fire into your heart. It's going to eat you up. You always hurt yourself more with bitterness than you do the other person. While you're stewing and resenting, thinking of retaliation and revenge, rehearsing the pain over and over in your mind, they're going along their merry way, totally oblivious. You're not hurting anybody but yourself with your resentment.

The book of Job says you're only hurting yourself with your anger. Resentment will not change the past. And resentment will not solve the problem right now. It is incapable of solving any problem. Resentment doesn't even make you feel better. In fact, it makes you feel worse. It robs you of joy. It allows that person in your past to continue to hurt you now, and that's dumb because they can't hurt you anymore unless you allow them to by rehearsing the memory over and over. Bitterness doesn't work.

The book of Hebrews, chapter 12, says, "Be careful that none of you fails to respond to the grace which God gives. For if he does, there can very easily spring up in him a bitter spirit, which is not only bad in itself, but it can also poison the lives of many others, like your children, your husband, or your wife and others." So let it go.

The third reason you need to forgive that person is because God expects you to do it. Matthew 6:15. Let's read this verse aloud. Jesus said this, "For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins." I don't know how to make it any clearer than the way Jesus said it right there. Forgiveness is a two-way street. Do not burn the bridge that you've got to walk across to get into heaven. Jesus says we cannot receive what we are unwilling to give.

Rick, I just don't feel like doing it. Do it anyway, because it's the right thing to do and you're only hurting yourself. You're going to be hurt in life. That's an established fact. The only question is what are you going to do with those hurts? If you hold on to that hurt and you let it build in your life, you will end up being a gnarled up, shriveled up, bitter old person. Your heart's going to grow hard and you're going to die bitter and lonely because nobody wants to be around a bitter person.

Something else happens. If you don't release that person through forgiveness, you're going to start to resemble them. That's what bitterness does to you. You say, I'm never going to be like my dad, my mother, my brother, my sister, my ex-spouse. Who are you focusing on the whole time you say that? The Bible teaches that what we focus on we move toward, and what we move toward we become. What you resist persists. For your own sake, you've got to let it go.

You say, Rick, you don't understand. I could never forgive that person. You don't know how much they've hurt me. I don't know that. God does. That's why you need Jesus. You see, you can't manufacture enough love in your life to handle all the ways you're going to be hurt. You are going to be hurt in life. You don't have enough love to overpower that on your own. You need Jesus Christ, and you need His love in your life, or you're going to die a bitter person.

You need Him to fill you with love, not every year, but every moment of the day. The reason why some of you have a hard time forgiving is because you don't feel forgiven. So let's start with a prayer today. Would you bow your heads?

I want to pray a prayer of forgiveness, and I'd like for you to follow me in it. It's a prayer of liberation, freedom, a prayer that can change your life. If you say I've forgiven that person in the past, why do I still hurt? You've got to keep forgiving them until the pain goes away. Would you pray this prayer in your heart?

Dear Jesus Christ, you know that I've been hurt by others. You know that my resentment has made me act in ways that have been unreasonable and unhelpful and unhealthy. I need your power to release and forgive those who've hurt me, so I can stop letting them control me. Would you please replace my hurt with the peace of Jesus Christ?

And God, I realize that I've hurt a lot of other people with my habits and my bad decisions and my hang-ups. Would you please forgive me for the way I've hurt others? Help me to make a list of those that I've harmed and in the right way at the right time to humbly seek to make amends.

Jesus Christ, I want to refocus my life on you and I want to face the future courageously with love and peace in my heart. Would you replace my resentment with your love and replace my hurt with your peace and replace my bitterness with your grace? Thank you for your graciousness to me. Thank you for forgiving me for the things that I've done wrong.

If you've never invited Christ into your life, why don't you ask Him right now? Say Jesus Christ, would you please come into my life and fill me with your love and guide me from this day forward? I put my trust in you. In your name I pray. Amen.

Guest (Male): If you've just prayed along with Rick to accept Jesus in your life, Rick would love to hear from you. Just email Rick at PastorRick.com. We'll send you free tools to help start your relationship with Jesus. Right now, here's Pastor Rick with a special message.

Rick Warren: When I started Saddleback Church over 40 years ago with just a handful of people in our living room, I also began writing a simple devotional just for the people in our church to help them start each day with hope and with truth and with peace that comes from Jesus Christ.

That little devotional grew and today Daily Hope is one of the largest email devotionals in the whole world. Each day people all around the globe are reconnecting with God's promises and finding fresh strength in His word to face whatever comes their way. Here's the best part. It's absolutely free. We don't have any charge for this. Every day you'll get a quick devotional read and a podcast that you can listen to on the go.

In a world that's more distracted and uncertain than ever, I want to help you start your day centered on what never changes. What never changes is God's unconditional love for you and His promises to you. If you'll just spend just a few minutes a day in the morning with the Lord, it can bring so much more clarity, purpose, and peace to everything that happens in your day. Psychologists have said that what you do the first five minutes of your day pretty much sets the tone. Friend, you were never meant to go through life alone. I personally invite you to just sign up for the Daily Hope devotional. Do it today. I think it's going to bring fresh encouragement to your walk in God.

Guest (Male): If you'd like to sign up for the daily devotional, it's easy. Just go to PastorRick.com. That's PastorRick.com. Be sure to join us next time as we look into God's word for our daily hope. This program is sponsored by Pastor Rick's Daily Hope and your generous financial support.