Bible Question:
MY question is: If a person hurts you and ask forgiveness from you. Can you still exclude them from your life due to not trusting them? My situation is that I have an Aunt that for 46 years she and I have never had a cross word. ( she was there when I got saved at home) Then a Lady where we attended church at lied about me and my Aunt chose to believe her and screamed at me at the teachers meeting and because she was on the broad took away my Sunday school class and the play that I was working on with the children. I left that church and started attending the one that I go to now. This happened 2 1/2 years ago. This past January she came to me and ask for forgiveness and said that if she could she wouldn't have believed that woman. ( she and her are still friends) I was starting to let her back in my life and she was friendly only to get the information that I had on getting Sunday school teacher books. After that I have not seen her again. Which it did hurt to feel used. I have forgiven but I don't want her as part of my life. This is my Mothers favorite sister and my Mother says if I don't let her in my life I will go to hell. But it says I thought in the word to avoid those. Am I wrong? |
Bible Answer: Dear Katielee, Mathew 18:21,22 Then Peter came and said to Him, "Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me and I forgive him? Up to seven times?" Jesus said to him, "I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven." Forgiveness is a requirement of being a Christian, if Jesus tells us to love both our neighbors and our enemies then we are to forgive both. Being a doormat for punishment and abuse that is not for the sake of preaching and teaching of the gospel is not required of Christians. Luke 17:3 "Be on your guard! If your brother sins, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him. And if he returns to you seven times a day, and returns to you seven times, saying, 'I repent,' forgive him." There is another thing to think about, forgive them if they repent and ask for forgiveness. A non Christian or a non repentant Christian you may want to forgive just so you don't walk around angry and continuall hurt all the time and to make sure you are in the right with God. But according to this verse, if they don't repent, you are not required to forgive them. I had a lot of trouble (this is not a comment of frustration to forum members or snide remark about messages I may have recieved as a result) when I first came in here because I kept on including my personal circumstances with my questions. I had to learn to refrain a bit and rephrase my questions around the issue without going much into the situation the question came out of. I noticed that no one said anything like what was said to you regarding a man asking what to do about a situation with his mother in law, very very interesting, nothing got said to him, everyone just pitched in to help, and the thread went on and on for a while. Sometimes folks react to you differently after hearing personal things, be carefull what you say in here, you don't want what you reveal to color people's impression of you and your questions. Keep asking questons, God Bless, Tamara |