Forgiveness Is a Virtue

FORGIVENESS IS A VIRTUE

Forgiveness is a word that we use lightly in the world today. Forgiveness is more than

just a three syllable word, it is a word that keeps this world moving. What I mean by that is,

without forgiveness, everyone would go around in the world hating each other for everything.

Jesus tells us that no one is perfect, so how can we expect people not to make mistakes? The

definition of forgiveness is "excusing a mistake or offence". That is pretty simple to say, but to

some people it is not easily accomplished. Say that one of your best friends are in a bind after

they just lost there job, so one day when you were not around and they took $100 dollars from

your wallet to pay their cell phone bill. When you finally figure out who did it and you thought

to yourself that they really needed the money, would you not forgive them?

Jesus forgives us every time we make a mistake, he knows that we are only human and

that we are going to make mistakes. God sent his only son to die on the cross so that all we have

to do when we sin is ask him for forgiveness, is that not easy enough. People take this lightly,

they think that forgiveness and is not mandatory for us to go to heaven, but the bible tells us that

if we do not forgive others than we ourselves will not be forgiven, Matthew 6:15" But if you do

not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.'That to me is pretty serious, not

being able to go to heaven just because you didn't forgive that person who stole your money, or

that person who totaled your car when you tried to help them when they didn't have one.

We also forgive people and we don't even know it. We tell everyone that we just got

over it. That is still a way of forgiveness. How do we know that we have really forgiven

someone? Yes we may tell them that it is ok and that we forgive them and we might put on a

really good front by being nice to them when we see them around. You know that you have

forgiven someone by not thinking twice about what they did to you, and when that person asks

you again for you to let them borrow your car, you let them borrow it. That is forgiveness.

When it was time for the Guards to get Jesus and take him to the spot of death, Jesus told

Peter "You will deny me three times by the time the rooster crows," and Peter said he would

never do such a thing, but he did, right in front of Jesus when he was being persecuted. Peter

was one of Jesus' closest disciples, do you not think that he forgave him? Of course he did.

Jesus died on the cross so that we could have a relationship with him so that all we had to do was

to ask him to forgive us. When we were little kids and we told our parents a lie and they found

out about it, did they not forgive us? Yes they did and they will continually forgive us unto this

day.

There is more to forgiveness than just to forgive someone for a mistake they did. I think

Jesus tied it in with a form of preaching the word, or to help lead people to him. If you have a

friend who is a non-Christian, you have to expect them to make a mistake. When they still that

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