A Salvation Requirement: Forgiveness
Forgiveness is required for salvation, so it cannot be ignored; I have come to understand through experience, not only the power of forgiveness, but the pathway to successfully put it into practice.
Once wronged by another, the natural reaction is justification for retribution, which is often exacted through bitterness within by holding a longstanding grudge.
We are unable to reconcile a path to forgiveness from within ourselves. After all, simply changing our thinking fails to produce the desired result.
The Word of God is always where solutions to overcoming the natural are found. True forgiveness is a supernatural act requiring supernatural intervention. The required action is to pray for God’s best for the offender. In actuality, praying for the offender the way one would pray for themselves.
As with everything in the Word, perseverance is the key to success. Continual prayer for the offender over time is God’s Word in action, and true forgiveness is the revolutionary result of His promise.
Mark11:26 But if ye do not forgive, neither will your Father which is in heaven forgive your trespasses.
Matthew 5:44-45 But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.
Ephesians 4:31-32 Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice: And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you.