Changing The Mirror - The Devotional

In the world, when someone wrongs you, you protect yourself by holding it against them. You may forgive if they admit they are wrong. Or you may forgive because people are now beginning to talk about the emotional and even physiological baggage that accompanies unforgiveness. Turns out: God has a different standard of forgiveness which He has demonstrated since the beginning of time. He instructs us to offer to others the same forgiveness we have received from Him. That is hard. Actually, it is humanly impossible. Because when God forgave us, the Bible says He separated us from our sinful past 'as far as the east is from the west' [insert Scripture reference]. Not only that, but God - GOD - blots our sin from His memory [Isaiah 43:25]. In other words, forgiveness is divine. Yet God commands us to forgive.  Thankfully, because His Holy Spirit lives in us, we CAN forgive. Not in our own strength, but in the strength and love of the Lord. Not based on our emotions, but by deciding to forgive in obedience to