The Cusp of Recovery – Deciding to Forgive

So many people can’t see

They cannot possibly agree

But the only way we can live

Is to resolve what we need to forgive.

BITTERNESS will keep us from life and life will keep us from bitterness. If we can only see how life and bitterness are poles apart, God will do the rest for us by our faith to simply obey what he requires of us.

This is life: the fullest expression of what it means to exist. It is the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual capacity to experience reality – in all its fullness. But life in this way is an ebbing, flowing process that none of us ever masters, but we can grow in it (and we should).

Forgiveness is always a decision – and to be fair, for those struggling, it’s a process. But once a decision has been made, there will be sufficient commitment to carry the struggle through – onward toward and to the goal.

And forgiveness is the cusp of recovery. Having decided, and having come to the precipice of the prices to be paid to forge a recovery from bitterness unto life, and having braced for the journey with courage, the cusp was seen, experienced and endured.

Journeying further than perhaps ever before, seeing the possibilities for life, even for the relatively small cost of pride surrendered, the bitterness is let go.

Bitterness is caused by perceptions of transgression, but bitterness, of itself, is a sin against God for having refused to relate. To forgive is to reconcile with a person, even if that reconciliation means to never need to converse with the person again. There is just no animosity there any more.

It is always wrong to allow bitterness its full extent of reign. Bitterness usurps the role of God to judge. Bitterness usually reveals the choice to side with only one part of the story – a choice against the fullness of reality. Yes, that’s life; being able to experience life in all its fullness without compromising emotionally.

To experience life is the halcyon of human experience; to tap into joy, peace, hope, and all varieties of virtue that flourish in our lives.

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Bitterness will keep us from life and life will keep us from bitterness. Life guards our hearts, but bitterness is a nowhere road to a hell of our own making. Bitterness is never right, and the courage expended to forgive is always rewarded.

© 2014 S. J. Wickham.