#ItSeemsToMe...forgiveness is a command because it is the only path to healing.
Comment by Susan Goldbeg
National Georgraphic 03.2021
Martin Schoeller has been taking photographs, close-up portraits, of two groups of people.
Elderly survivors of the holocaust.
180 men and two women who have been "freed from death row after being found innocent of their crimes for which they were sentenced to die.
He's found that the two groups have something important in common.
He told me: "They are able to forgive."
There are so many reasons that you can be hateful and mad at people, but you have to have the ability to forgive. Otherwise it just eats you up...The people who can't don't make it."
Comments
#MySermonNotes
Mark 2:5 When Jesus saw the faith of these people, he said to the paralyzed man, “Young man, your sins are forgiven.”
Their faith produced a blessing for the person they cared for
“Today, you and I have the power to pronounce that sins are forgiven in Jesus' name. The head of the psychiatric department at Duke University, Bill Wilson, is a Christian physician.
One of his patients was a Viet Nam veteran who had been nonfunctioning for years. In the course of his Viet Nam duties he had been responsible for the deaths of many people. The hospital staff felt convinced that his illness was the result of his inability to forgive himself.
One day Dr. Wilson came in and asked to see this particular patient. He went into... his room, sat on the bed and said, "I want to tell you that your sins are forgiven." "What did you say?" asked the patient. Dr. Wilson continued, I have the authority to tell you through Jesus Christ that your sins are forgiven." The exchange marked the beginning of a healing, and the patient is now back functioning in society.” (Bruce Larson)
Steve Sjogren: The Bible contains no reference to people being led to repentance by anything other than kindness.