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Repentance involves us discussing something we’ve done with the Lord, and fixing it with Him. Those things are often carried out in secret. Just you and Jesus, talking together in your quiet time. Great! Do it!! But that is not all there is. Let’s be careful and prayerful over the people around us that we may have hurt too.
It really doesn’t matter whether we think what we did required an apology … or not! Here’s a verse to soak in: “Abstain from ALL appearance of evil.” 1 Thessalonians 5:22. Many people think if they did not mean any harm, then —there can’t be any harm. No harm, no foul. The thing is we can make our brother or sister stumble, and boy does that matter!! If what we did appears to be evil to someone else then we need to pay attention. In some versions it says, “avoid any appearance of evil.”
Jesus Christ identified Himself with each one of us, so when we do good stuff, we bless Him. And when we hurt someone else, or omit to do good, and we are bringing His Name into disrepute. And NO!… the answer is not to find a hide-out and become a secret Christian – the answer is to fix what we messed up! The way out is to apologise, because Jesus identified Himself with that person. If we want to be closer than a brother to the Lord then we will need to stay that way, by caring about the people He cares for —- He loves the whole world!
“Please forgive me because I hurt you…” is an essential part of loving care for others. Our opinion about what should or should not hurt someone else doesn’t matter two beans! This attitude is a wonderful witness to anyone, even the people who-don’t-know-Him-yet. The only thing that it will cost us is pride, and that is a small price to pay for restoration. This is a good time to remind ourselves that we now live for Him – so what we are doing is for His sake, even if it costs us our supposed dignity. It is also a good time to remember that Jesus was humiliated beyond belief for our sakes.
I don’t know if this has happened to you, but there are times when somebody may have jumped all over you, and never taken the time to apologise and ask for your forgiveness. I’ve found that in my own strength I can only swallow so much angst, and mean rubbish, before I start passing the pain I feel on to a totally innocent bystander. That’s why staying close to Jesus, and asking for His help, all the time, is essential!
The things of this world are not getting any better. Actually, I’ve never met so many pouty, unrepentant people in my life! You could drown under the vast wave of ‘poor me’ and ‘look what they did to me.’ That’s the way the world acts and they don’t know any better. Christians need to know better. There will always be people who are big babies that constantly need petting and patting and lots of reassurance – because “we hurt their feelings.” We need to see these people as a gift. They may probably seem like a gift you want to take back to the store!! But the truth is they are our own personal humility metre! They show us how humble we really are.
BTW, it is not good to re-gift this kind of unhappy behaviour onto someone else. In other words, one person may be extremely irritating and they keep giving you opportunities to be angry. You’ve tried hard to explain but they have their fingers in their ears and they are not listening … the talk-to-the-hand response! And we can spend hours explaining to someone else how irritating they are — and in the end — that person doesn’t much like the offender either. And wham, bam, now that irritating person has even more reasons to be a pain, because a whole bunch of people that we’ve influenced, don’t like them! Bad plan.
We are here to influence others for good. If we are going to be salt and light then we need to be careful with the amount of salt we are slinging about, because too much salt can spoil any stew … and we can spoil someone else’s good opinion of another person. Too much light means you see those little spots everywhere, instead of being able to see clearly. So let’s learn to put aside our own feelings in these situations, ask the Lord for help, and stop whining.
This is another place to die to self. We aren’t forgiving people so we can be thought of as being nice, and we don’t ask other people to forgive us for the same reason. We do it because Jesus said so. When we don’t take the time to humbly repent, or ask Him for the Grace to go and apologise to someone else who is upset with us, we are putting our own faith in danger of bitterness and resentment.
Finally, there are times when we are in the wrong and we can’t figure out how to fix it. Start by remembering sin no longer has a sting to it. Their sin, ours, mine, the grocer … it doesn’t matter – Jesus paid for it. Our bit is to be honest about what has happened. We are all in the same boat, so let’s not wreck that boat to make a point. Taking the time to apologise to someone means we are taking the time to value that other person. The Lord loves it. Bye. 👋
