The Healing Journey

January 19, 2026

“To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you.”
— Lewis B. Smedes

Forgiveness is hard. One of the hardest things imaginable, and most of us, if not all of us, want to believe that it really isn’t necessary. Avoidance, lingering resentment, bitterness are a lot easier, aren’t they?

Forgiveness can seem almost impossible, when someone we love dies and they ill treated us, they were unfaithful, they didn’t love us as they should, or they didn’t take care of themselves and paid the price. There are so many reasons we can be hurt by people we’ve lost, and just as many to be hurt by people who are alive, especially if we were treated unjustly and didn’t deserve it.

However, hurt is a part of life that we can never escape and our failure to forgive can ultimately hurt us more than the original wound. One of the most important things to learn is that on our own, we are virtually incapable of true forgiveness. The ability to forgive is a gift that comes from God, and we have to ask for it. And that gift might not come in a miraculous flash of light, but it will come because God always keeps his promises, and the Holy Spirit is always at work.

You don’t have to struggle to find forgiveness. There’s an easier way. You have to ask and Jesus will hand it to you as a gift … and that gift will lead to peace in your troubled heart. Our first reaction is to say, “Jesus, no way. I can’t do it. I don’t want to do it. They don’t deserve my forgiveness after what they did.”

But Jesus can be pushy. He’ll wait for you to come around. Very often, the first preliminary, but necessary, step is to pray that you are given the grace to forgive. Forgiveness requires practice, it’s true, but Jesus will be with you every step of the way, directing you at your own pace. After all, he does a LOT of forgiving and no one has been hurt more than he has been.
©J Pisani

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