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after reading todays stepping stone on forgiveness it really hit close to home for me. it made me go all the way back to my early childhood(some 30+ years ago) it made me remember a time that was not very happy for me. i never really told many people(maybe 4 people) that when i was in kindergarten or 1st grade i was violated by a male neighbor. i still remember every single detail and how scared i was. now talking about forgiveness for something like that is very difficult for me, especially being 5 or 6years old. i was truely innocent and some man that i didnt know took that away from me, how do you forgive something like that? i think I've tried to somehow block it out or put it away somewhere in my mind but it will always be there. I keep saying i forgive because jesus says that we need to but really how can i. from there everything just snowballed into a big gigantic mess of a person, ME. on the outside i act normal, function normally, act as if nothing bothers me but really inside i'm a total wreck, because of that incident when a person wrongs me once i can never truely trust that person a 100% ever again. and that is what is happening with my husband and i right now. everything is not his fault, but for the life of me i cannot help but blame him for everything that goes wrong in our marriage. what i read today about forgiveness is so true but hard to do. I definitely have a long road ahead of me.

I was molested and it takes alot of time to heal. God dealt with me patiently as he is still healing the wounds that hurt so deeply. I struggle with guilt and being rejected by people . Everyone feel like I'm going to be a no body. I'm married as well with a wonderful husband and i told him what happened to me before someone else did.He understands that I've been through alot and I'm still healing. Ihave some inadequacies as a wife becasue no one ever thought me how to be a woman but again God has been teaching me. Forgiveness is hard especially when it hurts deep but holding unforgiveness hinders us from reciving what God has for us, and allow the devil to keep us in bondage.

Forgiving ... though very "hard" to grasp , let alone to do the forgiving to such horendous violations , it is , at the smae time , much simpler and hence become much easier (Note: saying easier , not easy) to do once we grasp the true purpose of it .

Whenever we hold a resentment (grudge etc.) we ourselves become slaves of that resentment , and quite naturally , as slaves , we can only operate in that capacity ... "do as master says" .

Forgiveness is NOT for the "benefit" of the opressor , it is a necessity for our oun freedom from the bondage of resentments , which , by the way , it separates us from our Lord ... hence the difficulty(s) ... we try to do it on our own .

The memory(s) will NOT disappear , but , however , once we decide to become willing to forgive and/or forgive , everytime the memory flashes we will discover that it is bothering us less and less , and in so doing , we also discover that we are drawing nearer and nearer to our Lord .


Luv ya both
In Christ , our Lord
vahn

@bossladyrodgers & vahn
Thank you for the kind and understanding words. It's very difficult for me to even talk about this incident without feeling ashamed & embarrassed. I still, till this day don't really like to talk or think about it. But when I do things or feel things that I can't explain, it makes me wonder if it all is linked back to that event. I dont want this man(or what he did to me) to have control over me. i truely want to forgive for my own peace of mind but i don't know if I know how to forgive.

Hello,

As being a survivor of molestation, i can relate with how you feel. *hugs*

Once i realised that my hatred and anger toward my adversaries did not harm them in anyway, but only myself it became a lil easier. I had a heart opening experience towards myself and began to love myself more by not holding myself captive. Nelson Mandela once wrote "Resentment is like drinking poison and waiting for it to kill your enemy." Wow! Very strong words there! No wonder our Lord told us to forgive .

I found it very eye opening that the Aramaic word for "forgive" means literally to "untie." The fastest way to free yourself from an enemy and all associated negativity is to forgive. Your hatred has tied you to the person responsible for your pain. Your forgiveness enables you to start walking away from him or her and the pain.

This is only through my experience and I understand that other experiences may call for a different line of measures varying on the degree of abuse and the perpatrators. In my situation what helped me was by me putting myself in their shoes, that yes even though what they did was terrible and unexcusable, I did not know all the circumstances that was behind their wrongs. Were they also molested at some point and didnt get the help they needed etc etc. I realised that I am no man's judge, even and if i did have the power over them to damn them to hell... I wouldnt. I dont wish that on anybody. And these are the kind of thoughts that broke my bondage with hatred and fear and shame etc. I also realised that I needed to be truthful with myself about the incidents and not to take from or add to them in anyway. Being at such a young age in my situation it was hard for me to remember things the way they happened without time over the years making the beast bigger than what it was. And also important to not neglect what it wasnt. You get what Im saying?

My revenge is to live my life as a survivor, regardless of what I went through I am still standing, stronger than ever and through my forgiveness towards them i am living in peace. It is a process and a painful one at times but forgiveness brings such blessed peace and lets me move forward in the new freedom.

Its getting late for me, I will say an extra prayer for you tonite as well as for you adversary.

God bless
♥Jill

I have been dealing with forgiveness myself. Not for things as horrible as what happened to you but it is hard for me to just forgive sometimes. I wanted to share this story with you and then a song that goes with it. This song has spoke volumes to me in this long road to discovering the freedom of true forgiveness.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wz3tkHv5sbg

And here is the song
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h1Lu5udXEZI

I pray you can forgive and feel the freedom of that act!

Thank u rk7800