Urban Legends About God, the Bible & the Christian Life: “Forgiveness, An Act of the Will”

Thursday, April 15, 2010

“Forgiveness, An Act of the Will”

“Forgiveness is an act of the will, just make up your mind and do it whether you feel like it or not.”

Yes and no.

Yes, we disciples of Jesus are commanded to forgive (those who repent-Luke 17:3b,4) but to settle for a determination of the will is to stop dangerously short of Jesus’ command.

Jesus summed up his parable of the wicked servant who, though he had been forgiven refused to forgive his fellow servant with this stern warning, “In anger his master turned him over to the jailers to be tortured until he should pay back all he owed. This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive from your heart.” (Matthew 18:34; emphasis added) The apostle Paul added that everything we do must be done in love or it’s nothing—worthless. (1 Corinthians 13:1-3)

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About Me

I’m Joan C. Thomson, a writer, artist, and speaker but most of all, I’m a follower of Jesus and all that I am flows from there. I used to parrot what I heard in church and the American culture but the more I read the Bible, the more questions I had. I saw that a lot of what I heard didn’t add up with what I read (though some did). Somewhere along the way, God gave me the gift of knowing when something doesn’t add up—or when it does, along with a drive to find out what the Truth is. I’ve been studying the Bible personally and in many classes for over forty years but my understanding jumped into a higher gear when I took a college introductory Hebrew and Greek class. There I learned to use Biblical reference books to see what the Bible truly says.

I invest a lot of time and Biblical research into everything I believe, write—even in many of my art pieces. I put everything that comes my way through the filter of Jesus’ teachings (the New Testament of the Bible). Why go to all that trouble? First, it’s what I do, it’s who I am as a follower of Jesus and I am utterly convinced that it’s crucial to believe the right thing (Biblically) and then live it. It can be a matter of life and death—spiritual or physical. And freedom from the unnecessary heavy weight of false teachings—well-meaning though they may be, gives freedom to take up Jesus’ teachings.

Though I’ve participated in quite a few denominations over the years I don’t identify with any denomination, nor with “conservatives” or “liberals”—I’m simply a follower of Jesus.

My hope for this blog is that you too, will want to know what the Bible truly says on a given subject and that you will read what I have written as a prompt to dig more deeply yourself, as a signpost of where to look. I don’t expect anyone to take my word for it but to be a “Berean” and look into it themselves as did the early Bereans.

“Now the Berean Jews were of more noble character than those in Thessalonica, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true.As a result, many of them believed…” Acts 17:11,12

When I was a child of seven or eight years, my best friend and I wondered about the important matters of life. What would happen if we didn’t rinse the shampoo off our hair? My friend had already put the question to her mother, who answered, “Oh you wouldn’t want to do that because your hair would be so bright and shiny that it would blind your friends!” Horrified at such a prospect, the girl solemnly determined to always rinse her hair. Likely my friend’s mother meant to paint an exciting fairy tale-like answer; instead she put on her a heavy burden with her beautiful lie. (It’s interesting that the truth was the exact opposite—dull hair.)

Beautiful lies or myths or old-wives tales are still fabricated or carried forward from the past to soften the sharp edges of difficult times but they are still lies. Lies, in the end, do not encourage but deceive and often make life worse. How much better it is to speak truthfully to our neighbors (Ephesians 4:25) and to know the Truth—Jesus who will set you free! (John 8:31,32)

Topics

Falling From Grace
Hezekiah’s Second Round of Life
Paul’s Thorn in the Flesh
Unconditional Forgiveness?
“As Christians, We Don’t Need to Please God Because He’s Already Pleased With Us.”
“Christians Are a Bunch of Hypocrites”
“Christians must tithe to their local church!”
“Cleanliness is next to Godliness.”
“Death is the Ultimate Healing”
“Do all you can do and when you’ve done all you can do, God will take over.”
“Even Though He Doesn’t Cause It, God Allows Sickness So He Can Teach Us Something.”
“Everyone in the church should be in an accountability group.”
“Everything that happens is God’s will because God is sovereign.”
“Forgiveness, An Act of the Will”
“God helps those who help themselves.”
“God Makes Christians Sick” part 1
“God Makes Christians Sick” part 2
“God Makes Christians Sick” part 3
“God Must be Mad at You.”
“God wants you to be rich!”
“God Won’t Give You More Than You Can Handle”
“God Works in Mysterious Ways”
“If We Could Understand God, He Wouldn’t Be God”
“It’s a Sin to be Sorrowful”
“Jesus never said we shouldn’t defend ourselves.”
“Jesus taught in parables to make his teachings easier to understand.”
“Miracles are Rare.”
“Moderation in all things.”
“Never Pray for Patience!”
“No One Ever Learns Anything in the Good Times”
“One of the reasons we go through hard times is so we can comfort other people who are going through hard times.”
“Sometimes you have to suffer the consequences.”
“Spare the Rod and Spoil the Child”
“Spiritual Healing is the Ultimate Healing”
“Spirituality + Common Sense”
“The Antichrist”
“The Christian Trinity Consists of God, Jesus and Mary”
“The Jerusalem Temple must be rebuilt before Jesus comes back.”
“The Wonderful Cross”
“There’s Someone Out There for Everyone (to marry)”
“To keep praying for something is a lack of faith.”
“Too Heavenly Minded”
“Truth is truth wherever you find it.”
“Wives Must Obey Their Husbands”
“You can tell if you are in God’s will by the ‘indicator of peace’—if you are in God’s will you will have peace, if you’re not your peace will lift.”
“You have to love yourself before you can love anyone else.”
“You shouldn’t help that person because it might interfere with what God is trying to teach them.”