Latest / HAVE FAITH LET IT BEGIN® / Forgive, Love, Begin Again — A Sermon That Lifts the Heaviest Burdens

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Forgive, Love, Begin Again — A Sermon That Lifts the Heaviest Burdens · HAVE FAITH LET IT BEGIN®

• 0:07
  Well, good morning, everyone. Wow.
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  Normally I have to say it twice. I didn't have to say it twice this morning.
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  You can hear the bells over here of our church just gleaming down on everybody.
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  I'd like to welcome every single person this morning to the First Reformed Church
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  of Walden, New York, or as I like to put it, welcome home.
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  This is a place where we come together. We are the light on the hill,
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  and we come together each and every week to serve our Lord and Savior.
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  Before we begin, I'd like to just let anybody that's here that's visiting, we welcome you.
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  If you have to use the restrooms, it will be to my right, which will be your
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  left, down the stairs, second door on the left. We also do have a chairlift
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  if anyone is in need of assistance to go up and down those stairs.
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  I understand it's a smooth ride.
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  But we are going to turn the clocks back Saturday night, one hour back. Okay.
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  I'm not going to tell you what that means if you don't come,
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  because I'll mess it up, but just turn the clock back next Saturday night,
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  right before you go to bed, just turn the clock back.
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  Best way to do it. Any other announcements this morning?
• 1:14
  Well, I'll tell you when I dropped off my daughter to the ballet on Friday, I was stopped again.
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  That's the guy from the church with the chili cook-off.
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  So we are making head waves. The chili cook-off should be good.
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  Dad, if nobody, that many people, you know, take advantage of that,
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  you may actually win that this year.
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  So I'm just saying, you have a chance.
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  At this time, we come together as a family. We are here today because it is a very special Sunday.
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  Why do I call it special? Well, I call it special because we are celebrating Pledge Sunday.
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  And it's a time when we can reflect upon God's blessing and prayerfully consider
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  how we can continue supporting the ministry and missions of this congregation.
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  But this morning, we are also going to talk about something that touches every
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  single one of us, forgiveness.
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  Oh, I can hear a couple of people going, yeah, forgiveness. That's how I felt when I wrote it.
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  We've all experienced hurt. We've all made mistakes.
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  We've all had moments when we
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  struggled for forgiveness and perhaps even struggled to forgive ourselves.
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  So sometimes, you know, we carry these loose feelings for years.
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  But here's something I want you to think about right before we begin.
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  We cannot change what happened yesterday.
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  But through the grace of Jesus Christ, yesterday does not have to determine tomorrow.
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  Our message this morning will be called, forgive, love, begin again.
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  So now, as we bring in the light of Christ, and I'm getting to make sure the
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  kids are getting ready to light this candle.
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  Let's just do a few second prayer while they light those candles to bring in
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  our light of Christ. powerheads.
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  Heavenly Father, thank you for the light that will shine in this sanctuary yet again.
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  We thank you for coming together and bringing that light of Christ into this church.
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  Lord, we know that there are many people right now that are probably dealing
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  with the word forgiveness or maybe hurt on their own.
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  Today is the day that we will change and help them secure what forgiveness is all about.
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  So, we prepare our hearts for worship.
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  Come, let us bring in the light of Christ.
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  The book bag we're talking about is really heavy, right? What I was telling
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  the young lady here was, what if you carried that book bag every single day
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  and you could never take it off? And it was heavy.
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  Well, technically speaking, every single one of us has a book bag.
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  We carry that book bag. That book bag carries our fears, our anger,
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  our struggles, and the list can go on and on and on and on.
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  How many of you are carrying a heavy book bag?
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  There's a secret. There's a secret.
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  That's right. Do you know what the secret is, guys? We need to empty that book
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  bag. Do you know how we empty that book bag?
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  Open. You can open it. And how do we open a book bag that we cannot see?
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  Ooh. I'm going to teach you what you're going to do. Ready? Close your eyes.
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  Close your eyes. We have a book bag. Our book bags are full.
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  Let's worry about one thing at a time.
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  We can pray for, Lord, today was a difficult day.
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  I need you to take away my anger. I should not have gotten angry at the clerk
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  that misgave out my change.
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  I should not be angry with the person that cut me off just to get that spot in the parking spot.
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  I forgive them, Lord. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
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  There's one thing out of your book bag. So for you guys, I want to share one
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  quick story. One of you that are sitting here today had a bully.
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  And one of you didn't know how to deal with that bully.
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  Until one of you taught me a very, very special, special message.
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  And that was my daughter, who was bullied for six months, had meetings upon
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  meetings upon meetings, didn't know what to do, thought I was failing as a father.
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  Until my daughter came to me and said, dad, I'm going to do something with my bully.
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  She's going to be my best friend. And I said, you're going to make your bully
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  your friend? She says, yes.
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  But okay, why? Because that's what Jesus would want.
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  And a little child shall lead them. Let us pray. Heavenly Father,
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  we thank you for these beautiful children.
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  We thank you for the messages that provide us to them.
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  We pray that the schools that they go to and the buses and their families and
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  all the teachers are held with the armor of Christ.
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  And we pray that each one of them finds their hearts and their dreams.
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  And as the weeks come up and they get ready to go trick-or-treating,
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  may their teeth hold strong and may all the dentists calm down because they
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  know they're about to get extra business.
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  We just ask you to blotch them in your precious name. Amen.
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  In a long time. And that has really opened up my heart because this sermon spoke to me.
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  And I knew when it was time to preach for this week, I knew this was a sermon
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  that was long and well overdue.
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  In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
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  So this morning, I want you to imagine something for me.
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  I want you to paint a picture. Imagine standing face to face with someone responsible,
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  for one of the most painful chapters of your life.
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  Not someone who simply annoyed you. Not someone who forgot to return your phone call.
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  I'm talking about someone who hurt you.
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  Someone you trusted. Someone you loved. Someone whose actions changed something inside of you.
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  And now imagine that years later this person is standing directly in front of
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  you except now you have power what do you do,
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  would you remind them that what they of what they did would you make them feel,
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  some of the pain they've caused you would you walk away Would you forgive them?
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  Because that's what we find Joseph. Joseph's brothers were jealous of him.
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  They threw him into.
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  Oblivion into this world of chaos by just selling him. They sold him into slavery.
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  They went home and allowed their father to believe that Joseph was gone.
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  And Joseph's life changed forever. He experienced slavery, false accusations,
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  prison, years separating him from his family.
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  But eventually, through circumstances, is Joseph never could have predicted,
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  that God brought him to a position of authority in Egypt.
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  And then one day, his brothers stood before him.
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  They didn't even recognize Joseph, but Joseph recognized them.
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  Can you imagine that moment? The memories, the betrayal, the hurt,
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  the years that he could never take back.
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  And now the people responsible for much of this standing directly in front of them.
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  Joseph had to make a decision. And there's something about his response that
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  I don't, how would I say this?
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  I don't want us to miss this message.
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  Joseph didn't pretend it never happened. He acknowledged what his brothers had done.
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  That's important. Because sometimes we misunderstand forgiveness.
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  We think forgiveness means forget about it.
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  Pretend it never happened. Everything's fine. No.
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  Forgiveness doesn't mean the hurt wasn't real. It doesn't mean what somebody did was acceptable.
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  It doesn't automatically restore trust. And it doesn't always mean that relationships
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  returns to exactly what it was before.
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  Forgiveness and trust are not the same thing.
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  Forgiveness can be within my heart. trust involves both of us trust may require
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  time honesty accountability,
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  changed forever change behavior sometimes even distance you can forgive somebody
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  and still say i love you but something has to change,
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  you can pray for somebody without giving them permission to continue hurting you.
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  You can forgive without opening or reopening every door.
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  Because sometimes forgiveness isn't reopening the door.
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  Sometimes forgiveness is finally putting down the weight you've been carrying through it.
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  And I don't say that easily. I don't say that to you this morning as somebody
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  who has forgiven or has forgiveness completely figured out yet.
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  I say it as someone who stands in front of you today, who continues and has lived it.
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  See, there's someone very close to me who hurt me.
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  I'm going to respect that person's privacy because this isn't about embarrassing
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  anyone or standing here and telling you what they did to me.
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  This was someone I loved. Someone I loved with all my heart.
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  Someone I consider my very best friend. And what happened hurt me in a way that
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  even standing here today, I don't know if I could completely describe how angry I was.
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  I had resentment. I lost sleep.
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  And there were nights when my mind wouldn't shut off because I kept replaying what happened.
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  And for a while, I wondered whether I would ever be able to trust people the same way again.
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  That's how deeply it affected me.
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  And I'm sad to tell you this, there were moments when that pain brought me close,
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  very close, I mean almost, to questioning my faith.
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  Not because I stopped believing in God, but because when you're hurting,
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  and you're hurting that badly, sometimes you start asking God one question. Why?
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  Why did you allow this to happen? Why this person?
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  Why did someone I love so much have to be the person who hurt me so deeply?
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  I wish I could stand here and tell you that I've prayed one prayer and suddenly
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  everything disappeared.
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  It didn't. Forgiveness was slow.
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  For me, forgiveness became prayer, patience, and grace. It,
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  was asking God to work on my heart when I didn't know how to work on myself.
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  And a little by little god showed me something,
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  my faith was stronger than my doubt the pain was real but christ was still there,
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  the anger was real but christ was still there the questions were real,
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  but christ was still there and eventually i had to ask myself how am i going
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  to forgive something or someone that hurt me this badly?
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  And the answer kept coming back to,
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  was Jesus.
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  When the memory comes back, even to this day, I learned something else.
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  Something I think we need to talk about more.
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  Something I think we all can relate to. Sometimes you can forgive somebody and
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  still remember the pain.
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  There have been moments when I truly believed that I had moved beyond what happened.
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  I had prayed about it. I had forgiven the person. I wasn't walking around angry anymore. I was smiling.
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  I'd be in the car, turn on the radio.
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  And sure enough, the radio would be like, this is 95.5. Let's see here.
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  I've hurt you once again.
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  You have to like hear another song or, you know, you hear a song that reminds
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  you of it. You're like, Oh, you go home and watch one of your favorite TV shows.
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  And of course it's like the replaying. Well, here's angels life.
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  I wasn't walking around angry anymore, though.
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  And sometimes when I realized the anger was about to start, I just began to pray more.
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  I really got tuned in with Jesus Christ.
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  And maybe my sharing of my pain this morning is a conversation that many of
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  you needed to hear this morning.
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  And suddenly, here we are again. we're talking about a memory maybe i'm the
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  person that's bringing up the memory for you and you're like oh even at church,
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  but maybe we needed to talk about it this morning and for a moment some of those
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  motions would come rushing back and they will and then i would think,
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  wait a minute wait a minute wait a minute i thought i have to i have forgiven
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  this person why am I feeling this again?
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  I mean, I've already done the forgiveness part. Why does this keep coming up?
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  But God has a funny way of doing things. God began teaching me something.
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  Being reminded of the wound doesn't mean that you failed at forgiveness.
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  Sometimes it means healing is still taking place.
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  Forgiveness doesn't erase our memory. It'd be nice if it did,
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  but that's a different story.
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  It doesn't magically make something painful painless.
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  And it doesn't mean that you'll never have another difficult moment because of what happened.
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  Sometimes forgiveness means that when memory returns, you choose again not to
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  let that memory control you.
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  You say, yes, it happened. Yes, it hurt. And yes, I remember.
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  But I still choose not to live in bitterness.
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  And maybe someone needed to hear that this morning.
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  Healing can continue after forgiveness. You don't have to condemn yourself because,
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  an old wound suddenly hurts again.
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  Bring it back to God give it to Jesus pray again ask for his peace again,
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  and remind yourself through his glory with his grace with the power of prayer
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  we need to take one more step,
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  we've heard that before.
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  That's what I've learned not because the person earned my forgiveness,
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  I already gave this to God I don't have to pick it back up again but I needed
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  to let this out because I was feeling that pain again,
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  but because I remember what Christ gave for me and what the old hurt tried to
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  pull me backward in I remembered my faith was stronger than my doubt.
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  I forgave. I continue to heal.
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  And eventually I learned something that changed the way I looked at the whole experience.
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  When the memory returned, I didn't have to return with it.
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  Joseph remembered too. And maybe that's why Joseph's story means something different to me.
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  Joseph couldn't change what his brothers had done and neither could I.
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  Joseph couldn't recover every year that had been taken from him.
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  But Joseph could decide what he was going to do with what he had been done,
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  what had been done to him.
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  And so I close this way with you.
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  And so can I do the same thing that Joseph did? Absolutely. I can forgive.
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  Can you forgive? Have you forgiven?
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  Are you still healing? Are you still hurting?
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  But now we have to turn the mirror around because while we've been talking,
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  some of us have probably been thinking about the one person who hurt us.
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  You may already have the name in your mind but if you are the person somebody
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  else is trying to forgive,
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  I've made mistakes I've said things I wish I had taken back I have hurt people,
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  I've been wrong I've been guessing I've been misguessed,
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  but guess what you're not alone,
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  sometimes the most powerful words we can't we can say aren't i forgive you,
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  sometimes the most powerful words is i am sorry i hurt you and i was wrong.
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  But don't add the but part after that. Trust me, it doesn't work.
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  Our fellow gentlemen here that are married, we know that we don't add the word
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  but to that, right? Just saying, happy life, happy wife, come on.
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  Sometimes I'm sorry is enough. Forgiveness requires humility from us too.
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  One final thought. What if the person Is you,
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  And There's one more person we haven't talked about Sometimes the person we
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  have The hardest time forgiving Is ourselves,
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  Maybe you're Dealing with that right now,
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  Maybe you've confessed it Maybe you've apologized Maybe you've changed Maybe
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  it happened five years ago 10, 20 years ago and still replaying it and restating why did I do that?
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  Why did I say that?
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  If I could only go back but you can't,
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  and neither can I. Sometimes we look at who we are years ago and using all the
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  wisdom we have today and punish the person for not knowing something that looked,
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  and looked toward us Years to learn.
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  Takes years to learn all the things that we're trying to learn.
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  That doesn't excuse our mistakes.
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  We take responsibility. We apologize. We make things right where we can.
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  We learn. We grow. But there is a difference between taking responsibility for
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  your past and sentencing yourself to a lifetime of shame because of it.
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  Then we look at the cross. And that's where the gospel reading changes everything.
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  Because Jesus is hanging on that cross and he's suffering.
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  He's being mocked. And in the middle of his suffering, Jesus asks Father to forgive.
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  Hold on to that. Because Jesus shows us what forgiveness can look like and Jesus
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  shows us what forgiveness ultimately comes from.
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  The cross reminds us that every one of us needs grace. And yet sometimes we
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  tell everybody else, God loves you.
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  God forgives you. Your past doesn't define you.
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  Then we look in the mirror and say, accept me.
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  Why? If God's grace is real, then eventually we have to believe his grace applies to us too.
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  You may have made mistakes, but,
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  you're not the person and you're not your mistake.
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  And maybe you're thinking, well, angel, this is a long sermon as usual.
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  And you don't know what happened to me. So how can you tell me that you know?
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  And you're right. I don't know.
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  I don't. But maybe you're not ready to forgive today.
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  And maybe the wound is fresh. Maybe you're not ready to have this conversation.
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  Maybe reconciliation isn't possible today.
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  And I'm not asking you to solve all that before you leave here this morning,
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  but I am asking you if you've heard me preach before if there's something I want you to remember.
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  Just take one more step maybe that step is praying for someone you still are
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  angry with maybe it's finally saying I'm sorry and maybe it's establishing a
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  boundary without hatred,
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  Maybe it's accepting forgiveness God has already offered you.
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  Or maybe your step is simply saying, God, I am not ready yet,
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  but I'm willing to let you begin working on my heart.
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  And that's enough. So leave it with God. And eventually there comes a point,
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  when you've done what we can.
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  We've prayed, we've apologized, we've forgiven, we've tried to repair something,
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  we've established boundary.
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  And we're still asking, God, what else am I supposed to do?
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  Maybe nothing. Maybe you've done what you can. Or maybe it's time to give God what you cannot fix.
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  Or of course, we're all terrible at that.
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  We'll pray, God, I'm giving this to you. And five minutes later,
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  actually, Lord, I'm going to need that back.
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  And pick it right back up. Ciao.
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  Forgive what you can, repair what you can, learn what you can,
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  and give God what you can't.
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  You cannot rewrite history. You cannot rewrite yesterday. But through the grace
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  of Jesus Christ, yesterday does not have to rewrite tomorrow.
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  Forgive, love, heal, and begin what God has made for you.
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  And that is love. Amen.
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  Well, in record time, our service is over. I will not be hearing the end of
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  that one. I think I did that on purpose and somebody said I went a little over
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  last time. No, I'm just kidding.
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  One of the things I'm learning in service is that, yes, we may run in an hour
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  service, but when the Holy Spirit takes over you, you have to let time just,
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  not be your negative thing.
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  It is making sure the message gets across.
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  And I know that somebody got that message this morning.
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  I leave you with these words. May you go in peace. I thank the visitors from
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  the new Hackensack of Wapingos Falls First Reformed Church for coming out and
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  visiting us. I forgot to mention that. Thank you for being here in attendance.
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  And I thank all of you for continuing to support me through my ministry.
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  But more importantly, I thank you for allowing me to stand up here and share
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  with you all that I have to offer you by the goodness and grace of our Heavenly Father.
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  So today, do not try to rewrite history.
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  Don't go and think about your past. Think about what you're going to do tomorrow,
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  because God is still with you.
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  God believes in you. God trusts in you. And God is never going to leave your side.
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  My mother was in the back and saying to me when I was a kid,
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  when you were born, all the angels came from heaven.
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  Do you know why? Because you are special.
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  My mothers, my grandmothers upstairs would always say to me,
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  have a good day and que Dios te bendiga, which means God bless you.
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  And as my father always says Let's eat Have a good one See you next week.