Finding God’s Forgiveness

Dugan’s dad was a man of gentleness and compassion, and an obsessively cautious driver as well.  Tragically, one day a boy on a bicycle turned abruptly in front of his car, and in a moment, the boy’s life ended, but so too, in many ways, the life of Dugan’s dad ended.  As guilt sat on his soul, grief and despair weighed on his every thought, and he became withdrawn.  He contemplated suicide.  His belief in a loving God was overshadowed by fear.  He could not forgive himself.  I could tell my own story of living under the horrendous weight of guilt, and I could tell of its consequences and the complications it darkens life with.  There is a difference between “true” guilt and “false” guilt, but both can be just as destructive.  Guilt stagnates within us, especially as believers, crippling us spiritually, emotionally, and often relationally.  Whether guilt though is “true,” given to us by God to make us aware of our own sinful choices and given for the ultimate purpose of drawing us to Him, or whether guilt is “false,” imposed on us by the lies we believe or by the responsibilities we assume that literally are not ours to assume – guilt that is rooted in truth or guilt that is rooted in lies – both can find their answer with God.  

Ultimately, God’s grace gave me the courage to face my own guilt.  I recognized I needed to fully confront the guilt.  In many ways, I had already done that.  Isn’t that the reason my guilt tormented me?  I knew it was there.  I knew “what” had put it there.  I owned it, and I owned all the degrading, intimidating, self-limiting, God-distancing consequences of it.  Confronting guilt though alone in the hidden darkness of my own thinking either produces nothing or it produces more distorted thinking.  Guilt must go to God.  Openly, with raw, painful honesty.   Jesus died for my sin.  God forgivessin because Jesus died.  Why, why, why then, when I cried and I cried out to God, why did my tears continue to seemingly find God’s heart and arms closed, and I was still sitting in the turmoil of my guilt????   

I believe it was because I was still listening to and responding to, the lies that had warped my thinking and my spiritual sensitivities.  Yes, I needed to talk with God, but I also needed to start talking with someone who had a heart for God and a heart for me.  Someone who could give me an accurate picture of God.  Someone who could give me God’s truth and God’s perspective.  Someone who could assure me of God’s love and forgiveness in the midst of my raw, painful honesty.  Someone who could help me find the truth in my story – what I truly had responsibility for, what I was taking responsibility for and it was not mine to carry, and perhaps, what was not clearly discernible.  Someone who could do all that, and then walk with me to the cross so I could give all of it to God.

Dugan’s dad also, ultimately, found his peace with God and came to a place too of being able to forgive himself.   He was able to forgive himself because he came to know that for whatever responsibility he held, God had fully forgiven him.  He wanted others to know his story so they too would know the reality of God’s forgiving heart.

                                                                                                  – Bev

(Related Bible reading: Psalm 32:1-5; James 5:16; Ephesians 1:6-8)