Day 1 - Useful for building up

Only By Grace | Author: Gerrit Gustafson | © 1990 Integrity

I therefore beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

Let no evil talk come out of your mouths, but only what is useful for building up, as there is need, so that your words may give grace to those who hear. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with which you were marked with a seal for the day of redemption. Put away from you all bitterness and wrath and anger and wrangling and slander, together with all malice, and be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ has forgiven you.

Ephesians 4:1-3 and 29-31

We open another Advent season with the forgiving heart of God expressed in Jesus whose humble birth, life, death and resurrection, rings out forgiveness and grace.

Paul, a strong advocate of grace, in his letters often writes “Therefore I beg” or “I urge you by the mercies of God”, so referring to what he has previously outlined of the Grace and Mercy of God as an encouragement for the saints to be merciful and kind to one another.

By the time Advent arrives the Harvest season is behind us but the lessons of sowing and reaping are always there for us to learn from. Like the blood vessels that run around our physical bodies can slowly and unnoticeably become furred up, leading to damaging blockages (sometimes a harvest of eating too much of the wrong thing?), so when we allow resentment and bitterness to build up (harvest of unresolved hurt) this can block what the Spirit of God wants to do in our lives and through our churches.

It is so easy to follow our natural inclination to become angry, defensive, withdraw from, or even slander others, when we have been hurt, intentionally or otherwise. We have all been there but as our minds are to be renewed to be more Christ-like it is the fruit of the Spirit of ‘self-control’ which should become more instinctive. When unforgiveness is allowed to ferment it becomes like a toxin inside us and whatever the rights and wrongs of situations, “forgiving one another, as God in Christ has forgiven you” is the way God has ordained relationships to flourish and is what God’s grace towards us exemplifies. Yes, pain is an indicator that something is not quite right but two wrongs never made a right and forgiveness, although very hard to practise, is part of the living sacrifice we are called to offer to God. As Jesus absorbed the humiliation and pain of the Cross we can learn by His example “Father, Forgive them....”. Taking up our cross to follow Jesus in the ministry of reconciliation is our great calling. “Blessed are the peace-makers for they shall be called the children of God”. (Matthew 5:9)

Let’s pray.

Merciful and Loving God, we are conscious that we fail You in the area of unforgiveness perhaps more than in other areas where we disappoint You. Please bring healing into hearts where hurts are raw and into hearts where wounds are still festering from the past. And if there is any unforgiveness in my heart towards someone who has wronged me or those I love, I ask, Holy Spirit, that you would help me to overcome the natural resistance to forgive without an apology or the situation changing. I ask for strength and grace to forgive, and I trust in You to set things right.

Transform us, O Lord, into channels of Your peace as we come in the name of Jesus who has given, and forgiven us, so much. Amen.

Elisabeth Sweeney Smith