Forgiveness...Even if...

I went out of town yesterday to look for a specialty shop.
On my way there, I had to take a detour through all the construction that was going on.
The detour took me to a dead end of the road.
Thinking I must have missed a turn, I took several other detours that all led me to cul-de-sacs and other dead ends. Frustrated, I retraced my path and drove several miles back and used another road.
In my frustration and muttering under my breath of what I had just experienced, other equally frustrating moments in my past came to mind as waves of bad experiences flashed in front of me one after another.
But then a song on the radio came on it seemed to remind me to not let past events eat me up inside… to forgive the past dead-ends and to allow myself to just enjoy the scenery in front of me…

These times are so uncertain, theres a yearning undefined and people filled with rage.
We all need a little tenderness. How can love survive in such a graceless age?
The trust and self-assurance that lead to happiness,
Theyre the very things - we kill I guess.
Pride and competition cannot fill these empty arms
And the work I put between us You know it doesnt keep me warm.

Im learning to live without you now But I miss you sometimes
And the more I know, the less I understand
All the things I thought Id figured out I have to learn again

Ive been trying to get down to the heart of the matter
But everything changes and my friends seem to scatter
But I think its about Forgiveness.. Forgiveness..
Even if...even if...you dont love me anymore

We commit to the journey of forgiveness hoping for the best, but ultimately knowing that the only person we can control is ourselves. We choose our own path of forgiveness anyway, even when reconciliation doesn’t happen. Forgiveness is not just about the other person’s heart; it’s also about our heart and the anger and bitterness that we want to rid ourselves of.

Too often someone will have a moment when they are willing to forgive and they speak words of forgiveness, only to be surprised three days or three weeks or three months later when feelings of hurt, anger, and bitterness again well up in their heart. Thinking we’ve done something wrong in the way we forgave, we allow that moment to send us off the path of forgiveness down a dead-end detour.