Sometimes forgiveness can be a challenge, especially since we tend to justify holding on to our hurt feelings and grudges. However, the Lord has told us that we are required to forgive. There is no gray area. Forgiveness provides a sense of relief and freedom that we otherwise would not be able to experience. Here are seven quotes that will help you to recognize the need to forgive.
“We must recognize that we are all imperfect—that we are beggars before God. Haven’t we all, at one time or another, meekly approached the mercy seat and pleaded for grace? Haven’t we wished with all the energy of our souls for mercy—to be forgiven for the mistakes we have made and the sins we have committed? Because we all depend on the mercy of God, how can we deny to others any measure of the grace we so desperately desire for ourselves? My beloved brothers and sisters, should we not forgive as we wish to be forgiven?”
(Dieter F. Uchtdorf, “The Merciful Obtain Mercy”)
“Forgiveness is the very reason God sent His Son, so let us rejoice in His offering to heal us all. The Savior’s Atonement is not just for those who need to repent; it is also for those who need to forgive. If you are having trouble forgiving another person or even yourself, ask God to help you. Forgiveness is a glorious, healing principle. We do not need to be a victim twice. We can forgive.”
(Kevin R. Duncan, “Healing Ointment of Forgiveness”)
“…[I]t is not on our forgiveness any more than on our goodness that the world’s healing hinges, but on His. When He tells us to love our enemies, He gives, along with the command, the love itself.”
(Excerpt from Corrie Ten Boom’s “The Hiding Place.”)
“When something is over and done with, when it has been repented of as fully as it can be repented of, when life has moved on as it should and a lot of other wonderfully good things have happened since then, it is not right to go back and open some ancient wound that the Son of God Himself died to heal.”
(Jeffrey R. Holland, “The Best is Yet to Be”)
“I recently received a letter from a woman who reported having endured great suffering in her life. A terrible wrong, which she did not identify but alluded to, had been committed against her. She admitted that she struggled with feelings of great bitterness. In her anger, she mentally cried out, ‘Someone must pay for this terrible wrong.’ In this extreme moment of sorrow and questioning, she wrote that there came into her heart an immediate reply: ‘Someone already has paid.'”
(Boyd K. Packer, “The Reason for Our Hope”)
“Hard to do? Of course. The Lord never promised an easy road, nor a simple gospel, nor low standards, nor a low norm. The price is high, but the goods attained are worth all they cost. The Lord himself turned the other cheek; he suffered himself to be buffeted and beaten without remonstrance; he suffered every indignity and yet spoke no word of condemnation. And his question to all of us is: ‘Therefore, what manner of men ought ye to be?’ And his answer to us is: ‘Even as I am.'”
(Spencer W. Kimball, “The Power of Forgiveness”)
“Forgiveness is freeing up and putting to better use the energy once consumed by holding grudges, harboring resentments, and nursing unhealed wounds. It is rediscovering the strengths we always had and relocating our limitless capacity to understand and accept other people and ourselves.”
(Dr. Sidney Simon, quoted by James E. Faust in “The Healing Power of Forgiveness”)
