Simply let your “Yes” be “Yes,” and your “No,” “No.”—Matthew 5:37

It may seem surprising to some that people who are not Christians can learn to forgive. I believe that there are degrees of forgiveness. A person who is not a Christian could demonstrate what may be called “limited forgiveness” and feel all the better for it. If a person is sufficiently motivated, he or she may achieve a great deal of inner satisfaction by overcoming bitterness. Mahatma Gandhi appealed to a sense of valor and heroism when he said, “The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.” On the other hand, President John F. Kennedy said, “Forgive your enemies, but never forget their names.” That is hardly total forgiveness!

The Bible urges us to forgive—totally.

I suppose that the fifth petition of the Lord’s Prayer, “Forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors”—or, as put another way, “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us”—has made liars out of more people than any other line in human history. But don’t blame Jesus for that. We should mean what we say if we choose to pray the Lord’s Prayer. And Jesus did not say we had a choice; He said, “This, then, is how you should pray.”

Jesus regarded this as the most important petition in His prayer. “Forgive us our debts” is obviously a plea for forgiveness from God. But then comes the following line (or possibly the big lie): “as we also have forgiven our debtors.”

Just after the prayer is finished, Jesus goes on to say, “If you forgive men when they sin against you … ” Jesus intended the meaning of sin when He said the word debt. It means “what is owed to God,” and because you owe Him pure obedience, falling short of that means you are indebted to Him.

Excerpted from Total Forgiveness (Charisma House, 2002).

Simply let your “Yes” be “Yes,” and your “No,” “No.”—Matthew 5:37

It may seem surprising to some that people who are not Christians can learn to forgive. I believe that there are degrees of forgiveness. A person who is not a Christian could demonstrate what may be called “limited forgiveness” and feel all the better for it. If a person is sufficiently motivated, he or she may achieve a great deal of inner satisfaction by overcoming bitterness. Mahatma Gandhi appealed to a sense of valor and heroism when he said, “The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.” On the other hand, President John F. Kennedy said, “Forgive your enemies, but never forget their names.” That is hardly total forgiveness!

The Bible urges us to forgive—totally.

I suppose that the fifth petition of the Lord’s Prayer, “Forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors”—or, as put another way, “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us”—has made liars out of more people than any other line in human history. But don’t blame Jesus for that. We should mean what we say if we choose to pray the Lord’s Prayer. And Jesus did not say we had a choice; He said, “This, then, is how you should pray.”

Jesus regarded this as the most important petition in His prayer. “Forgive us our debts” is obviously a plea for forgiveness from God. But then comes the following line (or possibly the big lie): “as we also have forgiven our debtors.”

Just after the prayer is finished, Jesus goes on to say, “If you forgive men when they sin against you … ” Jesus intended the meaning of sin when He said the word debt. It means “what is owed to God,” and because you owe Him pure obedience, falling short of that means you are indebted to Him.

Excerpted from Total Forgiveness (Charisma House, 2002).

But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you. —Matthew 5:44

Total forgiveness involves praying for God’s blessings to rain on the lives of your offenders. When you do this as Jesus intends it, you are being set free indeed.

To truly pray for the one who hurt you means to pray that they will be blessed, that God will show favor to them rather than punish them, and they will prosper in every way. In other words, you pray that they will be dealt with as you want God to deal with you. You don’t pray, “God, deal with them.” You don’t pray, “Lord, get them for what they did to me.” And neither is it enough to say, “Father, I commend them to You.” That’s a cop-out. You must pray that they receive total forgiveness, just as you want it for yourself.

To me the greatest inspiration to live in this manner is found in the life—and death—of Stephen. He is one of my heroes. When I read Acts 6:8-15 and consider the Holy Spirit’s touch on his life, his enemies’ inability to contradict his wisdom, the miracles he did, and his radiant countenance, I say to myself, I’d give anything in the world for that kind of anointing. His secret, however, emerged at the end of his life. While his enemies threw stones at him, he prayed—seconds before his last breath—”Lord, do not hold this sin against them” (Acts 7:60). And therein lies the secret to his unusual anointing.

I must add one caution: Never go to a person you have had to forgive and say, “I forgive you.” This will be counterproductive every time unless it is to a person that you know is yearning for you to forgive them. Otherwise, you will create a stir with which you will not be able to cope. They will say to you, “For what?” It is my experience that nine out of ten people I have had to forgive sincerely do not feel they have done anything wrong. It is up to me to forgive them from my heart—and then keep quiet about it.

Excerpted from Total Forgiveness (Charisma House, 2002).

So then, it was not you who sent me here, but God. He made me father to Pharaoh, lord of his entire household and ruler of all Egypt. —Genesis 45:8

You can make a friend for life by letting someone save face. I gather this is an Oriental expression, because for an Oriental the worst thing on earth is to lose face. Some have been known to commit suicide rather than lose face. But I have a suspicion that, deep down, we are all the same when it comes to losing face—none of us want it to happen. God lets us save face by causing our past (however foolish) to work out for our good.

Can you imagine the look on the faces of his brothers when Joseph said to them, “So then, it was not you who sent me here, but God” (Gen 45:8)? Reuben may have said to Judah, “Did we hear him correctly? Did he say that we didn’t do what we did, but God did it instead?” To have believed a statement like that would have meant an unimaginable burden of guilt rolled off these men. It would have been news too good to be true.

For the one who totally forgives from the heart, there is little self-righteousness. Two reasons we are able to forgive are:

1. We see what we ourselves have been forgiven of.

2. We see what we are capable of.

When we are indignant over someone else’s wickedness, there is the real possibility either that we are self-righteous or that we have no objectivity about ourselves. When we truly see ourselves as we are, we will recognize that we are just as capable of committing any sin as anyone else. We are saved only by God’s intervening grace.

When we let people save face, we are doing what is right and just, not being merely magnanimous and gracious.

Excerpted from Total Forgiveness (Charisma House, 2002).

And now, do not be distressed and do not be angry with yourselves for selling me here, because it was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you. —Genesis 45:5

I sometimes think guilt is one of the most painful feelings in the world. My own greatest pain over the years has been guilt—and being reminded of my own failure, especially as a parent. If someone wanted to hurt me—to really and truly make me feel awful—all they would have to do is ask, “How much time did you spend with your kids in those critical years as they were growing up?” I am grateful that my children have totally forgiven me for my sins as a parent, but I still struggle with feelings of guilt for the mistakes that I made.

Joseph wanted to set his brothers free. He did not want them to blame or be angry with themselves; he wanted them to forgive themselves. Forgiveness is worthless to us emotionally if we can’t forgive ourselves. And it certainly isn’t total forgiveness unless we forgive ourselves as well as others.

God knows this. This is why He wants us to forgive ourselves as well as to accept His promises that our past is under the blood of Christ. Joseph was trying to do what Jesus would do: make it easy for his brothers to forgive themselves.

God does that with us as well; He wants to make it easy for us to forgive ourselves.

God doesn’t want us to continue to feel guilty, so He says, “Just wait and see. I will cause everything to work together for good to such an extent that you will be tempted to say that even the bad things that happened were good and right.” Not that they were, of course, for the fact that all things work together for good doesn’t mean necessarily that they were right at the time. But God has a way of making bad things become good.

This, then, is total forgiveness: not wanting our offenders to feel guilty or upset with themselves for what they did, and showing them that there is a reason God let it happen.

Excerpted from Total Forgiveness (Charisma House, 2002).

A weeping, flowering
cherry tree is one of the most beautiful of all of the ornamental trees. We
bought my mother-in-law one for Mother’s Day many years ago. She was so
excited. Being a certified nurseryman, I planted the tree exactly the way it
should be done. The next year it bloomed nicely—and even better the next year. 

However, after about
four or five years, my mother-in-law called me right after the tree had
bloomed. She expressed concern because the tree barely bloomed at all that
spring. In fact, she said it was pitiful. The next time we went for a visit, I
took my pruning clippers and small pruning saw. While she watched, I got the
ladder and went to work. Several times I heard her say, “O my,” and “O dear.”

Correct, effective
pruning is different than just “shearing” the tree to look like a lollipop.
There are two basic types of branches that need to be removed. The first is a
branch that is growing the wrong
direction. These branches rub the other
branches and can cause disease. They also block out the sunlight that is needed
for flower buds to form. 

The other type of
branch to prune is a “sucker” branch
that shoots out beneath the graft. These branches are incredibly dangerous to
the life of the tree. They will draw all of the strength and energy from the
tree into themselves, and the tree will often die—but only above the graft, which is where the blooms grow. 

When I completed
pruning, there were enough trimmings to fill a pickup truck. My mother-in-law
had gone inside and explained to the rest of the family that she was very sure
I had killed her tree. I told her to trust me, but it was pretty obvious that I
had lost “favorite son-in-law” status.

Then, nine long
months later, I received a phone call from her. She was so excited. Her tree
had bloomed—and not just bloomed. It was covered in so many blooms that it looked like
a huge pink snowball. And my “status” was instantly reinstated (whew).

John 15 says that we are the
vine, and that our heavenly Father is the Vinedresser. Verse 2 says that “every branch that bears fruit (blooms), He prunes it, that it may bear more fruit (bloom even more)” (NASB,
emphasis added).

Hebrews 12 tells us
that the Father disciplines the children He loves. We picture that as the
proverbial “spanking,” or punishment. In reality, the word discipline has the same root as the word disciple. Our Father loves us
so much that He wants to disciple us—and
sometimes He uses pruning to do just that. 

He prunes the “branches” of our lives that are
growing the wrong way. He prunes the branches that are growing from
beneath the “graft,” sprouting out of our flesh. This pruning is not done to hurt us or punish us.
We are not being sent into the corner, grounded until we decide to “be good.”
No! That’s not it at all. He is simply pruning us to make us more like His Son. He
lovingly disciples us to look and act like Jesus. How deeply
He loves us! He loves us enough to prune branches that have some blooms—in order that we can have many blooms.

This week in your
Christ walk journey, understand that the “testing and trial” time that you are
going through may in fact be a time of pruning. Try to understand that this is
a sure sign that your Father loves you—that He desires for you to “bloom.” Not
just a few small simple blooms, but tons of blooms with lots of fruit.

Perhaps some of your
branches have begun to grow in the wrong direction. Or maybe your flesh has
“sprouted” a branch that, if left un-pruned, would drain the strength out of
your spirit and your spiritual life. It’s an unholy branch that would
eventually destroy your effectiveness, causing you to have no beautiful blooms
and no fruit. Blooms display a
healthy, vibrant, intimate walk.

Relax! Your Father
is lovingly pruning you.
When the “springtime” of your journey comes around again (and it will), you
will bloom more beautifully than ever. I
promise.

PRAYER POWER FOR THE WEEK OF 6/4/2012

This week thank God that He prunes the “branches” of
your life that are growing the wrong way, and that He knows what He is doing to
get the most beautiful results. Determine to stay connected to the vine (Jesus)
so that you can produce the abundance of fruit He desires for you.

Continue to pray for an outpouring of His Holy Spirit around
the world, and especially in our own country. Pray that the body of Christ
would unite in prayer and purpose to see God’s will done on earth as in heaven.
Continue to pray for the peace of Jerusalem and the upcoming elections. John
15; Heb. 12;  I Tim. 2:1-4

To enrich your prayer life and learn how to strategically pray with power by using appropriate scriptures, we recommend the following sources by Apostle John Eckhardt: Prayers that Rout Demons, Prayers that Bring Healing, Prayers that Release Heaven on Earth and Prayers that Break Curses. To order any or all of these click here.

There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love. —1 John 4:18

Fear can cause us to do silly things. Our insecurity is what causes us to want people to stand in awe of us. We become pretentious; we try to keep other people from knowing who we really are and what we are really like. Sometimes I think the most attractive thing about Jesus as a man was His unpretentiousness. Jesus did not try to create an “aura of mystique”; even common people could relate to Him.

In terms of prestige and power, Joseph had ascended as high as one could get. Had he so desired, he could have kept his brothers at a distance. But, no. That is not what Joseph did. He wanted them to feel no fear in his presence. He wanted to be loved rather than admired.

What Joseph wanted his brothers to feel is what Jesus wants us to feel about Himself and the Father. “Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father,” said Jesus (John 14:9). If you had an abusive or absentee father, you may understandably have trouble relating to God as a Father. But there is no law that says we have to have perfect fathers before we can rightly relate to our heavenly Father. The perfect image for us to follow can be found in Jesus Christ—and it is also what Joseph was trying to convey to his brothers. Joseph did not require them to feel a trace of fear or show further how sorry they were before he forgave them; instead, he wanted them to love him and feel his love for them in return.

This is the kind of relationship that Jesus desires with us. He wants us to put us at ease in His presence.

When we have totally forgiven our offenders, we will not want them to be afraid either.

Excerpted from Total Forgiveness (Charisma House, 2002).

See to it that no one misses the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many. —Hebrews 12:15

Bitterness is an inward condition. It is an excessive desire for vengeance that comes from deep resentment. It heads the list of things that grieve the Spirit of God. (See Ephesians 4:30.) And it is one of the most frequent causes of people missing the grace of God. Bitterness will manifest itself in many ways—losing your temper, high blood pressure, irritability, sleeplessness, obsession with getting even, depression, isolation, a constant negative perspective, and generally feeling unwell.

We must, therefore, begin to get rid of a bitter and unforgiving spirit; otherwise, the attempt to forgive will fail. It is true that doing the right things, even when you don’t feel like it, can eventually lead to having the right feelings. But the very act of trying to do right shows that the bitterness is not as deep as it could be. In other words, if someone feels bitter but begins to put the principle of total forgiveness into action, it shows that he or she is not totally controlled by bitterness. Otherwise he or she wouldn’t make a start in doing what is right.

The absence of bitterness allows the Holy Spirit to be Himself in us. This means that I will become like Jesus. When the Spirit is grieved, I am left to myself, and I will struggle with emotions ranging from anger to fear. But when the Holy Spirit is not grieved, He is at home with me; He will begin to change me into the person He wants me to be, and I will be able to manifest the gentleness of the Spirit. Relinquishing bitterness is an open invitation for the Holy Spirit to give you His peace, His joy, and the knowledge of His will.

How can we be sure that there is no bitterness left in our hearts? Bitterness is gone when there is no desire to get even or punish the offender, when I do or say nothing that would hurt their reputation or future, and when I truly wish them well in all they seek to do.

Excerpted from Total Forgiveness (Charisma House, 2002).

That God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. —2 Corinthians 5:19

The ultimate proof of total forgiveness takes place when we sincerely petition the Father to let those who have hurt us off the hook—even if they have hurt not only us, but also those close to us.

I had come face-to-face with this reality, so I prayed for certain people to be forgiven. However, after a few moments, it was as if the Lord said to me, “Do you know what you are asking Me to do?”

I thought I knew the answer to His question, so I said, “Yes.”

He then seemed to reply, “Are you now asking Me to set them free as if they had done nothing wrong?”

That sobered me! I needed some time to think, but while I pondered His words, the Lord reminded me of the many sins for which He had forgiven me. I became frightened of the possibility that He might reveal—or let come out—some of the terrible things I had done.

I then humbly prayed, “Yes, Lord, I ask You to forgive them.”

Once more I needed a little time. Then the Lord seemed to say, “What if I forgive and bless you, RT, in proportion to how you want Me to forgive and bless them?”

By this time I was boxed in a corner, and I surrendered. I began to sincerely pray for them to be forgiven and blessed as though they had caused me no offense. But I cannot truly say that my prayer was particularly godly or unselfish.

This is, after all, the message of the New Testament: “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Rom. 5:8).

What impresses the world most is changed lives for which there is no natural explanation.

Excerpted from Total Forgiveness (Charisma House, 2002).

I have given them the glory that you gave me. —John 17:22

I was brought up in the Church of the Nazarene, a denomination that was born in revival. There was an unusual anointing of convicting power on that church in its early days. They had what its founder, Phineas Bresee, called “the glory.”

What was that? It was the anointing—an anointing that transcended their lack of education, money, refinement, and prestige. The presence of God was at times so powerful it seemed almost impossible for lost people to enter their services without getting converted. People who came to laugh and scoff ended up smitten and on their knees in tears before God. The services were frequently characterized by shouts of joy and people waving their handkerchiefs with inexpressible happiness.

In his last days old Dr. Bresee would preach from church to church one message: “Keep the glory down.” Why? He knew that if they ever lost it they were finished.

If God had His way in our churches today, what would happen? I don’t know. I know how He has worked in the past. The trouble is, our education, culture, and refinement stand in the way of the Spirit having His own way.

When the anointing lifts and the glory fades away, there are always those who sadly won’t admit to the withdrawal of the Spirit. They continue trying to “work it up”—creating the shouting and manifestations that become pale imitations.

Once this happens, the glory becomes yesterday’s anointing in two ways. First, God may not necessarily want His glory to be manifested in precisely the same way as it had been unveiled in a previous era. Yesterday’s anointing was real enough, but it was for yesterday. Second, those who “work it up” are trying to keep yesterday’s anointing alive, and the flesh becomes all too obvious. They are trying to relive what God was doing yesterday but may not have chosen to do today.

Excerpted from The Anointing: Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow (Charisma House, 2003).