“But love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again; and your reward shall be great, and ye shall be the children of the Highest: for he is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil. Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful.” Luke 6:35-36

There is a reality that we each face. You will experience hurt, disappointment, betrayal, wrongs, and outright cruelty.

There is no excuse for it. It’s unmitigated gall—often selfish, egotistic, narcissistic, unkindness.

They lied.

They cheated.

Dispicable.

Processing what happened is a journey. What we do with it will determine our personal peace and ultimately affect our ability to live a sanctified life, preventing us from becoming the very thing that we complain about.

Without intentional intervention, we will do to others what has been done to us.

Hurt people hurt people.

Full stop.

How can you move forward, improve, and avoid becoming bitter?

Disavow your rights to rehearse, replay, retell, and relive this darkness.

Jump to the solution.

“Then said Jesus, Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.” Luke 23:34

Embrace the spirit of the divine and flip the script from the victim to the intercessor for the wrongdoer.

“You meant it for evil, but God meant it for good.”

”We know all things work together for the good to them that love God, that are called according to His purpose.”

It might help to rehearse these words to the point of counter-programming our nature that loves to suck on the savory sucker of hurt.

You will either become a living, puss-filled infection that multiplies the hurt you received into the world, or you will become a point of grace and a source of hope.

Put this in your mind.

Jesus Christ at the pinnacle of his betrayal, the object of hatred, rejection, mockery, betrayal, and human shame. Bleeding with a mockery of a crown of thorns and a placard proclaiming his kingship, with soldiers gambling for His clothing stripped from Him.

What does this innocent man do?

“Then said Jesus, Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.” Luke 23:34

This is the exclamation of God’s incarnation in flesh, also serving as a model for us of the divine plan to live in the same manner, overcoming and refusing the darkness that infests and possesses us with damp, distressed, and disempowering darkness.

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