Have you ever walked away from someone you thought you knew well thinking, “I don’t even know who you are”? Or, “Who are you and what have you done with ______________?”
At times like those, our thoughts are usually anything but kind and the more we think about the interaction, the angrier we become.
Several days after one such episode, I wrote about the incident in my prayer journal before picking up my Upper Room devotional guide. I groaned. The devotional for the day was titled Letting Go. The selected Scripture was Ephesians 4:29:32 with this key verse: Get rid of all bitterness, rage, and anger, brawling and slander along with every form of malice. Here’s part of the devotional:
Too often we hang on to negative attitudes, feelings, and behaviors which can cause harm to ourselves and to others. Bitterness, rage, and anger are just some of the feelings that cause damage as we focus only on ourselves. If we act on these feelings, they can hurt others as well. Most important, negative behaviors can hinder our Christian witness. Such harmful attitudes hold us back from being loving, forgiving persons.
When we become angry or hurt, we can listen as the Holy Spirit urges us to “Let go!” Then with the Spirit’s help we can rid ourselves of the attitudes, feelings, and behaviors so harmful to ourselves and others and become who God calls us to be.
Then as if that wasn’t enough, one of my friends posted this on Face Book that day:
When I shared these things with one of our daughters, she said, “I hate it when God speaks to me that way!” Don’t we all!
Later, I remembered a conversation I’d had with a friend a couple years ago. After listening and sympathizing with her about the hurts she had experienced from several people, I told her, “You know, sooner or later you’re going to have to forgive them.” I sighed. It wasn’t the first time those words had come back to haunt me.
The next day, Ephesians 4:1-2 was the Scripture in my daily promise calendar: “As a prisoner for the Lord, then I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love.”
By God’s grace, I chose to let it go. I chose to obey God, rather than holding on to my bitterness and anger. I chose to overcome evil with good the next time an opportunity arose with the person who had upset me.
I’ve recognized that while we can’t control how people treat us, we do have a choice about how we respond. In a handout I put together on Strategies for Spirit-Controlled Living for those I counseled, the third strategy says,
“Remember that we have a choice about how we’re going to respond to situations that confront us. The Amplified translation of John 14:27 says, Peace I leave with you; My own peace I now give and bequeath to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. (Stop allowing yourselves to be agitated and disturbed; and do not permit yourselves to be fearful and intimidated and cowardly and unsettled.) We want to believe we don’t have a choice about how we respond when upsetting things happen, but by God’s grace we can choose to remain calm if we realize we don’t have to allow our emotions to control us.”
Is there someone with whom you’re angry? Someone against whom you’re holding a grudge? There are times that we need to confront people and issues, but there are other times when we just need to Let It Go.
Father, thank you that by your grace, we have a choice about how to respond to those who’ve hurt us. Help us be willing to hear you when you tell us to let it go, and forgive as you’ve forgiven us. Amen.
