I came across a particularly humorous meme a few weeks ago:

Jesus had twelve friends who traveled with Him everywhere. These disciples watched Him miraculously heal hundreds, raise dead persons back to life, feed thousands twice from just a few fish and loaves of bread, walk across water as though it were land, and calm wind and storms with a few words. They watched Him endure critique, testing, and cruel words and accusations from the Israelite religious leaders of their day. They watched Him consistently love and reach out to the outcasts of society. They knew Him better than any other humans on Earth at that time: they were His very best friends.

And yet one of His very best friends betrayed Him. One of Jesus’ best friends sided with His earthly enemies and decided that money was worth more than trust and friendship. But Jesus still chose Judas to be one of His best friends.

I know, prophetically, that He had to choose Judas because Jesus needed to be betrayed in order to fulfill prophecy and become the Saviour of the world, but that would have been a God choice. Jesus was God, but He was also fully human. And as a human, I would never willingly spend three years of my life loving a person, trying to speak truth into their lives, washing their nasty, dirty feet just before my very last meal on earth, knowing the entire time that this man would betray me to my enemies and bring about the events of my excruciatingly painful death.

Could you? Could you forgive someone for something awful you knew they were going to do before they even chose to do that awful something? Could you love a person you knew ahead of time would hurt you terribly? I struggle to forgive people even after I know they’ve done something and regret it and struggle even more with loving those people who hurt me. And yet, we know Ephesians 4:32 tells us, “And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you.”

God commands forgiveness without prefacing that command with “if they deserve it.” Judas did not deserve Christ’s forgiveness or Christ’s love during the three years they spent together. I did not deserve Christ’s forgiveness for the years I spent pretending to be a stronger relationship with Christ than I actually had. Some of the people in my life who have hurt me deeply over the years have never earned or deserved my forgiveness.

And yet, we are commanded: forgive. If God commands us to do something, He would only do so  knowing that it was something we could do. So how do we forgive someone who doesn’t deserve it?

1. Start with acknowledgement. You can’t forgive a hurt if you can’t admit the hurt happened. At the last supper, we see this happen: “When Jesus had thus said, he was troubled in spirit, and testified, and said, Verily, verily, I say unto you, that one of you shall betray me.” Jesus called out the hurtful choices He knew Judas was making that night. My dad didn’t always know what to say or do with us when we were younger. It took me years to admit to him that he hurt me. But there was freedom in admitting to him those words: you hurt me. Because when I admitted to him what he suspected, he was then able to apologize. Speaking truth out loud frees us from the pain of that truth. This is why we feel better when we confess our own wrongdoings to others, too. Some hurts only have power over us when they remain silent.
2. Remind yourself what God forgave you. Often, I’ve listened to others tell me, “But you don’t know what they did!” As a Christian, our forgiveness is never based on the merit of the person we’re trying to forgive. It doesn’t matter what they did: what does matter is what God has forgiven you. Matthew 11:25-26 tells us, “And when ye stand praying, forgive, if ye have ought against any: that your Father also which is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses. But if ye do not forgive, neither will your Father which is in heaven forgive your trespasses.” Our forgiveness, just like our salvation, is always based on what God has done and not based on what we’re capable of. I know this isn’t easy. I know. But again, we need to realize that God would never command us to do something that we weren’t capable of accomplishing. When you find yourself questioning whether you should forgive someone, it’s good to start asking yourself the question, “What has God forgiven me for?” This shifts your focus from the temporal “what this person did to me” to the eternal “what did God do for me” kind of outlook.
3. Say it out loud as a reminder. Say the words as often as you need to. Did you know that when we say something out loud we’re more likely to learn and remember it? It’s one thing to choose to forgive someone at one point in time, but what about keeping that forgiveness in play when you hear their name spoken or when you’re reminded of just how badly they hurt you? By saying the words, “I forgave them for _______,” we’re able to remind ourselves and continue to learn and accept our choice of forgiveness over our former choice of bitterness and unforgiveness. We teach ourselves to continue forgiving and continue forgiving, just like Jesus does. Speak your forgiveness out loud as a reminder of your choice.

Ultimately, forgiveness comes down to a choice about how much you want to be like Jesus. If Jesus was willing to forgive every unforgivable thing that a human could do to another human, I think we can forgive the imperfect humans that happen into our lives, too. Even when they simply do not deserve our forgiveness.