In your mind, does forgiveness equal condoning the action?

Answer 1

Forgiveness is an act of mercy and possible reconciliation.

To be forgiven, the person must ask forgiveness. No one is to forgive a person who has sinned against us and not asked for forgiveness. There is a reason for this. Grace is a precious gift, but God offers it to the penitent. We should follow our Father in heaven.

The other thing is that we are to recognize that people fail in their intentions. Thus Jesus told us to forgive as often as a person is truly penitent.

The key to forgiveness is truly in how willing they are to turn from their sin. We are not called to enable bad behavior. As an example of the above, I'm on a diet. Now if I slip on that diet and truly am remorseful, my wife can forgive me. But if I ask forgiveness while thinking of the key lime pie in the refrigerator, my wife should not forgive me as my mind is still on sin. If she forgave me, she would enable my bad behavior.

Now we need to talk about the nature of public vs. private behavior. The above refers to forgiving a person who has wronged you.

But my experience as a pastor has convinced me that unforgiven sin eats at the soul. I'm not suggesting that forgiveness be given. I am suggesting that we need to let go of it.

The bitterness we feel when we dwell over the wrong is what consumes our soul. So when a person isn't penitent, we do need to let go of it for our own sake. This involves an honest assessment that the person has sinned against us and they don't acknowledge that sin. It involves our willingness to say that I'm not going to let that person destroy my life. So I'm going to let go of it.

Of course everything I say is dependent on the sin. When a person is threatening or has committed a crime against us, we should involve law enforcement and seek proper societal punishment. A truly penitent person knows they make make recompense for their sin.

I hope this helps sister,

Pastor John

Answer 2

Absolutely not! Forgiveness is necessary to the Christian belief..We must forgive in order to be forgiven.. Condoning the action has nothing to do at all with forgiveness...It's more like, I don't care, do as you want!

Answer 3

Forgiveness does not condone the action.

Answer 4

God forgives our sins, does He condone the action?

Answer 5

Absolutely not. When those Amish girls were shot last year, the Amish community forgave the shooter. That doesn't mean they believe his action was acceptable.

If we never forgave, we'd never be able to move on from any disagreements - we'd be eternally twisted and bitter over everything. But just because we forgive and move on does not mean that support the action in question.

Answer 6

Forgiveness shows that we are all sinners saved by grace. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. You have to forgive if you want to be forgiven because, all have sinned and falllen short of Gods glory. It's like saying, hey, you messed up; sometimes we may even have to add Big Time, but when we forgive, we see that we have won victory over sin and sin is not holding defeat over us because we are too proud to forgive.

Answer 7

Forgiveness is best described as giving up your right to repay someone for hurting you. It does not necessarily condone the offense.

Answer 8

Of course not! If the action was acceptable no forgiveness would be necessary.

Answer 9

Forgiveness doesn't mean forgiving the actual sin, it means forgiving the person who is truly repentant for committing the sin against you.

Answer 10

Pearly Gator said it VERY well! When we forgive someone for something they did to harm us in some way, we give up the idea of getting even. We let go of the entire incident completely. When we are unable to forgive, it hurts US more than it hurts the person who wronged us.

God bless!