Wonderful message from my friend David Matthews….

Years ago, while living in Michigan, I met a couple at a social function visiting from Alabama. “What brings you guys to Michigan?” I asked.

“My dad and mom are in the nursing home here, and it’s my dad’s 90th birthday. We are going to visit them this afternoon, and spend about a week here.”

It turned out that I knew them, and had visited them in the nursing home on numerous occasions. The old man was one of my favorites – tough and ornery – always spoke his mind. I liked him because I had the freedom to always speak my mind with him. I was never afraid to do that -mainly because he was 90, deaf, and confined to a wheelchair. I felt safe with him.
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The following article is powerful and deeply touching.

It was written by my friend David Matthews. He does a workshop for people working through grief. It could be the grief of losing a loved one to death. It might be the grief of losing a loved one to another person. If you, or someone you know, is working through grief for any reason, I strongly recommend you contact David. You will find his info at the end of this article which may well change your life….
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Nearly every Christian in a position of leadership has had someone ask them about the “unforgivable” or “unpardonable” sin. The question involves the story in the New Testament when Jesus said that anyone who blasphemes the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven “either in this age or in the age to come.” (Matthew 12:22-32) It appears a lot of people worry that they may have committed this sin and that they now have no hope of heaven.

Shall I explain what it means?

Nope. Decided not to unless someone asks…

BUT I have a passage to share here that is much easier to understand, and that says much the same thing, that apparently doesn’t worry anybody much. Personally, I find it much scarier, if you think in terms of actions that prevent forgiveness.

What passage? It comes right after
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Question received through the Internet:

20 years into our marriage, I “came out” to my wife and told her of my homosexual past. She said she would stay with me as long as I remain faithful to her (I have been & intend to). We love each other, but now live more as roommates than husband/wife. I know she deserves more and am saddened to see her so unfulfilled. My question is whether the most loving thing would be to divorce and let her move on to find a man who can be the husband she needs and deserves? [Note: I would not seek involvement in a homosexual relationship as I believe acting on my homosexual desires to be unbiblical.]  Thanks for considering my question.

Answer:
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Pardon the delay between Steps 3.3 and 3.4.  Back on track now…

We shared four of the steps for reconciliation in previous blogs. We conclude now with steps 4, 5, and 6. If you put all the blogs together, you have one of the most effective ways to reconcile — or help others reconcile — available today. No brag meant. Instead this is based on great research.
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Forgiving does not always mean reconciliation. Forgiving frees the forgiver from chains of anger, hatred, bitterness, or haunting memories. Reconciliation means that as forgiveness is granted, the previous relationship will be restored, if possible.

Previous blogs, Reconciliation Steps 3, 3.1, and 3.2, lay the foundation for this segment. Working through the acronym REACH, we conclude with the ACH segments in this blog. ”A” stands for
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When I consulted with a large jewelry chain years ago, one of their executives told me that if a customer came in unhappy, nothing a store manager could do would make them happy until the customer felt the store manager understood WHY they were unhappy. He said, “We could replace the jewelry, give them their money back, and they’d still leave mad if they didn’t feel that we cared. They need to be able to tell us about their unhappiness with us and know that we heard it and understood it.”

Same with any relationship, including parent-child, married partners, romantic partners, and good friends. We all want to be validated
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If you choose to reconcile with someone who hurt you, there is a process that works. Reconciling without thinking through a valid process may lead to more hurt if the same things happen again. Maybe worse than last time.

Though no process guarantees success, and there is always an element of risk in reconciliation, there is a six step process that can help healing occur faster and help prevent relapses. In “part 1 – decide whether to reconcile” and “part 2 – softness”, we explained the first two steps. Now for the third.

Everett Worthington, Jr. PhD, created the model we use for step three. He calls it the Forgiveness Pyramid, though I’ve been unable to find it drawn or displayed in pyramid form. It consists of
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The last few blogs considered forgiveness. If you read them you recall that…

1. Forgiveness frees you, not the person you forgive.
2. Forgiveness is a decision, not an emotion, and you can make that decision in spite of what you feel.
3. Forgiveness involves making two decisions.
4. Forgiveness does not always mean reconciliation.

Yet forgiveness often includes reconciliation. When it does, the results may be beautiful or they may be brutal. It seems the difference lies in how the reconciliation is done. Over the next several blogs I will share six steps to reconciliation that were gleaned from scientific research on the subject of forgiveness and reconciliation. Some steps can be explained
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Before we examine reconciliation, let’s talk about something called “decision based forgiveness.” Baskin and Enright wrote about it in a scholarly article published in 2004 in the Journal of Counseling and Development.

If a person waits until he or she feels like forgiving, or until the hurt has gone, forgiveness will be a long time coming. More than that, the misery the person goes through lasts much longer. Whether we realize it or not,
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