In my last post, I mentioned the story of St. Maximus the Confessor and how he was persecuted for the faith. This week, I heard from him via our church bulletin and the Lord spoke to me through his commentary on the Lord's Prayer:
"...by saying, 'Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors,' he [a man] exhorts God, who is beyond imitation, to come and imitate him; and he begs God to treat him as he himself has treated his neighbors. For he wishes to be forgiven by God as he himself has forgiven the debts of those who have sinned against him; hence, just as God dispassionately forgives His creatures, so such a person must himself remain dispassionate in the face of what happens to him and forgive those who offend him. He must not allow the memory of things that afflict him to be stamped on his intellect lest he inwardly sunders human nature by separating himself form some other man..."
Obviously this spoke to me as this is difficult to do and has been difficult to do for me personally.
How do we go about not rehearsing wrongs done to us? It is obviously a choice, an act of the will. We can choose to show mercy and forgive or we can choose to rehearse how others have afflicted us.
St. Maximus assures us that, "Such a condition [mercy and reconciliation] of the will is an inner state actively characterized by the grace of what is good by nature and hence productive of virtue."
So when we choose to exercise our will towards mercy, forgiveness, and reconciliation, our inner state will produce virtue, not vice.
Words to ponder as we journey through forgiving those who have hurt us spiritually.
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