The Magic Key to Health and Happiness
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spiritual4u
| Posted on
11:05 AM
When you harbour hatred against someone it harms you more than it harms your enemy. Would you like to destroy yourself by hating your enemy?
We all have problems and a good part of the problems relate to our relationships with people. The increasing rate of divorces show husbands and wives are not getting along well. Businesses fail when business partners work at cross purposes fuelled by mutual suspicion and want of understanding.
If you are getting along well with your wife/husband, praise God. You are spared from a hell at home. You may get along well with your wife, but will not be so fortunate in the office. Mutual distrust and one-upmanship arising from a competitive spirit and sheer selfishness are bound to spoil relations.
Backbiting, jealousy, self-centredness are ingredients of conflicts which bedevil relationships in offices, households and even organizations. It doesn’t take long for a sensitive soul to learn that lesson.
Where do we look for answers to this miserable situation? In human nature. The scriptural view of human nature lays down very clearly that we are imperfect beings. The Bible, for example, states that we are selfish, judgemental, self-righteous and blind to the faults in ourselves. With the result, we always conclude that the other person is in the wrong.
If you read the scriptures carefully, it will dawn on you that our problems are the normal outcome of our imperfect nature. The human mind is often compared to a monkey. If you can understand this comparison, you will easily grasp the reasons why a monkey gets into trouble. And those are the same reasons why we face problems too.
Look at your particular problem with that particular person objectively. Let the Lord of Life enable you to judge yourself harshly and your rival with a little bit of compassion. You will soon find that you are at fault too. Then in that humbling recognition you decide to forgive your rival. Your hatred and resentments begin to melt away. You get reconciled with that person.
Your rival, your enemy, becomes your friend. It is a metamorphosis that happens when a man takes courage to forgive his bitter enemy! Oh, what a change it brings in your inner self. A problem that has been robbing you of peace and sleep just disappears as if by magic. The bitterness you harboured all the while no longer pollutes your inside. You are at peace. You are able to concentrate better and work with greater efficiency. What a little forgiving achieved for you! What tremendous relief!
Doctors have reported miracle healing resulting from removal of old grudges, resentments and enmities. These elements, like cancer, eat into your vitals. Medical experts have been holding that a host of illnesses such as ulcers, high blood pressure and heart attacks are caused by bitterness and conflicts. When you harbour hatred against someone it harms you more than it harms your enemy. Would you like to destroy yourself by hating your enemy?
When Jesus asked us to forgive our enemies, He was prescribing the best remedy for relational problems. He tells the man who has come to worship at the altar: “If you are standing before the altar in the temple offering a gift to God and suddenly remember that a friend has something against you, leave your gift there beside the altar and go and apologise and be reconciled to him and then come and offer your gift to God.’’
You sense a spirit of urgency in that command. He says that you should first get right with your friend. Otherwise, the small difference will fester into a bitter enmity and then reconciliation will be difficult. Or he may go to court against you and in the end you will end up spending large amounts in litigation. Reconciliation saves you from future problems. Don’t we read in papers of incidents in which men kill one another over petty differences?
Often people are not ready for reconciliation because of self-righteousness - they think the other person is in the wrong. But the stubbornness will in the end bring sorrow and ruin in its wake. Humility and a willingness to admit mistakes will, on the other hand, pay rich dividends. An enemy, in an instant, becomes your friend. You regain sleep and peace of mind. When you live in enmity with people you are at constant risk.
Our imperfections and the imperfections of others with whom we have to do lead to hurts and injuries. Healing calls for admission of mistakes and willingness to apologise. Every day we need to examine our lives and take a resolve to get right with others by open talk, admission of mistakes and offer of reconciliation.
“The very purpose of existence is to reconcile the glowing opinion we hold of ourselves with the appalling things that other people think about us,” wrote a wit. Indeed there can be differences in the way people think about us. We can be totally wrong in the way we view a person with whom we are in conflict. The wisest thing to do is to give him the benefit of doubt and extend a hand of reconciliation. Then former adversaries can let go of the past and embrace the future in a spirit of forgiveness and reconciliation.
If you are getting along well with your wife/husband, praise God. You are spared from a hell at home. You may get along well with your wife, but will not be so fortunate in the office. Mutual distrust and one-upmanship arising from a competitive spirit and sheer selfishness are bound to spoil relations.
Backbiting, jealousy, self-centredness are ingredients of conflicts which bedevil relationships in offices, households and even organizations. It doesn’t take long for a sensitive soul to learn that lesson.
Where do we look for answers to this miserable situation? In human nature. The scriptural view of human nature lays down very clearly that we are imperfect beings. The Bible, for example, states that we are selfish, judgemental, self-righteous and blind to the faults in ourselves. With the result, we always conclude that the other person is in the wrong.
If you read the scriptures carefully, it will dawn on you that our problems are the normal outcome of our imperfect nature. The human mind is often compared to a monkey. If you can understand this comparison, you will easily grasp the reasons why a monkey gets into trouble. And those are the same reasons why we face problems too.
Look at your particular problem with that particular person objectively. Let the Lord of Life enable you to judge yourself harshly and your rival with a little bit of compassion. You will soon find that you are at fault too. Then in that humbling recognition you decide to forgive your rival. Your hatred and resentments begin to melt away. You get reconciled with that person.
Your rival, your enemy, becomes your friend. It is a metamorphosis that happens when a man takes courage to forgive his bitter enemy! Oh, what a change it brings in your inner self. A problem that has been robbing you of peace and sleep just disappears as if by magic. The bitterness you harboured all the while no longer pollutes your inside. You are at peace. You are able to concentrate better and work with greater efficiency. What a little forgiving achieved for you! What tremendous relief!
Doctors have reported miracle healing resulting from removal of old grudges, resentments and enmities. These elements, like cancer, eat into your vitals. Medical experts have been holding that a host of illnesses such as ulcers, high blood pressure and heart attacks are caused by bitterness and conflicts. When you harbour hatred against someone it harms you more than it harms your enemy. Would you like to destroy yourself by hating your enemy?
When Jesus asked us to forgive our enemies, He was prescribing the best remedy for relational problems. He tells the man who has come to worship at the altar: “If you are standing before the altar in the temple offering a gift to God and suddenly remember that a friend has something against you, leave your gift there beside the altar and go and apologise and be reconciled to him and then come and offer your gift to God.’’
You sense a spirit of urgency in that command. He says that you should first get right with your friend. Otherwise, the small difference will fester into a bitter enmity and then reconciliation will be difficult. Or he may go to court against you and in the end you will end up spending large amounts in litigation. Reconciliation saves you from future problems. Don’t we read in papers of incidents in which men kill one another over petty differences?
Often people are not ready for reconciliation because of self-righteousness - they think the other person is in the wrong. But the stubbornness will in the end bring sorrow and ruin in its wake. Humility and a willingness to admit mistakes will, on the other hand, pay rich dividends. An enemy, in an instant, becomes your friend. You regain sleep and peace of mind. When you live in enmity with people you are at constant risk.
Our imperfections and the imperfections of others with whom we have to do lead to hurts and injuries. Healing calls for admission of mistakes and willingness to apologise. Every day we need to examine our lives and take a resolve to get right with others by open talk, admission of mistakes and offer of reconciliation.
“The very purpose of existence is to reconcile the glowing opinion we hold of ourselves with the appalling things that other people think about us,” wrote a wit. Indeed there can be differences in the way people think about us. We can be totally wrong in the way we view a person with whom we are in conflict. The wisest thing to do is to give him the benefit of doubt and extend a hand of reconciliation. Then former adversaries can let go of the past and embrace the future in a spirit of forgiveness and reconciliation.
Source: Spiritual4u.com
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