Receive The Holy Spirit

Receive the Holy Spirit.
For those whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven;
For those whose sins you retain, they are retained.
This should have us pondering until our dying breath.

People hurt us, they say mean things, do things that cause us great physical and emotions pain, and then walk free; as if they did nothing at all.

We all have met these people, they are our acquaintances, neighbors, friends, and family members. We are bombarded daily with stories of people who are hurting other people.

Yet Our Lord gives us this command at Pentecost!!!!!

If in our own lives we struggle with those who have hurt us and let us down; how can we come to grips with the hurts of the wider world?

If we could figure this out, we could be living once again in the Garden. Unfortunately this is not the case...or could it be?

In my life I struggle with this because I have a hard time, not so much forgiving, but forgetting the action that needed forgiving. So I think, oh I forgiven that person....then I am reminded about their action(s) and re-live it over again. I am sure that all of us have experienced this.

When this happens, I really ponder, have I forgiven them?

I know I want to because the truth is that I am sure I have hurt others by what I have done and what I have failed to do.

Yet these last two lines are what really give me pause to ponder. Those whose sins you retain, are retained. There is no ambiguity about that!! Those you have not forgiven, their sins are retained!!

I wonder how many people have retained my sins by not forgiving me. I wonder what that will look like on my last day. I wonder what I will have to answer for and will I even remember doing it?

We hurt others everyday by our careless choice of words, our own inability to look deep into ourselves and accept our own fallenness, our sense of pride and succumbing to temptation. Some of the time, it is a concious choice but mostly we are totally unaware of how our behavior has hurt another.

As human beings our emotions and feelings are so fluid that on any given day another’s action may or may not produce the same emotional intensity or pain.

With that knowledge in mind: Our Lord breathed on them and us [by virtue of our Confirmation] and said,

Receive the Holy Spirit.

For those whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven;

For those whose sins you retain, they are retained.

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