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[Micro Motivation #17 – “…What you can’t forgive!!” Unforgiveness is very po…]
Speaker: Adam DeGraide
Hey, everyone, it’s Adam DeGraide here with another Micro Motivation. A pretty serious topic today, one that’s a little bit difficult to speak about, but I think it’s important for all of us to hear it. It is the following: You become what you can’t forgive. I’ll say it one more time. You become what you can’t forgive.
See, unforgiveness in our lives literally grips us and holds us hostage to it and I’m going to tell a story about my dad, who is not like this at all anymore. He’s been amazing. Since 40 years old, his life has changed. He accepted Christ into his heart and his entire world changed.
But I remember being a little boy, somewhere between the age of 8 to 10 years old and my dad had given up smoking. I was so proud of him. Here I am as a young boy watching my dad smoke every day and he decided to give up smoking.
Well, unfortunately, 7 to 10 days into it, maybe a couple of weeks into it, right when things get difficult, him and my mom got in a really big fight and I remember him saying, “That’s it! I’m going out buying cigarettes and I’m smoking!” And I said, “Daddy, don’t! Don’t!”
And I watched him walk down the stairs, walk out the door and I went to the window and I’m screaming, “Daddy, please don’t do it! You don’t need to do this,” and I’m just crying. And I can see it vividly, man. It just shows you how so many things in our lives impact us in very, very powerful ways. My dad drove off. Several minutes later he came back and sure enough, he was smoking in the front of the yard and my heart was crushed as a young man.
There’s many of you watching this video right now that have been hurt by your parents, a friend, a relative, a neighbor, and very, very painful things have ended up happening. And what I realized really quickly was, is that this sat with me for so long and fast forward to my teenage years where guess what I started to do? I became a smoker. I started abusing substances. And I became what I couldn’t forgive.
When I was 18, I finally went to rehab, changed my life, and one of the first things they had us do, about 20 days into it, my mom and dad came to visit and my dad and I spent time together and we talked about forgiveness, we shared with each other. I asked for forgiveness, he asked for forgiveness, and healing happened, and it was incredibly powerful.
I think about the Lord’s Prayer, where we say, “God, forgive us of our trespasses as we forgive others who’ve trespassed against us.”
The question is right now, what have you not forgiven? Who have you not forgiven? You see, the Bible says in Colossians 3:13, “Bearing with one another, if anyone has a complaint against another, forgiving each other. Just as the Lord has forgiven us, so you must also forgive.”
So, I’d ask you, what do you need to forgive? Who do you need to forgive? And you need to forgive them. If they’re not alive, you need to get before the Lord and you need to say, “God, please help me forgive this individual,” and you got to release it. Because if you can’t release it, it’ll hold you hostage and before you know it, what you can’t forgive becomes who you are, and we don’t want to do that in life.
Once again, this is Adam DeGraide with a Micro Motivation. Remember, if you can’t make your point in under four minutes, you might not have a point to make. If you’d enjoyed the video, be sure to share it, like it.
Thank you, guys, so much for listening and I really wish you guys the best. Remember, forgive unforgiveness is not what we want. Forgiveness is the way forward. Thanks, everyone.
