If you have an ex that you haven’t forgiven, you run the risk of carrying around a bitterness that will haunt you for the rest of your life. Jesus tells us not only to forgive our enemies, but to love and pray for them, too. When we forgive those who have hurt us, we experience freedom from the past, and the opportunity to let go and move on.

There’s a difference between being at peace with God when we become saved, and having peace from God that comes from a genuine relationship with Him. When we choose to follow our own desires over obeying His will, we declare war on Him when He wants us to bring peace. It’s when we live a life of obedience to Him and extend forgiveness towards others that we experience the peace that comes only from Him.

Before Jesus, justice came in the form of “an eye for an eye” and “a tooth for a tooth”. But Jesus turned justice upside down when He instead told His followers to love their enemies; do good to those who persecute them; give more than what is asked; go further than the extra mile; and love their neighbor as themselves. What He requires of us goes against our very nature most of the time — and it requires us to surrender to God and allow Him to extend mercy, love, and forgiveness through us.

“Treat others the way you want to be treated” seems easy enough, as long as those “others” are people we like/agree with/who share our views. But when we have different thoughts and opinions, we’re quick to judge and get angry with one another and “cancel” those we don’t get along with. God calls us to a standard of perfection, but He also teaches us how to show mercy to ourselves and to others when that standard isn’t met. Jesus was the only “perfect dude” who ever lived, and He made a way for us to be perfect through His sacrifice for us.

Have you ever heard the saying, “Let go of the past before you become part of it”? We’ve all had defining moments in life that shape us, change us, and all too often, wound us. It’s easy to carry the weight of that hurt with us into the rest of our lives — but God delights in taking those painful experiences and turning them into beautiful tools to be used for His glory, if only we allow Him to help us heal and move forward in freedom.

Peter once asked Jesus how many times we’re supposed to forgive those who have sinned against us. Jesus replied, “seventy times seven” times! The point Jesus was making is this: we can all think of reasons to not forgive those who’ve hurt us, but none of those reasons are justifiable in God’s eyes. No matter how great the offense, we’re called to forgive others completely because He’s forgiven us completely. When we release the hurt that someone’s caused us and extend forgiveness to them — even if we think they don’t “deserve” it — we’re doing for them what God first did for us — even when we didn’t deserve it, either.