When They've Hurt You So Deeply

Common Responses to Deep Hurt

When others hurt us deeply, our common response indicates our spiritual health.

1. Bitterness – Have you allowed past hurt to cloud your present attitude?
2. Revenge – Do you seek to repay others for the hurt they caused you?
3. Isolation – Do you withdraw from others because maintaining a distrusting distance is safest?
4. Unrighteousness – Are you justifying sin in your life as a coping mechanism?
5. Forgiveness – Has the grace of Jesus transformed you so thoroughly that it seeps into all your relationships?

Jesus’ Stance on Intertwined Grace (6:14-15)

• Our selective standards amplify what others have done to us while diminishing what we have done to others.
• It is doubtful to be mobilized by grace if I can’t comprehend how desperately I need it.
• Jesus sought every single one of us while we were rebelliously mounting an insurrection against Him.
• Jesus’ stance on forgiveness isn’t conditional, but it is confirmational.
• While others’ debts are significant, they are redeemable once compared to the grace we’ve been shown (cf. Matt. 18:21-35).

Next Steps for Gracious Healing

• Trust in Jesus for the eager, complete, and transformative forgiveness of your sins.
• Ask the Holy Spirit to strengthen you to give grace to those who have hurt you.
• Pray that your tangible expression of grace could be part of that person’s redemption story.
• Use God’s standard of grace to define your own.
• Don’t confuse complete forgiveness with unchecked trust.
• Commit to the wisest path that offers grace to another and provides healing for you.