Re-Profiling

Forgiveness can be really hard. Especially when you've truly been grievously and unfairly wronged. Especially when the perp is unrepentant. But it's so important, because our unforgiveness keeps us in prison, not the other person.

It's a process, not a single event. It can be a long process, one that we keep going back to – forgiving again and again – layer after layer – going deeper and deeper.

One exercise that can significantly help us along in this process is re-profiling the person. No single person is wholly evil – only Satan and his demons have that distinction. So there is something good about the person. Rack your brain and find those things. If you just can't, ask the Holy Spirit; he'll tell you. Then write it down.

The goal here is to write down how God sees the other person, which is not necessarily how they are behaving right now, but how he made them to be. So then when we fall into bitterness, we go back and read our re-profile of them. Read it out loud – let your ears hear your mouth say it. It's powerful.

Then you start thinking of the other person in terms of how God made them, versus what they've done. Because they are not the evil they did to you. Wrapping our mind and heart around that last sentence is the essence of forgiveness.

Re-profiling makes this much easier, and it is very freeing. Try it!