The Forgiveness Chair

Several years ago, the Lord put me in counseling. When I say, He put me there, I actually mean it. I wasn’t looking for it. I woke one Sunday morning and felt like He wanted me to go to a church in Newnan I had once worked at for a short time. He wanted me to go there and “encourage”, is all He said. I didn’t really know what that meant, but I got ready and headed that way. The funny thing is, I was told a few times that morning, that just me coming to visit and see people, encouraged them. I love how the Lord just does things! But there was another reason I was supposed to go there that morning. A reason the Lord decided to not let me in on.

I was talking to a lady, who was a friend of mine, we were just catching up. She and I had always talked deeply about what the Lord was doing in our lives. I started telling her about how I had been having these dreams. They were hard dreams, about people and things from my past and they were painful. I told her that I felt like the Lord was wanting to do some healing in me with those people and situations, but I didn’t quite know how He wanted to do that.

She looked at me and said, “Kristen, you know that’s what I do, right?”

”What?” I said, not really sure what she was talking about. To be honest, I thought she was a retired real estate agent. (Which was actually also true.)

”I work at Christian Families Today. I’m a counselor.”

“Really?” I said, completely shocked. ”How did I not know this?”

”Yes, why don’t we get together and see if meeting with me would be a good fit for you.” She offered.

I left church that day, kinda blown away, and feeling a little bit set up by the Lord.

Turns out, she was a good fit, a fantastic one actually. But again, the Lord surprised me with the type of counseling He wanted me to have. I met with her every week for 6 months and the main thing she had me practice was… forgiveness.

I remember her talking to me about what Jesus meant when He said that the ruler of this world had no power over Him. (John 14:30) She explained it, along the lines of saying that Jesus never gave the enemy a foothold or a hook, because He constantly forgave.

Forgiveness is a big deal. When we choose not to forgive, it leaves an open door for the enemy to come in and grow a garden full of bitterness, anger, rage, harshness and pride. I would even say he may sprinkle a few seeds of depression and anxiety in there to grow as well. I’ve heard it said, that un-forgiveness is like “drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.”

My personal favorite quote to use is from the movie “Madea Goes to Jail.”—“Forgiveness isn’t for the other person, it’s for you.”

Jesus said,

“If you forgive those who sin against you, your Heavenly Father will forgive you. But if you refuse to forgive others, your Father will not forgive your sins.” -Matthew 6:14-15

Ephesians 4:32 says,

“Instead, be kind to each other, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God through Christ has forgiven you.”

Colossians 3:13 says,

“Make allowance for each other’s faults, and forgive anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others.”

This is important to know: Forgiveness doesn’t justify what has been done to you. It doesn’t give tolerance. It doesn’t sweep your hurt and feelings under the rug as if they don’t matter. It doesn’t mean you have to fully trust that person immediately or ever, depending on what the Lord wants to do. Trust takes time and has to be earned. Even the Lord felt this way. (See Numbers 12) Forgiveness simply releases these things to the Lord for Him to have and deal with. It frees you, and uproots the enemies garden, and places you and your heart back in the safe garden of the Spirit— where He grows His fruit. (Galatians 5:22-23)

I feel like the hardest part about learning to forgive, is in fact, learning practically how to forgive. I used to think, that I just had to bury my feelings, push them down so far and just “get over it” with people. However, the more I did this, the less human I felt. Suddenly, I was indifferent towards everything and everyone. I felt numb, passionless, and I felt like I couldn’t trust anyone, so I isolated myself from people. Then, there was a time when I felt like the correct way to deal with forgiveness was to constantly confront or have conversations about all of my feelings with everyone. But, a lot of the time, I felt like I would end up feeling worse afterwards.

One day, my counselor explained to me that sometimes the answer is not to confront and have a conversation, because a lot of the time “you leave the conversation having way more to try to forgive that person for.” She taught me that it was important for me to learn to ask the Lord about each situation and relationship. Trust me when I say, this is key! Sometimes, for example, He has you wait on Him to work… just like the story I told in Wait on Him. Sometimes, people hurt unintentionally, or feel like they couldn’t have done anything different. Sometimes, they are prideful, and refuse to be wrong, therefore, they see no reason to apologize. And that’s just the way it goes sometimes.

So how do we forgive people, practically?

Well she taught me about The Forgiveness Chair! This is truly one of the most powerful practices I do often. Full disclosure, you may think it sounds silly, you may think it sounds too easy to make a difference, but trust me, the Lord has led me to do this so much over the years and every single time I’m blown away by Him in it. I do this with every single person I need to forgive. Sometimes, it’s all the Lord wants me to do, and other times, He has me do this before I go to have a conversation with the person. The beauty behind it, is it gets to the roots of what is really going on inside you— the reason you were offended, the reason you were hurt, the lies you heard and maybe even started to believe. So, I’m going to walk you through it!

1. The first thing I would encourage you to do is find a space that you feel like you can talk out loud. You guys know I love to write and journal, but this practice really does work best out loud. However, if it helps you to write your thoughts out first and then read them out loud, that is perfectly ok. There is just something powerful about using your voice in this practice. I have done this in my car, a park that no one is at, my bedroom and my living room!
2. Once you have found your spot, I want you to imagine the person you need to forgive sitting in a chair.
3. Then, I want to you to say to them whatever you need to say to them. If you need to yell, scream, use choice words, tell them off, whatever! Just get it all out! All the built up pain, frustration, anger, offense, all of it!
4. Once you feel like you’ve gotten it all out, I want you to start naming all the lies you believed about yourself because of what they did to you. An example would be, “You made me believe the lie that I wasn’t worth making time for.”
5. After you have named all these lies, I want you to name every lie you believed about God because of what they did. An example of this one would be, “You made me believe the lie that God was withholding from me.”
6. Now, I want you to speak the truth to each lie you believed. Using scripture here, is really powerful! If you want to write these truths down to come back to later, that is a great idea too.
7. After you have gone through all these steps, I want you to say, “I forgive you, (say their name), because Jesus has forgiven me.” I have also found it really powerful to list some things Jesus has forgiven me for. Sometimes, I am shocked and humbled by how closely they resemble the offense I am dealing with at the moment.
8. Finally, say, “I close this door of un-forgiveness and I seal it with the blood of Jesus.” And I say a prayer asking the Holy Spirit to help me fully walk out this forgiveness and truly let it go, so I can live in His freedom.

Again, you may think, there is no way this works and I’ll tell you, if you try to do it on your own, it won’t. You have to do this with the help of Jesus. Only He can reveal the hidden things in your heart. Only He can bring them to surface and the light.

Also, some of you need to put yourself in the chair. This is a really humbling experience. Some of you are living in a constant state of shame and fear, because of your past, things you did to yourself and others. Friend, it is not the heart of Jesus to leave you in this place. When you put yourself in the Forgiveness Chair, you will be met with His grace that is strong enough to cover all your mistakes, both intentional and unintentional. His grace will also empower you to live differently. You are never too far away!

I heard this said in a movie the other night:

“I believe there’s grace all around us, all the time, if we can only have the humility to admit that we need it. That we can’t find the way out on our own.”

-Surprised by Oxford

Your encouragement this week:

You are worth forgiveness and you are worth giving forgiveness. I pray that this week, you allow the Lord to examine your heart. Who has hurt you? Who has offended you? Who has caused you to believe lies about yourself or about the Lord? Who has made you doubt His love? Humble yourself, and receive the grace to find your way out of the weight and endless maze of un-forgiveness. Take courage, and allow yourself the gift of practicing The Forgiveness Chair.