#211 REVENGE IS NOT SO SWEET

In his popular book None of These Diseases, Dr. S.I. McMillan entitles one of his chapters "The High Cost of Getting Even".  According to Dr. McMillan the failure to possess a spirit of forgiveness makes us susceptible to many diseases of body and mind.  Because we cannot resist the temptation to get even, we pay the high price of a pound of our own flesh -- toxic goiter, strokes of apoplexy, heart attacks, high blood pressure, ulcers, and many other serious ailments afflict millions of people.  And often it's a direct result of the inability to forgive.  Dr. McMillan states, "It might truthfully be written on many thousands of death certificates that the victims died of grudgitis." We have heard people say from between clinched teeth, "I'll get even with that skunk if it's the last thing I ever do." Too often it is exactly that.

When Jesus said, "Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you."(Matthew 5:44) He was not giving us impractical pie-in-the-sky kind of advice, but sure resources with which to cope with abrasive conflicts.  Life is made up of hurts and conflicts, which arise daily, in our interpersonal relationships.  It is only the unresolved conflicts, the harboring of grudges and resentments which wreck havoc on spirit and mind, and finally upon flesh.  Every unresolved conflict produces its own wound.  If the scar tissue isn't planted somewhere upon or within the body then its hidden inside the heart.  C. William Fisher in his book Don't Park Here wrote, "One of the most persistent warnings in traffic, and in life is the warning of the danger of parking, of resting, of settling down.  And yet men go right on parking where the should not and of course the pay the penalty in arrested development, in stunted personalities, in narrowed wisdom, and limited lives." No one ever parks in life without paying a price.  We cannot afford to park by attitudes of resentment and hate.  If I let myself bare an unresolved conflict against someone, failing to bring that conflict before the alter of God's mercy then its inevitable that I shall find myself turning bitter.  If I degrade myself to the point where I permit any person to make me hate him, then I am blinded and rendered impotent to forgiveness.  The most therapeutic petition in the world, the Lord's Prayer, is clear on this point, "Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us." Or if we forgive others that trespass against us.  In short God's forgiveness toward us depends upon our forgiveness of others.  Take a good look at yourself; have you parked beside an unloving, unforgiving spirit?  If you have, move on, move on beyond your hurts, adversities, tragedies, set backs; move on to wholeness and happiness that comes from not being overcome of evil, but overcoming evil with good. The key message of Romans 12:14-21 is that revenge is not so sweet.