"It is easier to forgive an enemy than to forgive a friend."
-William Blake (1757-1827)
A Story From Mountain Wings
Not too long ago my husband and one of his best friends had a tiff. After telling me what had happened, my husband told me to delete his friend's name from the cell phone speed dial. I hesitated and told him he was just angry and not to act too quickly. He insisted he would attempt to do it himself if I didn't, so I did. I told him, "It's easy to delete his name from the phone, but be careful about deleting him from your life. Friends are blessings from God and even though sometimes they disappoint us, we should realize they are just human." From nowhere (I know now it was the Holy Spirit) I said, "What if God deleted our names from the Book of Life every time we let Him down? I wouldn't have a chance because I know I fail to live up to His expectations everyday." Nothing else was said but I thought about it for a very long time. We so often let anger cause us to banish people from our lives for the most trivial reasons, only to regret it, sometimes after it's too late. Thankfully my husband and his friend worked things out and their friendship survived. What I learned most from the experience was how grateful I am that I serve a loving God who doesn't delete me just because I let Him down.
I seem to have a problem with forgiving friends. I need to work on it because I know I have let my friends down before. I have never flat out deceived someone behind their back though with the exception of girlfriends. It happens to me a lot though. I do not know why they do it to me. It just happens. I am a sensitive man and maybe people read that and think "I should not tell him the truth because I do not want to hurt his feelings." Well, let me make that decision. Let me have the opportunity to decide and discuss what is going on. But if you deceive me and I find out then that hurts more than anything. If you have a reason to hide something, which generally means your conscious is telling you that you are doing something you should not be doing. So back to the subject...if my friends have hurt me generally I will write it off as a loss and move them out of my life and press on. That only makes it worse though. Because now I am left without the friend I enjoyed having. So I need to find a way to get over myself and realize people make mistakes, sometimes unforgettable, but never unforgivable. I should not try and erase them from my book of life. To the friends out there (who never read this by the way) I am sorry I have pushed you out. I am sorry I have taken myself out of your life when you may have needed me. I am sorry you felt the need to decieve me. I am sorry that we may have missed some great times in this crappy city. But know you mean a lot to me and I am grateful for the things I have shared with you all.
I receive mountain wings inspiration emails daily and sometimes, well most times they hit the nail on the head the day I need to read it. So the last few day I have received emails about this friendship subject...hear is the last one I received that sums it all up.
Now a days it just don’t seem cool but tell me what am I supposed to do?
And then a wise man once gave me a clue, he said sometimes the only way out,
...is the way through.
~from the movie, “Love Don’t Cost A Thing”~
