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A family member in the South was involved in a car accident many years ago. She had been out drinking socially and she was not hurt, neither was her car damaged. But the other car was one of those that turn over easily....it turned over and also the seat belts in that car broke. The young woman in that car was killed.

As a result, my cousin has been in prison for many years. (One thing good is that she came to know Christ as her personal Savior due to being in prison.) She was an outstanding business woman before and involved in her community....no criminal record at all. She raised her children into good citizens, took care of her elderly mother and even the prison has given her a job where she can benefit humanity. I think she has even done some tutoring among the other prisoners who tend to be illiterate.

But every time her appeal comes up, she is denied her freedom because the family of the young woman that was killed in the other car will not forgive my cousin, and they are very influential in the community!! This family goes to church....I think they are only "church goers"....because even in the Lord's Prayer, we pray "forgive us our sins, as we forgive those that sin against us." Also, the Lord teaches us to forgive elsewhere.

I just felt like telling this because my cousin recently had another appeal and it was denied again. She is still trusting the Lord.

Amen, sister. We are indeed supposed to forgive others. If we cannot forgive how can we expect God to forgive us.

We should be praying that God opens their eyes and softens their hearts.

dear christian, well this is very diffurcult to fully understand,i know GOD test us one of us daily.AND in forgiveness we should start with every day things.forgiveness perhaps takes some time and pray too.But the child of GOD should be able to forgive,thats a true mark of a christian forgiveness. we have to rest on this promise of romans 8:28

Yes, thank you very much.  My mom talked to my cousin's very elderly mom on the phone and her mother thought that it might even be unsafe for my cousin to be released....they are still so angry after so many years.

Yes, all things do work together for good to those who love God and are the called according to His purpose. : )

Remember when Paul and Silas were in the prison there in Acts 16.
God could have released them at any time.  But He waited until midnight.  And what we see is that Paul and Silas had a mission even there in prison.  Through the suffering they took by getting their stripes (lashes) the jailer was a saved man.  And apparently all that were in prison with them.

So take heart and let the Lords will be done.  And do not worry for your cousin, for she is in God's hands and His are much better than anything we could do.  The only thing we should do is to continue to pray.  And pray I shall for your cousin and family.

Amen to what Brother Jerry said.  I too thought that maybe The Lord has something more in mind for your cousin while there in prison. And for the family that lost the woman, bitterness will eat them up alive.... pray for that bondage to be broken. Who knows.... maybe the Good Lord will use your cousin to reach them!

(http://i20.photobucket.com/albums/b207/tinabaran/godblessyouSPARKLE.gif)

I pray that the bondage of unforgiveness is broken in many people, there are so many people in this world who are miserable and a lot of it is because they are unwilling to forgive. Forgiveness heals everyone involved.

Amen!  None of us are perfect, only Jesus.  I too will pray for your cousin and family.

Thanks very much everyone.  She is still trusting the Lord very much, but does struggle with depression over this.   The prison has her training dogs (helper or drug sniffing, I forgot which)....so she does love this.  She just got another new puppy to train.

I will pray for your cousin and family.  Also, I am adding this for you to share..........

Learning to Forgive

The journey toward our healing starts with unconditional love and forgiveness - unconditional love and forgiveness we offer first to ourselves. These two are so closely interwoven that it is impossible to conceive of unconditional love without forgiveness and vice versa. As God loves utterly and forgives utterly, so we are to offer love and forgiveness. Jesus in his reply to the Pharisees stated: "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it; Love your neighbour as yourself." Matthew 22:37-39 In the prayer he gave to his friends, and in his subsequent explanation Jesus is quoted as saying: "Forgive us our debts as we forgive others ... if you forgive others their transgressions, your heavenly Parent will forgive you ... but if you do not forgive others, neither will your Parent forgive your transgressions."

There is no doubt God desires that we are all healed and whole, yet self-forgiveness and self-love are either neglected or put in the "too hard" basket. Worse still, many of us have never heard this portion of the Gospel. Yet from our earliest days we have been subjected to moral and spiritual directions which have taught us what was "good" and what was "bad"; what was "expected of us" and what was "unacceptable or inexcusable conduct". In fact, we are bent over by layer upon subsequent layer of shame and guilt, imposed on us by family, society, various spiritual decrees and regulations, by those who employ us and those with whom we work. Our greatest need is to see ourselves with the eyes of God, as people who are loved and are forgiven totally. We may need to turn to those skilled in the ministry of healing of memories to help unlock all those doors behind which we have repressed pain, anxiety, bitterness and failures together with the memories of those kindnesses we neglected, and all those acts of conciliation we refused. As Jungian John Sanford notes, "We are all of us wounded people. The is no such thing as a person who is free from illness, incompleteness, and injury to his or her personality. Some of us can simply hide from our woundedness better than others. When we can no longer hide from our woundedness, we are ready for individuation." As those who have not yet forgiven nor loved themselves we remain unhealed people. What is our reaction when we are required by Jesus to love and forgive others as we love and forgive ourselves, if we have not yet made peace with ourselves? How can we express unconditional forgiveness and love to others when we have not yet experienced it in our own lives?

Fear, the opposite of love  is manifested in many forms: hatred, jealousy, pride, resentment, anger, greed, prejudice, hostility, conceit and various, "ism" words. Each and every one of these manifestations of fear corrodes our personality, our spiritual walk, our attitudes and our physical bodies. Changes in blood pressure, indigestion, ulcerated stomachs, nervous breakdowns and coronary attacks can often be traced back to lack of unconditional love. Unconditional love frees us from all bonds and restrictions - we rejoice at the successes of others, and mourn over the plight of many. We are so filled with love that life bubbles over. Those who are yet to know this experience of unconditional love often close in on themselves, creating a universe of which they are the center. They are fearful and jealous of their reputation, they begrudge the successes of others, they become neurotic and sometimes paranoid that there is a conspiracy somewhere directed against them. Their fear, hatred and jealousy eat away at their peace of mind, at their relationship with the Creator, and at their physical bodies. They become consumed by fear, riddled by the worms of nightmares of their own making. Their lives are punctuated by explosions of anger, and as such are immature reminders of childhood. Whether these outbursts are used as a release of tension or frustration, or whether they are used as a weapon, they are still only tools of manipulation. James 4: 1-2 speaks of these outbursts.

God continues to love all of creation, passionately, unconditionally. For God so loved the world that ..........


"If love is the soul of Christian existence, it must be at the heart of every other Christian virtue. Thus, for example, justice without love is legalism; faith without love is ideology; hope without love is self-centeredness; forgiveness without love is self-abasement; fortitude without love is recklessness; generosity without love is extravagance; care without love is mere duty; fidelity without love is servitude. Every virtue is an expression of love. No virtue is really a virtue unless it is permeated, or informed, by love 1Corinthians 13."

Why shouldn't those who have wronged us be punished, made to bear the cost of their actions/words? We all have a deep-seated conviction that "someone ought to pay." Jesus spoke of this "eye for an eye" attitude - the letter of the law - as being superceded by the requirements of Love. How can things ever be made right? How can those words/actions be wiped from the memories and lives of the victims and of others? Revenge merely sets one on the same level as the one who has wronged you, forgiveness moves you both closer to God. From forgiveness it is a tiny step to accept others as beloved children of God, and to love them as such.

Jesus demonstrated that God condemns no person; therefore why do we? Why do we refuse forgiveness when for our own healing, wholeness and peace of mind we need to be forgiven and to offer forgiveness? "Forgiveness means that we have asked for a miracle: the ability to see through the mistakes that someone has made to the truth that lies in all our hearts"  Marianne Williamson, Illuminata. Forgiveness is seeing others as loved as equally as we are by God, and as justified, forgiven and reconciled by the blood of Jesus as we are.

Forgiveness removes our rights to avenge and to revenge. It prevents us from attacking others. Forgiveness costs - often it seems to produce more pain than the original wounding. It involves accepting voluntarily the harm or evil that has been inflicted on oneself, and letting the other person go free. In love, we bear the cost of those sins against us. Both human and divine forgiveness are substitutional. The cross was the price God paid to forgive us. We could never pay the debt of sin we owe to God, so God paid it for us. By our forgiveness of others we pay their debt to us.

Forgiveness does not mean we suppress our anger - forgiveness means we give up our right to anger. Alone we cannot do this, it is far too hard. Every person is one for whom Christ died, and one whom God regards as a perfect, loving child. We need to recognize that each and every one of us is an immortal soul. Our actions and reactions will become part of the immortal record of our lives. We need to turn to God and ask for strength to tread this path, so that we may offer forgiveness, acceptance and love to others. Only God knows and understands others, so rather than trying to analyze their motives, we need only to be accepting and forgiving. In Col 3: 12-14 Paul speaks of this. God has never refused forgiveness to any person, nor turned away from any.

There can be no peace without forgiveness. Forgiveness does not erase the past, nor can forgiveness change it. Instead forgiveness removes the power of the past to cause pain or anger; it provides permanent healing of those memories. Forgiveness empties the bitterness from our lives. Bitterness left to fester will erode our attitudes, our rationale and motives and our relationship with God. To be able to accept God's forgiveness we must be free in ourselves to offer forgiveness to others. We must be prepared to offer this forgiveness not only once, but should a memory of the offence be renewed we must offer forgiveness once again - continually. To offer forgiveness continually is to live forgiveness by accepting the rough and tumble of life, by turning disappointments into opportunities. While we still may not like the person(s), or may find a clash of lifestyle or philosophy to be a bit too much to say 'friend', we at least reach out to find the common ground and see if friendship, or at least the ability to work and live together, develops.

cont'd next post

C.S. Lewis in The Weight of Glory speaks of the unconditional love we are asked to demonstrate:

"And our charity must be a real and costly love, with deep feeling for the sins in spite of which we love the sinner--no mere tolerance, or indulgence which parodies love as flippancy parodies merriment. Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbour is the holiest object presented to your senses. If he is your Christian neighbour, he is holy in almost the same way, for in him also Christ vere latitat -- the glorifier and the glorified, Glory Himself, is truly hidden."

It is by forgiveness that we dissolve the bonds that tie us to those we forgive, as well as to our old thought patterns and beliefs. Without the willingness to forgive we perpetuate the pain, the abuse and the memories of those past traumas continuing in our present time. We have no need to confront that person(s) to offer forgiveness. We can ask God to wrap them in our forgiveness and love, or we can choose to visualize sending a cloud or blanket of love and forgiveness to them and having it enfold them. Those who use a pipe in prayer will also know how to send such blessings. There is no barrier to prevent us extending our forgiveness, save our own willfulness. Perhaps we don't choose to forgive today, or let go of those painful memories just yet. We want to hug them a little longer to our breasts, to feel the thorns again pierce our flesh. Why? Why in the name of the Risen Christ do we Christians choose this option? Christ has borne the cost of forgiveness, why must we punish ourselves by refusing forgiveness? Why do we choose to continue to live as the victims of rape, of verbal or emotional abuse, and of rejection when in an instant we can set ourselves and the perpetrators free? Do we not believe we deserve the peace and joy such forgiveness will secure? What is the fear which will not permit us to live as healed, whole, radiant people?

As a society, as a nation, as part of all creation we need communally to seek forgiveness from God. While a society cannot be ordered to don sackcloth en masse, we can gather publicly and commit to the change, and the Christians of our nations can (as individuals and as the Church) confess our sins before God and another (or many others) and seek God's forgiveness. Our society and our nations have practiced racism; we have been willing to destroy the mountains of food we have overproduced while millions in the world starve; we have not spoken out when we have seen the rights, the homes and the lives of others destroyed; we have created barriers of class, gender and sexuality. As members of our societies and our nations we must be prepared to seek forgiveness from those whom we wronged, and try to make restitution. Sometimes restitution is not possible, but our act of confession and sorrow allows the growth of roots of healing. And with this healing comes reconciliation.

Reconciliation is not easily achieved on either side, for each of us has been damaged by our own acts and by the acts of others. We have built defensive walls to protect us from further damage. God will need our permission to start demolishing these walls. But by the gift of unconditional love and forgiveness Jesus has moved to restore our relationship with God and our relationship with each other.

For this is my blood of the covenant, which will be shed on behalf of many for the forgiveness of sins.

Sometimes I believe we forget the price God paid so that we could be forgiven, so that no trace of those sins would ever remain to convict us in God's sight. Jesus was physically put to death, his body broken, spilled out for us. When we read the Ten Commandments and Jesus' commission for each of us, we cannot but note that God's directs our concern outward to others. It is our neighbours, our families, our enemies, and the untapped fields waiting to be reaped for Christ which are the focus of God's attention. When we share the Eucharist it is not a solitary meal, for even if we are celebrating it by ourselves, we do so within the entire universal family of believers, past, present and future. God's love and forgiveness pour out, as Christ's blood was poured out, for all. And that includes all from whom we have withheld our forgiveness. We can never be sure of the hidden compulsions which cause people to strike out, so how can we judge their words and actions justly? God does know, and God forgives.

Stop judging and you will not be judged. Stop condemning and you will not be condemned. Forgive and you will be forgiven.

We are called to be a peculiar people, to view life differently and to live it differently. In some ways our walk may seem topsy-turvy to others; our values have changed from self to service. In Matthew 5: 21-24 are recorded Jesus' words which challenged his hearers' previous thoughts about their relationship to each other and to God. Jesus not only overturned the tables at the Temple, but he overturned our responses to one another even to this day. When, after the war, Corrie ten Boom met a former guard who had been responsible for the torment of women in the concentration camp at Ravensbruck, try as she could, her hand would not extend to touch his ... until she put the matter in God's hands, and forgave. She could then clasp his hand and bless him. Topsy-turvy it could seem.

The words whose echoes still resound in the ether, continuing to challenge us to repudiate the reasons we use to justify withholding unconditional love and forgiveness, are those which Jesus spoke at Calvary:

Father, forgive them, they know not what they do.

Resting in the hands, of the Lord.
Bob

Sister, I am praying for your cousin and for her mom, as I know her mom must be terribly heart broken. I also pray that God will break the bondage of unforgiveness in the other family and that they may realize that they must forgive it is a command given to us as Christians.

In the meantime I am glad that your cousin has received the Lord as her Savior and that she is doing good work. God sees all things and I know He holds her future.

Thanks everyone.  Yes, God did do a work in my cousin's heart when she landed in prison.  Before she apparently had the "good life" but not the Lord.  Since we live on different sides of the country, I have not seen her since we were children.  But she writes to my mom and me, and my cousin's letters are full of hope and love of God.

Oh, my cousin's mother is almost totally blind, too.  If she were out of prison, she would also be taking care of her mother.  The prison appeal board is not thinking right....why make taxpayers pay to incarcerate a person that is not a threat to society....just to appease an influential family that won't forgive.

The family that will not forgive her go to a Baptist church....so that is why I think they are just church goers....a born again Christian would be miserable if they would refuse to forgive another.

Has anyone actually went up to them and asked why as Christians they don't forgive? Also Remind them that they have to forgive if God is to forgive them. Also I suggest non family members talking to them. Asking God is good but we must do some ourselves.

As for the crime, you didn't say how long she has been in, but even though accident, her carelessness cost a life and she deserves 20 years.

13Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. 14And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. 15Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful.
Colossians 3:13-15 (NIV)

And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you.
Ephesians 4:32 (KJV)

So watch yourselves. If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him. 4If he sins against you seven times in a day, and seven times comes back to you and says, 'I repent,' forgive him."
Luke 17:3 (NIV)

In these  verses the Bible says to forgive people just like God forgave you, no matter what.  It seems very hipocritical to say "Dear God, I want you to forgive me of my sins but I'm not going to forgive 'Jane Duck' for what she did to me." 

You can't love God and hate your brother at the same time.  And you are to love your enemies as yourself.  Even if you don't like someone or something they did, you are still supose to love and forgive them.

DavidKortleve2: http://forums.christiansunite.com/index.php?topic=15893.0 do you think I am
Friend : I do not think you are harsh.  No one is addressing the situation that she was driving while drinking... and her own actions caused this to happen.  If people are going to drink and drive they need to pay the price for that.   The other family... for their own peace of soul ... must forgive.... but it doesn't mean they have to try to help the person who caused their family member's death to be free.  they can forgive and still say she should serve  the time for the crime she committed,  as a message to society that  drinking and driving kills people,  but they must forgive .. if they expect God to forgive them for their transgressions
DavidKortleve2: I agree

I would like to explain more so you might understand the situation.    I do not agree with drinking but my cousin was not drunk but out drinking socially.  Her car was a very small car....it had no damage and she was not hurt.  Meanwhile, the other car, an SUV (the kind that rolls over very easily did roll over and the seat belts broke.

I think if it had been another type of car and if the seat belts had not broke....the other girl would still be alive.  Also, the couple in the car (with the girl that died) had also been drinking.

Plus the family sued the car manufacturer because the seat belts broke!!  And they were awarded money for this.....so apparently, they also think that their daughter died because the seat belts broke.

My cousin has served plenty of years and is no danger to society.   After her time served already, I think it would be better to put someone that is a danger to society in prison instead.  Once my cousin is out of prison she wants to continue to tell of how God saved her and helped her through this experience.  She probably will also start a business so she can provide for herself and her elderly mother.  As I said....she is no menace to society.

Okay I understand now. I am no expert at law but I do think they should release her.

Thanks, David, for your kind understanding.  God bless you.

I have been thinking about your cousin. How is she?

Thanks, David, for thinking of her.  She is still in prison and is still training the dogs.  She really loves doing this work with the dogs and has trained a few already through the recent years.  She thinks she will be getting "work release".....not real soon....actually, she wrote us but I forgot when she said it would come up.

Maybe someone here can explain work release?  I think it's like living in a half-way house and going to work each day on the "outside".  In the meantime, she still loves working with the dogs.

In prison systems, work release programs allow a prisoner who is sufficiently trusted or can be sufficiently monitored leave confinement to continue working at his or her current place of employment, returning to prison when his/her shift is complete. The concept was introduced in the state of Wisconsin in 1913 under the Huber Law program, which continues to be the casual name of Wisconsin's work release program presently.

Some work release programs allow greater freedom for the prisoner, allowing prisoners who follow a Monday-Friday work week to attend work and live at their homes on those days, and serve their sentences two days at a time on weekends.

Hope this helps Debp.

Thanks for explaining it.  Since we live on the West Coast, my mom and I only hear what's happening via the letters and sometimes my mom phones my cousin's elderly mom.