Morning Prayer 5

In this series of blogs, I thought I would share some explanations about the Morning prayer by Jo Getzinger, my prayer minister.  Some of you have asked questions about these prayers, so I will take it paragraph by paragraph.  Some of it might seem obvious, but I think this can be helpful for all of us.  If you’d like to see the full prayer you can go to www.Care1.org or purchase Prayer Warriors from Amazon. 

This is the next paragraph:

“I ask for Your mercy when any part of me harbors unforgiveness.  I confess that since You have forgiven and accepted me, I am commanded to forgive and accept not only the persons who have hurt me, but also myself and all of my parts, regardless of what was done.  I choose to accept Your forgiveness, and I am eternally grateful.”

This paragraph is pretty self-explanatory, but challenging, especially forgiving ourselves.  Before my memories began to surface, I thought I was a pretty good Christian and handled things well.  I was well versed in forgiveness and the necessity of doing it.  And because I “kept all the rules” in my presenter, I really didn’t need a Savior.  Of course I know the rhetoric and believed it, but in practice, I managed things pretty well on my own.  When the memories began to surface, I began to realize just how much I didn’t really know about forgiveness in practice, both forgiving perpetrators and then also forgiving myself, which to me is the hardest!

In the cult system, survivors are trained from a very young age to perpetrate as well.  Survivors will need to address both the victim side and the perpetrator side for full healing.  Many just stay in the victim mode about what was done to them.  This does need to be addressed and validated, but then what we were forced to participate in, must be addressed, too.  When I began to realize what I had done, it was easier to forgive those who perpetrated against me, understanding they had gone through the same programming and torture as me and may not have felt they had a choice in what they did.  It is true that some have been so programmed for so long that they now willingly participate, but understanding the intensity of the torture and programming to get there helps us to have compassion for them.  No one is beyond God’s redemption. 

Forgiveness is such a precious gift from True FAMILY that we get to give to others and to ourselves.  What do you struggle with most?  Forgiving others or yourself or both?  Comment below!