Completely free of resentment!

I am very grateful to have been healed of a decades-old claim of bad feelings toward another person. When I was a child, a houseguest of my family acted unkindly toward me and my mother. Even though I rarely thought of this person, when I did, I definitely thought of her as a bit of a “villain,” and certainly without any love.

Then, several months ago, seemingly out of the blue, I received an email newsletter announcing an online talk that would be given by this person. I recognized her name and told my husband about her unpleasant visit as though it were yesterday! I wondered if I should attend her talk, thinking it might improve my opinion of her (now that we were both adults). The next day, The Christian Science Monitor featured a quote by this same person! I was rather surprised that I had gone several decades without hearing anything about this person, and now I was hearing about her twice in two days! I mentioned this to my husband again, and he gently said, “Sounds like this is coming to the surface to be healed.” I agreed but was finding it difficult. 

Clearly, more than human effort was called for, so I started by listening to a really great chat on JSH-Online on the topic “Unity and Forgiveness.” One of the speakers mentioned how she prayed to “see the face of God” in someone she was having trouble loving and also shared that if you are still seeing someone as a bad person, you aren’t truly forgiving them. She said, “To truly forgive is to see that it’s not part of the individual at all and never was,” and the host of the program added, “seeing past the thought of wrongdoing to what God is seeing.” 

The other thought that made me realize I needed to pray to be healed of this resentment was in that week’s Bible Lesson: “God requireth that which is past” (Eccl. 3:15). Another translation of this says, “God seeketh after that which hath been chased away” (which made me think of a long-buried hurt), and the Vulgate translation says, “God reneweth that which is passed.” I take this to mean that God heals any sense of inharmony from the past. When something is in the past, it can be tempting to think, “Well, I don’t have to see that person anymore – it’s not part of my current life.” But if the thought of that person or memory still rankles, it needs to be healed. 

I had called a practitioner for Christian Science treatment about something else. When I mentioned my challenge in forgiving this person, the practitioner told me that the unloving thoughts I was having toward this person were not my thoughts, which was very helpful. That day I read an article in the Monitor about my former houseguest and admired the good work that she was doing, and I realized later that day that I was truly healed of any lingering resentment! It wasn’t human effort trying to convince myself that she was a better person now, but rather a complete wiping away of bad feelings toward her and the unpleasant memory of her visit. I found myself thinking of how the men in the fiery furnace didn’t have even the smell of fire on them, and that is how I feel – completely free of resentment toward her! I am very grateful to God for this healing and am inspired to apply these healing truths to other perceived hurts or slights that I may be holding on to. I would rather hold onto God!