Our world likes to speak of opposites, it gives us something to set our progress by.  Am I being good or bad?  Is this a truth or a lie?  Am I being greedy or generous?  Is this someone I love or hate?  From here we rate ourselves – in a fair, non-bias way, of course.  I wonder then about one of the great pillars of Christianity – forgiveness.
What sits opposed to forgiveness?  Grudges I suppose, but I am not so sure it works out in the same way.  I may tell someone the truth and then lie to them.  I may express love for someone only to hate them later.  No mater how I look at it; I just can’t make sense of the idea that I could forgive someone only to hold a grudge later.  It seems to me forgiveness is the end of the line.  I can rate myself and see just how forgiving I have been today, but it wont be anything like an assessment of my honesty.  Either I forgave or I did not.  The majority could be in one category or the other, but there really is no middle ground for half-truths.
What then is forgiveness?  Something so active really needs a story, not a definition. In finding one we need only look to Jesus.  “Father forgive them for they know not what they do.”  In the midst of His crucification, Jesus wanted forgiveness for those who were not sorry and those who would continue to cause Him pain and ultimately His death.  It isn’t because Christians are to be spineless, but because you cannot show unconditional love to those who you only conditionally accept.
It is a scary thing when Jesus says in the Lord’s Prayer, “Forgive us as we forgive…”  or even Mark 11:25.  Forgiveness is not “Pretend like it never happened,” but it is a change in your heart.  Unconditional love requires unconditional forgiveness.  How can I possibly take up a cross and follow Him when all I want to do is make the one who made me cry suffer?  Consumed with my anger and my desire for revenge, my grudge takes me off the path.  If I am lucky, in the end I will find myself back at the foot of His cross – to pick up my own again.
Scarred?  He knows, but from there you look pure as driven snow.  Can you see your neighbor with His eyes?

~JCPunk