Rest in Repentance and Forgiveness (episode 23)

0:00 Do you love a prodigal? Do you feel like you are lost in a scary and endless wilderness? Welcome to the When You Love a Prodigal podcast. I am Judy Douglass and I spent more than 15 years in that wilderness. I believe together we will discover help and hope for your journey. Did you get some rest this week? With lots of time in the presence of God? This week we will look at two more sources of rest for our souls. You know how children are good at manipulating their parents? Of course you know. They'll go to one, the one they think will say yes to what they want, and then they get their yes and go to the other and say mommy said or daddy said, pretty clever. We don't always outgrow that. I remember in a job soon after college I did the same thing. Because I had several different responsibilities, I also had several different bosses. I wanted to be given a certain assignment, but they kind of had to agree on that. So I wanted to ask the one I was sure would say yes first. So I went to that person who said oh yeah that's fine as long as it's okay with the others. So then I went to the

1:32 other two one by one and I said this person said it would be fine and they said well if it's okay with him it's okay with me. So it was a great assignment. I loved it. But the cost was great because as you can see I still remember my shame for manipulating to get my way. You see sin is exhausting. And yes your prodigal is probably exhausted from all his or her sinning. But right now I'm talking about my sin and your sin. As we struggle through this journey almost anyone would grant us grace for occasionally raising our voices, responding in anger, saying really stupid things, making wussy decisions, or instead coming down too hard. And sometimes we sin in those responses which can weary us and yes God does give grace. Other potential sins can really go deeper and perhaps one or more of these sins, realities, plague you. Fear. Fear for the safety, future, and life of your loved one. That makes all the sense in the world but it can take over our hearts and minds. Fear that nothing we try will work and he or she will never change. Fear that we will have

3:11 to live with this pain for the rest of our lives. Fear that we aren't able to give this to God. How about anger? Anger at her for making these terrible choices for clearly not thinking. Anger at ourselves for not doing a better job of influencing, teaching, loving. Anger at God for letting this happen to us. Or not using the voice of grace which we talked about a few weeks ago. Speaking harshly with condemning words or inflammatory accusations. Forgetting that we love this person that we're speaking to. Or just plain not trusting God. How can I believe he is in control? That he loves me in my prodigal when he allows all this pain? How can I believe that he will or even can bring good from this mess? God says it is sin when we continue to live this way consumed with fear or anger or distress day after day. And this sin will truly exhaust us. It will drain the energy right out of us. But God says we don't have to live this way. David wrote

4:47 in Psalm 32 some wonderful words of hope and rest. He says, blessed is the one whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered. Blessed is the one whose sin the Lord does not count against them and whose spirit is no deceit. When I kept silent my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. For day and night your hand was heavy on me. My strength was sapped as in the heat of summer. Then I acknowledged my sin to you and did not cover up my iniquity. I said I will confess my transgressions to the Lord and you forgave the guilt of my sin. You see there is rest when we can trust him. There is rest in repentance. God says in Isaiah, in repentance and rest is your salvation, and quietness and trust is your strength. There is rest when we don't hold on to the sin in our lives but say yes Lord here it is thank you for forgiving me. I love to meditate on Psalms 32 and 51. God speaks to my heart and points out any sin that I need to deal with. I repent and receive

6:18 not only mercy and forgiveness but rest. I encourage you to try this. Then pray the same thing for your prodigal. Your loved one's sins may be different, more blatant, more destructive, more out of control, but they are also exhausting. The possibility of your prodigal returning to his or her senses to you and most of all to God is much better when they find some rest. There is also though rest in another place. There is rest in repentance and there is rest in forgiveness. I still remember the night our son lied to me on the way to spend the night with his girlfriend.

7:09 There was a lot involved there but he just lied and that really distressed me. And then there were the terrible things he said to me in his drunken state in our front yard at 3 one morning. I'm sure the neighbors enjoyed the show. And when he pawned the guitar I had given him for his birthday. So little gratitude. But this one really got to me. He stole from his sister. I was angry at those things. The lies, the drinking and drugs, the stealing, they happened often and there were consequences as well as God enabled grace and mercy. But those events that I just named, they have been harder for me. I have forgiven them many times. I put them behind me and moved on in peace.

8:08 But then something would trigger a memory and the pain would resurface or the anger would return. And once again I needed to consciously extend mercy to my son. I needed to forgive him. He of course knows nothing of this ongoing battle over his past sins. Unforgiveness is exhausting. If we hold on to our resentment or anger or even great frustration we'll get tired. We'll get weary. I'm sure our prodigals will need to know they are forgiven for all that they have done. Though usually they don't sense that need until they've made some kind of turnaround. We are the ones who are being worn out and worn down when we are not able to forgive. Consequences are appropriate.

9:05 They should be defined beforehand and given with grace. But we must then also forgive. And in forgiveness we will find rest. Conflict by definition implies lack of rest. Conflict, being wrong, the ongoing battle, all these bring offense. Something we hold on to grievances we embrace and the grasping of that will surely exhaust us. Again there is rest in forgiveness. God has given us the key. He says, bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you, we are told in Colossians 3. And in Hebrews, therefore since the promise of entering his rest still stands, let's be careful that none of you be found to have fallen short because of disobedience. If we can't forgive we will miss out on the rest that God has offered. He has clearly told us forgive. And just as clearly he has shown that rest comes through obedience. So is there something you are holding on to, a wrong from your

10:36 loved one that you have not forgiven? Take it to Jesus. Consciously forgive. Verbally forgive. Maybe to your prodigal but maybe you just need to say it. For conflict to dissipate we need to forgive and then there is rest. There is just this freedom, this release that comes when we forgive. Certainly our loved ones, even enemies God says, but this person we love we forgive and we find rest. Here are some questions for you. When have you experienced the release and rest that come from not keeping silent but confessing your failures or your sin to God? If you are weary, might some of your exhaustion stem from unforgiveness? If you can't yet forgive some things your prodigal has done, could you start with forgiving a lesser offense and then maybe as you find rest and freedom go on to the more hurtful things that they have done. You see in seeking rest in our Lord there is rest in forgiveness and there is rest in repentance. Oh how God wants us to live not in great weariness but in rest, at rest with Him. God bless you. Thank you for joining

12:16 me today on the When You Love a Prodigal podcast. If you enjoyed today's episode please subscribe, rate and review the show on Apple podcasts or wherever you listen. Your review helps the show reach more people with the hope and encouragement of Jesus. Don't forget take a look at the show notes and for more helpful information, resources and books check out judydouglass.com. That's Douglass with two S's. You can find me on Facebook and on Twitter and Instagram at JudyDouglass417.

12:56 Until next week.