Forgive and Forget: Healing the Hurts We Don't Deserve

Skip this book. It's all egotistical nonsense. I believe in forgiving less now than when I first opened this book.

I've struggled with some very painful issues in my life, and read several other books on forgiveness, but they left me feeling like I could never do what they suggested, and did nothing to help me to heal from the painful things that others have done to me. With this book I found that many of the things I'd already gone through were a part of forgiveness, and made forgiving someone within my grasp. I learned that it wasn't necessary to forget about the painful experiences in order to forgive, or to condone the action of the perpetrator in order to be able to forgive them. I didn't need to excuse their behavior by putting myself in their shoes to try to understand why their behavior had an excuse. I borrowed this book from a friend, but after reading it, I decided it was too good of a book to not have a copy of my own.

My father used the parable at the beginning of this book as a sermon illustration while I was home over Christmas break. Three weeks later, I was struggling with some personal issues and remembered this book. I read it, and my entire outlook on life changed. I realized that what the angel says is right. "You cannot change the past, you can only heal the hurt that comes to you from the past. And you can only heal it with the vision of the magic eyes." In reading this book, I learned what it means to look at someone with eyes of love. It means that you see them as who they are, with no exclusions. They are people who hurt you, but they may also be people who have been hurt themselves, or who are weak in some area. You learn to see this and forgive them the hurt they dealt you. This is what love is.

Forgive and Forget sounds like wisdom handed down from parents or grandparents. Lewis Smedes gently leads us through the WORK of forgiveness to the realization that forgiveness is a gift you give yourself. This book changed my life and I am grateful.

We have all been wounded by those we love at some time. We all know the pain of disappointment, injustice, betrayal. In the midst of our pain we cannot fully understand the nature of our feelings of loss, anger or even hatred. Nor are we capable of fathoming the nature of the process by which our most intimate bonds to those we love are sometimes destroyed. Lewis B. Smede's book is more than a mere intellectual journey into the psychology of our hurts. It is a thoughtful and insightful study of the only true medicine for our deepest wounds: Forgiveness. It appeals not only to the mind but also to the spirit. It is a wonderful companion for anyone who is suffering the loss of a cherished relationship, unable to reconcile the injustice or futility of such loss. And for those fortunate few who do not have a grieving heart, it will offer challenging insights into our most intimate emotions. This is a book whose audience is humanity as well as the reader.