Fairness or Forgiveness...

We have had such a great summer with the B&B… so many unbelievably kind people that we have had the privilege of having stay with us! Many of the guests we have had stay with us left the rooms so neat that it didn’t look like they even slept in the bed. It has been unbelievable of how God has blessed the Inn & us... from the beginning our prayer has always been, “Lord, bring the people You want through our door.”

Labor Day Weekend we had a couple last-minute guests through Airbnb so we ended up with a full house! That was great! I was a little hesitant about taking one of the last minute people, but after Luke reassured me, we “ok’d” the reservation. Anyway, we had the worse experience we have had with a guest so far. It was an awkwardly strained experience from the moment they came through the door. I will not go into any of the details, except to say, we have never had anyone be so disrespectful of our home or other guests!  It was so upsetting for me to think of someone treating our home with such disregard!

Fast forward to Wednesday… we received a review that this person wrote on our B&B… it was so disrespectful to our home & to other guests that were staying at the same time as him! It just upset me all over again! He did say the food was “superb”, but everything else was not good. It took me awhile to be able to stop talking about. So when we got home & I went into that room where they had stayed, I felt so violated all over again! This bad experience had completely thrown me off balance… distracting me from God’s vision for our home. I knew I had every right to feel the way I did, but it really was not going to do me any good or my husband (putting up with my crabbiness) any good either. So during my quiet time God showed me how I could let it go... here is that "secret"... FORGIVE!

Oh, forgive! It really never occurred to me that I needed to forgive how this person treated us & our home. It is one of those things that this person came into my life for a moment & then left, no ongoing relationship, so I wasn’t even seeing it as a forgiveness-needed situation. Here’s the picture God gave me… it is like little nicks in my heart & after I keep letting those little nicks build up it turns into a gouge out of my heart. 

I know that forgiving people that I have relationships with is so important, but I never gave any thought to forgiving strangers that hurt me. There are people that come across my path that may treat me poorly, like aggressive, rude drivers, strangers that I will never see again, but if I allow their actions to affect me, then I do carry them with me as a “nick” in my heart.

There are things that happen in life that are not fair, but forgiveness is not about fairness! Forgiveness is about releasing that person to let God handle it. Forgiveness is about not letting others’ actions change your actions for the worse. Forgiveness is about letting that “nick” in your heart be healed by the refreshing love of Christ… forgive others as the Lord has forgiven you for Christ’s sake. (Ephesians 4:32) Forgiveness is freedom from a wounded spirit!

What are you going through today? Will forgiveness go a long way in healing the nick in your heart?

Rejoicing in Truth!

Carin