Grab the key and unlock forgiveness // Grace Space // Sharnita Gates

Hey everyone, and welcome to the Gray Space. I'm excited to be with you guys on today, and we are still on our mission to be fruitful and multiply, multiply the word of God in our lives because it's really transformational. It's renewing and refreshing. To really hear the truth, and so we have our our campaign where we are taking the L out of the world, and we're coming back with the word. So today I have a special reflection, devotion, and strategy approach for us today, and we're going to explore some of the depths of for you know forgiveness, and also how we can put more love in our. Lives, um, as we dive deep into the word. And this is the space for us to be able to grow, you know, in love, in the topics that we, we have each day or week, um. And it's more about— for today, we're going to talk about forgiveness and love. So I'm excited to talk about that today. So we're going to be exploring know, a little bit into the word coming from Luke, and that's Luke's, uh, chapter 7, verses 41 and 42. And what it's going to do is it's going to allow us to have a better understanding of the profound impact. It has an impact on us. Like, when we have one understanding, it has an impact on us. So we're going to be able to dive into forgiveness and love, and we're going to be inspired by the teachings of Jesus. So let's get an understanding. Let's grab that key that is going to unlock forgiveness. So we're going to go into Luke 7, verses 41 through 42, and that is going to be About the word, you know, about how much we love. So we're going into that that depth of love and the power of forgiveness. So let's let's let's read Luke seven chapter seven verses forty-one and forty-two. It says two people owed money to a certain money lender. One owed him five hundred. And the other fifty. Neither of them had the money to pay him back, so he forgave the debts of both. Now which of them will love him more? Let's I want you to let's let's let's think on that. One had fifty, one had five hundred. So one had more, one had less. We're talking about debts. So he you know the The man, the owner, the money lender, he gave forgiveness. He forgave both of their debts. Now the question that we want to dive into is understanding now which of them will love him more, will love the money lender more. We're in this season talking about giving and Who— when you think about the level of forgiveness, the more and more you forgive, the more you will have a depth to love because you, you know how much you love, you know how much is forgiven. So we're, we're wanting to dive into that. And as far as we explore our personal journey of experiencing The love of God and, and going through the recognition of our need for forgiveness, grace, and mercy. And when I think about just reflecting on my own personal experience and thinking about like how that word really means how much I love, because I have been forgiven a lot by When I think about, I could, I could just think about how when I didn't know, um, the difference of light and darkness, like in the, in the understanding of not the understanding that I lead to my own, but the understanding when I put it against Christ's teachings and say, Lord, The depths of your love that you have is so profound. When I think about when he said forgive someone and how many times you should forgive over and over and over, like how many times, and I start to think about how many times I've made a mistake and how much God has forgiven me. That's like that 500, you know, when you think about was it 500 or was it 50, you know, how many times have God had to, you know, have to forget, had to forgive you, or, and will have to forgive you, you know. This is all a lonely journey. So he's forgiving and good, you know, abounding in love to all who call out unto him. So it's like, how many times, God, I need you to forgive me? How many times do I need to call out? As many times as needed. But he said call out to him. Say, I, you know, say, God, I need forgiveness for, um, not being able to forget or stop thinking about this person who may have wronged me, or I've felt like may have wronged me. But the thing is, the repetitiveness is saying, God, I need you to forgive me Or that thought that came when I was thinking about this person who I felt like, you know, came against me. Let me be specific. Let me be specific. God, I need you to forgive me for harboring any anger or resentment or, you know, fear, like, or let you know, even letting fear even in place. It's it's heading anywhere. Like God, I need let me let me be specific about what I need forgiveness on, and I can do that multiple times. But the power is to actually speak it and say, God, I need your forgiveness. And he's like, I'm I'm I'm forgiving and good abounding in love to all who call out to me. And I know that you you know when I When I speak it, I know God hears me. He knows my what I understand. He knows what I misunderstand. So we need to actually go boldly before our Father and saying, you know, let me reflect on areas that I may not have told God about. Like, let me let me tell God about you know this this area where I feel like I haven't yet forgiven somebody fully or if it's still bothering me. You, you know, it may still be bothering you. You still need to lead a life like Jesus, like go boldly before the Father and say, you know, Father, forgive them for what they, you know, what they've done, for they know not what they do, you know. So even that same case is for individuals who may have, um, caused you to feel some type of bitterness or you know, unforgiveness, and they don't even know it. And it just reminds me of a situation where, um, someone did, you know, said something to me which was very hurtful, and I had to go back and I was like, why did you say that? And I couldn't remember. And it was like, you, you have, um, you have— it was, it was a situation where we were kids, and it was like, you, you burned me. And I'm like, I don't even remember that. Was it an accident? Did I knock over the iron and burn it? I don't know. But I didn't know. So it's like, I need that forgiveness. And that's one of the things, I pray that they don't harbor anything and say, God, forgive them, for they don't know. I did not know what I did. And that same situation occurs for me when a person may— know, do something, and I'm like, ah, that made me feel some type of way, made me angry, or, you know, I felt maybe rejected, or, um, it brought like a, a fearful, limited thought to me. Like, Lord, I need you to forgive, forgive them. You know, they may not know that they are, you know, causing me to think differently from where I'm Trying to rest my thoughts and have the mind of— so just knowing that we, as we reflect on the areas in our lives that we, we need forgiveness, or, you know, to help unlock our understanding of the word of God, to really understand Jesus' sacrifice that he did for us and how he empowered us and extended grace to us and how we can extend grace others. So there's, you know, that's our, our strategy and our approach is to extend grace to others, to provide forgiveness in our lives so that we can unlock forgiveness in others as well. So today I really want to talk about an area of devotion where we will explore, like, as far as our personal journey of experiencing God's love. And we're going to be recognizing the need for forgiveness. So today I want you guys to devote yourself to really reflecting and, and recognizing your need for forgiveness and grace and mercy, and understanding what forgiveness is, understanding what grace is. Forgiveness is where you Pardon someone the debts. So when we pray, he when Jesus was teaching the disciples on how to pray, he said, "Give us our debts as we forgive our debtors." So we have to release that. We have to release any where we may feel like we may need any form of payment that is going to take away that forgiveness. The only thing that's going to take away forgiveness is for you to. Forgive that debt that you're holding on to it. So that weight, you know, we can hold on to some weight, and that's the debt that we have to release, release into God. And so that's the motion is to release that weight, release that weight of unforgiveness where you may need to give grace like. I may be in the period of where I'm, I'm needing to go to God and cast everything over him and ask him for forgiveness. That's where you can extend grace. Like, person is in, you know, forgiveness where they're, they're, they're trying to forgive. And so I can extend that grace and say, okay, continue to do it over and over and over as many times as you need to because I don't want You to harbor any type of unforgiveness in your heart, and that's a lot of weight. So also, we have the ability to extend mercy. So devote yourself to extending mercy. Mercy is when you have the capabilities to cause harm to someone, but instead give them forgiveness and compassion. Compassion. Instead of you know, being, being angry and sinning. Let's do what the word says. It says be angry but sin not, and let— don't let the, the sun go down on your anger. So, you know, um, as early as possible, continue to— before you, you, you close your eyes and go to sleep, do it over and over. God, I need your forgiveness. This is— look, cast all your cares, all your worries on God, and knowing that he hears you. So that's our strategy and approach as well, is embracing forgiveness. So it can lead to a life of us carrying our own, um, crosses. So when you do that reflection and ask yourself, um, what am I needing for you? What am I needing to extend forgiveness to? Um, when you start to and have that recognition of your own, um, the things that's going on in your own life, you can carry your cross as far as the, the things that are going to come with your life that God has planned. So he— the weight that you are carrying, going to carry weight. He says you're going to have trouble, um, but take heart. But you don't want that excess weight of carrying unforgiveness. Or when you say, I'm not going to extend mercy, I'm not going to be compassionate, you're carrying unnecessary weight. So you might— may as well go ahead and say, I'm going to extend mercy to this individual. So there's an importance of acknowledging our own, our, our, our own need for forgiveness and grace. So understanding that the weight of our debts and the freedom that is found in Christ, that is— these are some that I want you to remember on life. Understanding the weight of our debt and then also the daily commitment to picking up your own weight, your own cross, the things that you have to do to walk in the footsteps of Christ. And when you do that, you're taking up your cross. Okay, if I'm not extending grace to an individual, well, let me pick up my, my cross daily and follow Christ and say, okay, I'm going to extend compassion. And then, so these are key. Another key is just extending grace and forgiveness to others as an outpour of love. That you see. So outpour that, like, the love. This space is great space. Love that God has extended to me, I am extending it to everyone. Like, it— that with the weight of God's love, it's overflowing. It's to where you can— God forgave me for this God forgave me for this. God forgave me for this. I need to forgive others. Yeah, I can forgive someone else. I can love someone else the same way. And that's how I— if once I cast off of that unnecessary weight, now I can pick up the weight of love, of being, you know, joy, and extending that to others and not necessarily to myself. of— for myself reflecting on the areas that I need to cast off weight, you know, and not cast it off on no one else, but cast it off Christ, onto God, and speak to him about everything that's going on. And then another key is your personal testimony. So you have examples of things that you've experienced and also how you extended forgiveness and love to others. So think about those as you devote yourself to really making this journey personable, where you're walking with God and, and experiencing God's love, and also recognizing that we all have a need for forgiveness. We all have a need for grace and All have a need for mercy. Thing is, even wanting to grab the key and unlock forgiveness. Let's extend it to others as we reflect on forgiveness and on love. I want to thank you guys for joining this exploration of grace and Forgiveness. I want you to remember, as we embrace forgiveness and love, we become vessels of God's transformative power, and that's what we can do in this world. So don't— I want you guys to— you're watching, don't forget to like and subscribe and share this video with others that's, that's deep, that's looking to deepen Their understanding of God's grace. But like and follow us on social media, and if you would like to sow and be a blessing, we have our Blessed to Be Blessing. You'll be able to give on our platform if you go to me to gate forward slash give. You'll be able to provide a policy and be blessed to be a blessing. I really appreciate. Joining. Make sure that you are being fruitful and multiplying and continuing to multiply the word of God in your lives. So I thank you guys for joining. Make sure that you check out our community and look forward to the next time we see each other. Come back with the word as we continue to take those L's out of the. Thank you guys for.