Say if I did not get along with a family member. If I\u00a0forgive him, can I separate myself from him, like move away from him, and never speak to him again?<\/p>\n\t
Can you move? Of course! Once you are an adult you can live wherever you like. Now, that means you are taking on responsibilities that you might not have had before. You will need a job and a place to live, but both of those things are doable if you are willing to put in the effort.<\/p>\n
But what seems to be missing is an understanding of what forgiveness is. Forgiveness is the releasing of a person from any obligations to you. It means that you will treat the person as if the bad things he has done to you never occurred. I know you won’t be able to forget what happened, but when you forgive someone, you work at treating the person with kindness and respect — despite the past.<\/p>\n
Since this person is a family member, it will be necessary at times to talk with him. There will be family gatherings where you might run across the person. It doesn’t mean you have to treat him as if he was your best friend, but it also means you aren’t rude.<\/p>\n
It is difficult to achieve forgiveness since it isn’t merely words, but it helps a lot when you know that the person you have forgiven regrets what he has done. “Be on your guard! If your brother sins, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him<\/em>” (Luke 17:3). Notice that repentance comes before forgiveness. God is not asking us to forgive people while they remain in their sins. That means that in order to forgive, I must work at helping that person understand what he did was wrong and why. That, too, is not easy, but it is necessary.<\/p>\n Now, everyone won’t repent. God would like to forgive everyone (II Peter 3:9), but few are actually willing to change. Still, the effort has to be made. You have to be willing to forgive whenever that person finally does change.<\/p>\n Let’s say you have a father who gets drunk and abusive. Then you need to talk to him about why drinking is ruining your relationship with him. If he doesn’t want to give up drinking, then moving out is a practical choice. You keep your interactions with him polite and kind but minimal. Call him to wish him a happy birthday or send him a nice card talking about the good memories that you have of him. When he asks why you aren’t visiting more, tell him that you don’t want to see him drunk because enough good memories were ruined as it was. Either he will write you off, or he will change. But at least you know that you gave him a chance to change.<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Question: Say if I did not get along with a family member. If I\u00a0forgive him, can I separate myself from him, like move away from him, and never speak to him again? Answer: Can you move? Of course! Once you are an adult you can live wherever you like. Now, that means you are taking…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[173,1571],"class_list":["post-46803","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-answer","tag-family","tag-forgiveness"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":34688,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/when-you-forgive-someone-are-you-required-to-continue-talking-to-them\/","url_meta":{"origin":46803,"position":0},"title":"When you forgive someone are you required to continue talking to them?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"September 10, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: When you forgive a Christian brother or sister who hurt you are we required to continue to talk and be friends with them like old times, like nothing ever happened? Or can we forgive and move on? Answer: \"And forgive us our debts,\u00a0as\u00a0we forgive our debtors\" (Matthew 6:12). \"And\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":24695,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/how-can-you-forgive-someone-if-you-dont-trust-them\/","url_meta":{"origin":46803,"position":1},"title":"How can you forgive someone if you don’t trust them?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"October 4, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I'm really having a hard time with Christianity right now. Things keep getting more confusing to me, which makes me want to give up. We were discussing forgiveness in class Sunday and scenarios we brought up stating how hard it would be to forgive someone and how the relationship\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":60416,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/three-quotes-on-forgiving-a-brother\/","url_meta":{"origin":46803,"position":2},"title":"Three Quotes on Forgiving a Brother","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"April 20, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"From Questions Answered, Lipscomb and Sewell, Kurfees, pg. 260 Question: If a brother in the church offends us, is it right for us to forgive him whether he comes and asks us to or not, or must we hold it against him until he comes and asks our pardon? Would\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":17225,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/how-do-you-move-on-when-your-husband-leaves-you-for-another-person\/","url_meta":{"origin":46803,"position":3},"title":"How do you move on when your husband leaves you for another person?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"January 6, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: How do you move on when your husband leaves you for another person, and he is a Christian who knows better? Answer: I'm really sorry about your plight. It must be devastating. The thing to keep in mind is that you can only do what is within your ability\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":14978,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/my-husband-committed-adultery-and-had-a-child-what-do-i-do\/","url_meta":{"origin":46803,"position":4},"title":"My husband committed adultery and had a child. What do I do?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"November 9, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Good Day, Please, can you help me? My husband had an affair and a child was conceived. He first lied to me, saying it was a one night standing due to issues he had with his mother. But that was a lie. He was in a full relationship with\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":37851,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/why-wasnt-satan-and-his-angels-offered-forgiveness\/","url_meta":{"origin":46803,"position":5},"title":"Why wasn’t Satan and his angels offered forgiveness?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"March 17, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Hello, I just stumbled into your website. I have a question. God commands us to forgive and this I accept but my question is: Why did God not forgive Lucifer, the devil? We need to follow the examples of God. Is there a reason why God refused to forgive\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46803","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46803"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46803\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46803"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46803"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46803"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}