What are the most important entities we should seek?

What are the most important entities we should seek?

While reading the bible with my son, not too long before he died, he asked me what are the most important things we should consider?  My response was love and forgiveness.  I’m not sure if he had an inclination of his impending death or just curious.  However, during his final weeks his demeanor in concern for family members seemed to increase, and his question appeared to make sense.

Speaking to other members regarding this I received comments such as; I can forgive someone who has hurt me bitterly but will never forget it.  Or, as one person remembered a Rabi reminiscing the Holocaust said he could never forgive what was done at Auschwitz and other death camps during WWII; God would have to do that.  I could not say that I knew how he felt.  Unless we were there neither could we.  I know a woman who went through a bitter divorce where physical and mental abuse were common in her marriage.  To this day she is bitter and her four children are recipients of the brow-beatings she endured.  

The list of actual experiences from as many individuals as events that have left innumerable emotional scars would be never-ending.  If we could line up every event that has left too many persons with loads of suffering, sleepless nights, or distrust in other people there would be an endless array of bitterness and hatred towards humanity itself.  At the end of the exposition we would find a sad ending to souls who once were happy, industrious, and attractive to someone who cared.  They no longer have that demeanor of love and forgiveness.

Let’s move the clock back thousands of years when God’s creation went awry and his people constantly rejected his goodness and over and over God continued to forgive those he loved and still they continued to turn away.

Then, 2,000 years ago God said; “I will send a Savior, my Son, to show them I care; then they will believe me.”  “Whom should he sacrifice his blood for?  “Those who suffered a holocaust or the many who received a living hell from their spouse”?  “Or the persons who were guilty of murdering innocent people, and the unfaithful spouse who treated his family with abuse”?

There is so much love in the heart of God he never makes a distinction as to who he would shed his blood.  When we seek forgiveness confessing our sins God remembers them no more.  He not only forgives even the greatest sin we can commit, he forgets them as well.

With certainty we can not say I forgive but will never forget.  Since love is the greatest gift God has given us we must forgive as God forgives.  If not then where is the love in that?  Answering my son’s query I feel certain he took it to heart.

Ralph B. Hathaway, Love and Forgiveness; the most important essence of life!