Pursue Forgiveness Quickly

Scripture: Ephesians 4:26–27, 32

A few years ago a couple sat in my office locked in a standoff over something that happened eleven years earlier. Eleven years. When I asked the husband why he had never apologized, he said, "I was waiting for the right moment." Friend, if the right moment hasn't shown up in eleven years, it isn't coming. You have to go get it.

Paul gives married couples one of the most practical commands in all of Scripture when he tells us not to let the sun go down on our anger. Notice he doesn't say, "Don't get angry." Anger is going to happen in your marriage. You are two sinners married to each other. What Paul warns against is letting anger spend the night. Because anger that stays overnight doesn't just sleep on the couch. It moves in. It unpacks its bags. And Paul says it gives the devil a foothold — a base of operations right in the middle of your home.

Unforgiveness is rarely a single decision. It is a slow accumulation. Nobody wakes up one morning and decides to be bitter. Bitterness is what happens when small hurts are collected instead of confessed. The couple in my office wasn't really fighting about the eleven-year-old offense. They were fighting about four thousand nights of night resolving the conflict.

Forgiveness in marriage has to be pursued, not just permitted. Those are two very different postures. Permitting forgiveness says, "If you come apologize, I suppose I'll accept it." Pursuing forgiveness says, "I am not willing to let distance live between us, so I'm coming to you first." That is the posture of God toward us in Christ. He did not wait for us to make the first move. While we were still sinners, He pursued.

Paul finishes the thought in verse 32. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you. The measure of your forgiveness toward your spouse is not the size of their offense. It is the size of your Savior's forgiveness toward you. When I remember how much I have been forgiven, it gets a lot harder to hold a grudge over a forgotten anniversary or a sharp word spoken in traffic.

So here is the practice. Before your head hits the pillow tonight, do a quick inventory. Is there anything between you and your spouse — anything unspoken, unconfessed, unresolved? You don't have to solve the whole issue before bedtime. Some conflicts genuinely need daylight and rest before they can be worked through. But you can close the distance. You can say, "We're not done talking about this, but I want you to know I love you and we're on the same team." That one sentence has saved more marriages than I can count.

Don't let the sun go down. Pursue forgiveness quickly. Your marriage cannot afford an eleven-year standoff, and by God's grace, it never has to have one.

For the two of you this week.

Ask each other, "Is there anything I've never apologized for that still hurts you?" Then listen without defending. You may be surprised what eleven years of sundowns have collected.