{"id":367,"date":"2014-08-24T21:33:26","date_gmt":"2014-08-25T06:33:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/?p=367"},"modified":"2014-08-25T01:33:45","modified_gmt":"2014-08-25T10:33:45","slug":"august-24-reconciliation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/?p=367","title":{"rendered":"August 24 – Reconciliation"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>

\"reconcilation\"<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Our Sunday School Class today focused on the role of reconciliation in our lives.\u00a0 Reconciliation benefits both people or both sides of \u201cthe divide\u201d.\u00a0 In my dealings with families I deal with some where one or more members are not reconciled with the rest of the family.\u00a0 As I listen to the stories about the divisions I have empathy for those involved because I know their lives could be more joyful if the issue that caused the separation could be resolved.\u00a0 In Sunday School we learned that it almost always takes each person being willing to forgive the other person for reconciliation to blossom.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Sometimes illness can be a catalyst that moves family members to forgiveness because they don\u2019t want the animosity unresolved.\u00a0 Sometimes this is evidenced when a dying parents tells two adult children to please get past their differences so I can die knowing you will be there for each other.\u00a0 When this situation arises and one of the children engages me in a conversation about the request of the dying parent, it is an emotional experience for the child and also for me as the chaplain.\u00a0 Instead of ignoring my emotions I use them to guide how I respond to the person as they share their story.\u00a0 In many cases the person is seeking some justification that they have a right to be upset with their sibling.\u00a0 If they ask me if I agree I generally can relate with why they felt hurt and can affirm the event or events that caused the separation are legitimate reasons to be upset.\u00a0 Then I go a step further and ask them if perhaps they have held onto the pain long enough and maybe now is the time when they could let go of it.\u00a0 When you look at past hurts, they share one thing in common: they are in the past.\u00a0 Nothing we do now can change the event for erase the pain that has been felt. \u00a0But if we ask ourselves the question, \u201cDo I want to be burdened by this pain into the future?\u201d we learn surprisingly the answer is \u201cNo\u201d.\u00a0 Once we reach that point then describing what actions would be required to grant forgiveness can happen.\u00a0 In my experience no one will really move toward forgiving someone until they reach the point of wanting to be unburdened.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I\u2019ll ask the same question our Sunday School booklet asked: \u201cIs there someone you need to forgive today?\u201d\u00a0 Is so, what is stopping you from taking the first step?\u00a0 It is a good question to think about as you start the path of living reconciliation in your life.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  Our Sunday School Class today focused on the role of reconciliation in our lives.\u00a0 Reconciliation benefits both people or both sides of \u201cthe divide\u201d.\u00a0 In my dealings with families I deal with some where one or more members are not reconciled with the rest of the family.\u00a0 As I listen to the stories about … Continue reading August 24 – Reconciliation<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-367","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/367","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=367"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/367\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":370,"href":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/367\/revisions\/370"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=367"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=367"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=367"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}