{"id":3993,"date":"2014-01-05T01:00:52","date_gmt":"2014-01-05T06:00:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.allandouglas.com\/blog\/?p=3993"},"modified":"2025-04-21T01:56:40","modified_gmt":"2025-04-21T05:56:40","slug":"reconciliation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/reconciliation\/","title":{"rendered":"RECONCILIATION"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"AP.jpg\"How well do you handle reconciliation?\u00a0 Do you dread the process of making up?\u00a0 Do you enjoy clinging to the pain of past hurts?\u00a0 Does pride prohibit your assuming any responsibility for the conflict?\u00a0 Perhaps it is the discomfort of having to initiate the opening of old wounds and the cleansing of festered relationships that frightens you away from the peace table.\u00a0 Your hesitancy to apologize or suggest improved relationships may stem from your fear of being rejected.\u00a0 There are numerous reasons why reconciliation is avoided.\u00a0 Yet, it is one of life’s most rewarding experiences.\u00a0 There is no joy like the joy of being friends again.\u00a0 There is no love like the love from someone who has been estranged.\u00a0 There is no peace like the peace of being accepted and restored.<\/p>\n

How strange that something as beneficial to our emotional and physical health as reconciliation is postponed or ignored altogether.\u00a0 Sometimes we are our own worst enemies because we never allow our enemies to become our friends again.\u00a0 It is not so much that we keep returning evil for evil.\u00a0 It is the fact that we do nothing to aid the peace process.\u00a0 We suffer in silence and build up tons of unnecessary anger.\u00a0 When a relationship is strained we read into every conversation and action the worst possible interpretation.\u00a0 We sin against our own spiritual health by keeping a conflict alive in our imaginations when, in reality, a conflict no longer exists.<\/p>\n

Jesus understood the dynamics of reconciliation and good relationships.\u00a0 In essence He said if someone hits us on one cheek do not hit back but turn the other cheek.\u00a0 In other words, someone has to take the last blow.\u00a0 Someone has to say, “Enough is enough.\u00a0 Let us stop hurting one another and begin to build a better relationship.” The truth of the matter is that life is not always fair.\u00a0 Everything does not come out even.\u00a0 Sometimes we have to give more than it seems we get.\u00a0 However, when friendships are restored we all get more than we deserve.\u00a0 It is a grace rebate and a bonus for having the courage to go the second mile.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

How well do you handle reconciliation?  Do you dread the process of making up?  Do you enjoy clinging to the pain of past hurts?  Does pride prohibit your assuming any responsibility for the conflict?  Perhaps it is the discomfort of having to initiate the opening of old wounds and the cleansing of festered relationships that … Continue reading “RECONCILIATION”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[55],"tags":[58],"class_list":["post-3993","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-matters-of-faith","tag-relationships"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3993","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3993"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3993\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19099,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3993\/revisions\/19099"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3993"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3993"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3993"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}