> "imagine that now you are a priest in confession and this man comes to you, stands before you, confesses, and asks you for forgiveness."
This is a very good thought experiment. If we have been praying, for some time, for God to forgive the person who has caused us serious harm, then I think God will offer us the grace to forgive that person if he or she asked for our forgiveness face to face, and I think that we will have prepared ourselves to accept the grace He offers. But it may still be a real struggle to do so, because He knows exactly how much help to measure out.
Sometimes I think that, among the temptations for a dying person (besides obvious ones like "your sins are too big for God to forgive" or "heaven will be boring / why let God be the boss of you?"), perhaps the enemy would be permitted to tell the person that their worst enemy is now (or will be) a saint in heaven. If you all could spare a moment to pray for people who currently want (or in the case of one person I know, who literally has prayed for) their personal enemy to be damned and go to hell, ...
I think there are a lot of people who cannot imagine what it would be like for their wounds to be healed, for the sight or sound or touch of someone who has hurt them badly to not remind them of the harm and refresh the pain. So the only thing seeing that person in heaven brings up in their mind is an eternity of re-experiencing what they are currently trying to forget. Which seems more like hell than heaven.
But it won't be like that at all. Saints are all clear images of God, with all the blood and dirt and cloudiness purged away. So what we see and hear from them, even those who were once terrible, will be God. And our own wounds will be healed, the wounds in our hearts and memories, so there won't be any half-healed wounds to re-open or any pain to refresh.
I don't think God "measures out" His help though. I think we "measure out" our acceptance of it. We want to creep, rather than leap, because creeping feels more controlled and secure. He's not a tame Lion, and if you get too close, you know it. But He's Good, and we should leap. Well... maybe hop....
Powerful testimony from Bishop Mounir Khairallah.
> "imagine that now you are a priest in confession and this man comes to you, stands before you, confesses, and asks you for forgiveness."
This is a very good thought experiment. If we have been praying, for some time, for God to forgive the person who has caused us serious harm, then I think God will offer us the grace to forgive that person if he or she asked for our forgiveness face to face, and I think that we will have prepared ourselves to accept the grace He offers. But it may still be a real struggle to do so, because He knows exactly how much help to measure out.
Sometimes I think that, among the temptations for a dying person (besides obvious ones like "your sins are too big for God to forgive" or "heaven will be boring / why let God be the boss of you?"), perhaps the enemy would be permitted to tell the person that their worst enemy is now (or will be) a saint in heaven. If you all could spare a moment to pray for people who currently want (or in the case of one person I know, who literally has prayed for) their personal enemy to be damned and go to hell, ...
Prayers!
It is a good thought experiment.
I think there are a lot of people who cannot imagine what it would be like for their wounds to be healed, for the sight or sound or touch of someone who has hurt them badly to not remind them of the harm and refresh the pain. So the only thing seeing that person in heaven brings up in their mind is an eternity of re-experiencing what they are currently trying to forget. Which seems more like hell than heaven.
But it won't be like that at all. Saints are all clear images of God, with all the blood and dirt and cloudiness purged away. So what we see and hear from them, even those who were once terrible, will be God. And our own wounds will be healed, the wounds in our hearts and memories, so there won't be any half-healed wounds to re-open or any pain to refresh.
I don't think God "measures out" His help though. I think we "measure out" our acceptance of it. We want to creep, rather than leap, because creeping feels more controlled and secure. He's not a tame Lion, and if you get too close, you know it. But He's Good, and we should leap. Well... maybe hop....