THERE'S A LOT SAID AND WRITTEN ABOUT THE VALUE of forgiveness. People describe how much healing has come into their lives when they were able genuinely to forgive. And probably every person on the planet can find some area of life where forgiveness is needed, either toward others or toward himself.
Christian Science takes this issue vastly deeper and explains how an ultimate sense of forgiveness works. It's more than people forgiving people, as wonderful as that step can be. This revelation helps us see from God's perspective, which has even greater healing power than the person-to-person forgiveness. When we are able to yield so fully to God that we actually sense His divine truth, then error has been destroyed and, as Mary Baker Eddy says, "... nothing is left to be forgiven ..." (No and Yes, p. 30), and we've united with perfect Love in a way where changes take place at the deepest level. Isn't this where Christ Jesus was mentally when he said to the adulterous woman and to the fellow who had been bedridden for 38 years, "sin no more" (John 8:11 and 5:14). He wasn't just handing out some good human advice. He was glimpsing from God's perspective man's innocence. That's where the most significant healing happens—when we feel willing to confess in our hearts that sin is impersonal, that God's reality of perfection is true.
With this insight, the human picture certainly is set for everyone to go forward and do better. And when that fresh direction is backed by the glimpse Christ Jesus had of original purity, the healing effect is the most powerful. So our need is to get beyond putting our mental arms around whoever needs forgiveness and see what God is seeing—that the concept of sin vanishes in the face of infinite Love.
