Session 5Obedient Forgiveness

Let’s talk about what it might have been like for Sabina to deal with the reality of what her entire family as well as friends suffered during and after the pogrom of Iasi.

• How do you think Sabina suffered with the knowledge of what happened to her family?
• How might it have affected her trust in God?

After her husband, Ronnie, was murdered in Benghazi, Anita had to decide where she stood and how she would respond. She had been deeply influenced by Richard Wurmbrand’s book, Tortured for Christ, and remembered how Richard and Sabina forgave and pressed on in their discipleship journey. At the time she thought, That’s not something I could ever do. Yet after Ronnie died, Anita did what she couldn’t have imagined—she willingly prayed for and forgave his killers.

Read Matthew 5:6–11; 5:43–44; 1 John 4:8–12, 19–20. With these passages in mind, answer the following questions:

• Who do you have a hard time praying for, and why?
• How will you pray for God to embolden you with his love so that you can love that person with the love of God?
• How will you pray for that person to seek God and come to repentance?

Allow these verses to move you to the action of forgiveness this week:

• Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you. (Ephesians 4:31–32)