According to the John Hopkins website, “Studies have found that the act of forgiveness can reap huge rewards for your health, lowering the risk of heart attack; improving cholesterol levels and sleep; and reducing pain, blood pressure, and levels of anxiety, depression and stress. If you read my blog post last week you may remember that I was struggling with this concept and decided to wait until this week to share. I do believe my heart is right today (although it’s never perfect) and I’m finally ready to share week 17 with you.

I once heard a regenerative farmer say that when you are doing things different than most people, you really need to have thick skin. I will admit that I must have pretty thin skin, because when people gossip, slander, don’t compensate us for our work, or hurt us or other people, I really struggle with this. The fact that God continues to soften my hard heart makes it even harder since I can’t just forget it like I used to. I’m sure there are many self-help books out there, but I have found something much better, and it’s simple, but not easy.

Thanks be to God, and my faith in Jesus, I have used the Bible to help me with this issue. There are three steps that I do. First, I confess to God my struggle, then I ask God to help me forgive the person that hurt me, and finally I pray for that person. Since we are kind of “weird” I believe we are getting some good practice. Praise the Lord! The Lord has even given me compassion and love for people that I didn’t think I could tolerate. I’m still a work in progress and always will be this side of heaven. I do believe there are times when we need to seek help when the law is broken (although sometimes we have chosen not to), and even then, it’s important to practice forgiveness whether we are compensated, justice is served, or not.

After a lot of prayer and fasting last week, I felt so much peace about everything, and that could only come from God. If you are reading this and thinking that you would like to learn more about our faith, we would be happy to have you over to share a meal and our testimony. I will continue to work on this week’s suggestion, and I probably also need to review, “Get Your Sleep Right.” Hopefully I can follow that one better tomorrow.

Our family has learned to slow down, make careful observations of what heals/damages, get rid of the distractions, take a little more time preparing our food, and most importantly to seek the Lord’s wisdom. It’s a daily struggle and it never goes perfectly, but we just keep trying to do the best we can. If you are working toward a more traditional, clean, whole foods diet, and would like to take small steps to get there, then you are at the right place. Week one was get your salt right, week 2 was get your sleep right, weeks 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7 were get your fats right, we had several weeks about seasonings and herbs, some important discussion about natural sweeteners, and most importantly we have added Practice Forgivenss. Join us next Tuesday for Get Your . . . Right.