4 Steps to Forgiving Yourself

You are a New Person

If you look in the mirror and see yourself, but you don’t like the person you see, then you need to forgive yourself and learn how to love and see yourself as God sees you. This is a stronghold, or an incorrect thinking pattern, that needs to be torn down in your mind. If you have repented of your sins and taken them before the Lord, then you are forgiven… and now you need to come to realize the power of that fact.

You need to stop associating your failures with your “new creation” image for God’s Word says in 2 Corinthians 5:17 (New Living Translation)

This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!

Can you honestly look in the mirror and tell yourself, “I love you” and mean it with your heart? I’m not talking about a prideful way, but a humble means of accepting who God has formed in you. We need to love and accept the person that Christ has made in us, and forgive ourselves as Christ has forgiven us!

Think how your heavenly Father feels when He looks down and sees His children walking around beating themselves up over things that He shed His blood for so that they could be forgiven and set free. I believe it is clear that failing to forgive ourselves from our past mistakes is denying the work of the cross and the shed Blood of Christ in our lives.

Hebrews 9:14 (New Living Translation)

Just think how much more the blood of Christ will purify our consciences from sinful deeds so that we can worship the living God. For by the power
of the eternal Spirit, Christ offered himself to God as a perfect sacrifice for our sins.

Failing to forgive yourself will put blinders on your spiritual eyesight quickly. It will cause you to see things through the eyes of guilt, shame and condemnation. It will ruin your faith and cause you to go blind spiritually.

Steps to Forgiving Yourself

Step #1 – Be honest with yourself.

Realize that down deep inside you’re not happy with the person of your past. If you are in denial, then forget trying to treat the root of your problem.

You need to see the problem before you can apply the solution. It might even be helpful to list all of the things that you hate about your past, and one-by-one, give them to the Lord and release yourself from each failure.

Step #2 – You need to realize that your debt has been PAID.

The only way that you can beat yourself up after Jesus has paid your debt is because you aren’t accepting the gift that He has given you. If He’s paid the debt, and you keep denying that fact, then you are rejecting the very gift that God has given you! You need to accept what Jesus has done for you by faith.

Matthew 26:28 (New American Standard Bible)

For this is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for forgiveness of sins.

Now you need to see yourself as being forgiven and justified (which means, “just as if you’ve never sinned”). There are not any sins so bad that Jesus will not forgive them.

1 John 1:9 (New American Standard Bible)

If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Step #3 – Allow the Holy Spirit to heal your soul.

You need to let God heal you. As long as you keep holding something against yourself, you are blocking the Holy Spirit’s power from entering and healing that area of your mind and life!

Step #4 – Begin to see the “new creature” of Christ within you.

You are not seeing yourself as you really are. If you’ve repented of your past and sought God’s forgiveness, then you are forgiven. You need to see your past as “paid in full” by the work that Christ did for you on the cross! Seeing things with this perspective changes everything!

When the recipient of a gift receives it gladly and with joy, the giver is glorified!