God forgave you, now forgive yourself

"If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." 1 John 1:9 KJV

"Who is a God like unto thee, that pardoneth iniquity, and passeth over the transgression of the remnant of his heritage? he retaineth not his anger for ever,because he delighteth in lovingkindness. 19 He will again have compassion upon us; he will tread our iniquities under foot; and thou wilt cast all their sins into the depths of the sea." Micah 7:18-19 ASV

Thoughts:
For a long time, I lived in regret. Regret for the things I have done in my past. Many times, while I was out of the will of God, I thought I was not hurting anyone with the things I was doing. I have come to realize, two people did get hurt; God and myself. I love that God is a loving and forgiving God. He tells us in 1 John 1:9 that we can confess and repent and He will forgive us. Yet, many people skip over the second and equally important part of that passage, which tells us that He will "clease us from all unrighteousness". The dictionary defines cleanse as to make clean, and defines clean as being free from, as in unsoiled and unstained. This gives me hope and peace in the fact that when God forgave me, He also cleaned my sin from me and made me new again. The memories of my past will always be there, but now I can look at the past and be thankful that God brought me out of sin and made me a new creature once again.

Prayer:
Heavenly Father, I thank you for life and the freedom to live it blemish free. God I thank you that you loved me enough to cleanse me of my sin and lead me into your forgiving light. God I thank you, not only for your forgiveness, but also for the ability to forgive myself. Thank you for helping me set down the baggage I carried around by not forgiving myself for my past. Father, I ask that you bless the others in my life who have this same issue. God I ask that you help them see that when you forgive us, you cast our sin out and trample them underfoot. In Jesus' name I pray, Amen.