Friends Forgive

This month, our school has been teaching about forgiveness in our Friendzy unit. In this unit, “Friends Forgive,” we have explored how to forgive one another, just like Christ forgives us.

“Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ, God forgave you.”

Ephesians 4:32

Each Friednzy unit uses object lessons, crafts, skits and games. Our sixth grade class was caught playing the game of saying “I am sorry” with one person who’s giving a silly sorry and the other person in the circle who must hold their serious face. The goal is for the apologizer to be as silly as possible while the responding friend is to remain as serious as possible. The apologizer has to say the sentence, “Friend, if you forgive me then please give me a smile.” The person responding has to say, “Friend, I forgive you, but I just can’t smile.”

It was quite fun to see the strategies in this game, but true forgiveness can be difficult and as the students shared, even with forgiveness, the hurt may not go away immediately.

Students have been taught an acrostic that helps them with forgiveness.

F-stands for “Feel It.” We have to start by sharing how we feel. “I felt when you…”

O-stands for “Own It.” Instead of apologizing for the feelings we hurt, we have to apologize for the actions we did. “I’m sorry that I. Will you forgive me?”

U-stands for “Use It.” Instead of rushing through a quick apology, come to understand how to grow from this together. “Now that I know I hurt you, how can we make sure this won’t happen again?”

R-stands for “Renew It.” Now you have an opportunity to learn and grow from this experience. You’ve learned something new about one another and can strengthen your friendship in the long run. In friendship, sometimes you have to renew your forgiveness over and over. Forgiveness is a process. It takes time, but it is worth it.