Every one of us at one time or another has been hurt, betrayed, scoffed at, taken advantage of, robbed, deceived, or offended by someone, either by those we love or by complete strangers. Pastor Hiram Pangilinan dedicates his latest book, Sorry Po…Releasing the Power of Forgiveness to you and me.
We have all been hurt, there is no denying that. In Sorry Po, Pastor Hiram promises that there is a cure to all these wounds and hurts…it’s called forgiveness, which he explains in great detail but in a very easy, understandable way.
Composed of five parts and 21 chapters, Pastor Hiram starts his discussion by talking to those who have been hurt and giving five reasons to forgive. He then turns his discussion to those who have hurt others and provides five reasons to ask for forgiveness.
Parts three and four are kind of “different.” They talk about if you hurt God and if God “hurt” you, respectively. These topics are stuff about forgiveness that you rarely hear about, maybe because of our almost laser-like focus on ourselves.
The last part of Sorry Po discusses forgiving yourself and offers steps on how to do it, which is sometimes very hard to do.
On a personal level, the book ministered to me a lot. I had a lingering unforgiveness for someone who hurt me in what was supposed to be a “professional” environment. It was harrowing especially the fact that you have to see that person every day, even work with. To top it all off, that hurt happened a couple of years ago and every time (almost every day) I see that person if it’s as if the pain happened just yesterday. It was really traumatic and made me avoid that person like the plague.
Being a Christian made it imperative to forgive. Didn’t Christ say in Matthew 6:14, “For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.” I struggled with this knowledge. I really did not want to forgive my offender, I was that hurt…and no one (well maybe one or two…and my wife) knew it. I was hurting alone. And I wanted to get back. But I didn’t. I knew it was wrong. The fact that God ministered to me in all sorts of ways which in some way, alleviated what I felt, but not completely. I knew I had to deal with this sooner rather than later.
Then I came upon “Sorry Po.” I bought it and quickly devoured it (well not really but I read through it quickly) during my morning commute. As I mentioned earlier, the book ministered to me and in fact, answered a question that was in my mind all the time, which I am not telling you, I said it’s personal, right? Today, I can say that I still get hurt when I see that person but I’m getting over it. I don’t get angry alone anymore. I know that Jesus is healing me. I can now acknowledge that person without feeling “plastic.”
So I highly recommend Sorry Po which the distributor, Church Strengthening Ministries, says is already available in bookstores. If you can’t find it, you should be able to buy one at Pastor Hiram’s church, Church So Blessed in Quezon City. I don’t know how it costs now but I bought my copy for 250 pesos.
