What Else Could I Do?

My mom had been in the hospital ICU for months and as I stayed with her, many days and nights were spent in the ICU waiting room with other people in similar situations to me, hoping and praying that God would bring our loved ones through. One day I met this man whose son was there at the point of death from an automobile accident. We became friends while trying to comfort each other and talked for many hours. John was an ex-marine Sargent, tall, lean and tough as nails from his military career and was struggling with the fact that someone had run a stop sign and T-boned his son's car. He just couldn't figure out how someone could be so careless and ruin he and his son's life. One day while sitting across the waiting room two men, one older and one younger, came in and introduced themselves to John. As they talked, John began to cry and he hugged the younger man and seemed somewhat relieved about his visit. Later on that day, John told me that the men he talked to was a preacher and the young man who had run the stop sign and hit his son's car. The young man was crying as he talked and as they left they hugged each other. The young man was torn apart by what he had done and had asked his preacher what he should do about his situation. John told me that the young man had asked him to forgive him for what he had done to his son. I then asked John what he had said and he told me "What could I do, I had to forgive him." As he told me the story, we both began to cry and hug each other. The following day, his son died from the accident, but I learned a valuable lesson on forgiveness. I wouldn't have expected that an ex-marine would have ever gotten over his son's death or forgiven the one that had caused the accident. You can never be too big, too tough or too big in stature to forgive the ones that have hurt you, no matter what they have done.

Submitted by Anonymous

Forgiveness