It’s not easy to forgive, particularly when you’ve been hurt more than you can imagine. Joy Tanchi-Mendoza, a mother of six who was raped by seven men when she was 15 years old, decided to forgive.It’s not easy to forgive, particularly when you’ve been hurt more than you can imagine. Joy Tanchi-Mendoza, a mother of six who was raped by seven men when she was 15 years old, decided to forgive.
Forgiveness is a decision
Mendoza said it was hard to tell her parents about what happened, but she called it the starting point of her healing. One of the first things she did afterwards was to read the Bible.
“It was more of a choice. I had to say to myself, ‘okay, you know what, Lord? I still believe who You are. I believe You’re a good God, I believe that You cause all things to work together for good, You are sovereign, and that You have a purpose for everything that I went through so I am going to choose to trust You,” she said.
“‘Joy, all people fall short of My glory,’ God told me during that time. ‘Joy, you’re just like one of those individuals,’ God told me in Romans 3:23. And you’re only in a right relationship with Me because of My grace and forgiveness. So, can you extend the same grace and forgiveness to those people that I have extended to you?'”
The suspects were never charged by the family. Years later, she learned that several of them had been apprehended by authorities, and the gang had been disbanded. “As a result, it appears that justice has been served. God’s timing, God’s way.”
Mendoza is now happily married to Edric Mendoza, a financial adviser and TV broadcaster. She also wrote a book called “When a Good God Allows Rape.”
“We’ve all been through heartbreak, and it either makes us bitter or makes us stronger. We have a decision to make.”
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