Latest / The Father's Business Podcast / Safe in the Father's Heart-Part 3-Forgiveness and Release

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Safe in the Father's Heart-Part 3-Forgiveness and Release · The Father's Business Podcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_02: The Father's Business was founded by Sylvia Gunter to encourage people to a deeper relationship with God.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_02: I'm Elizabeth Gunter Powell.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_03: And I am Kimberly Roddy.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_03: Welcome to The Father's Business Podcast.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_03: We are so glad that you've joined us.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_03: Well, welcome back to our series on Safe in the Father's Heart.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_03: This is week three.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_03: We are going to be talking about forgiveness and release.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_03: Nelson Mandela once said, resentment is like drinking poison and then hoping it will kill your enemies.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_03: Pretty powerful quote.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_03: And I think Elizabeth, your mom, she shared that quote in this book because of her story.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_03: So kind of catch us up a little bit on where her story is here.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_02: So like mom's already shared in her story.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_02: She's a junior in college.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_02: home for Christmas and watches her dad pack up his car and drive away with no goodbye and never to be seen again.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_02: And so I think...
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, for one, my mom was focused on her mom and the devastation that she was going through as she was going through a divorce, um, and trying to make sure her younger brother was also okay.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_02: And so mom has told me that, you know, she just decided that if she didn't have to acknowledge it, if she didn't feel it, if she didn't think about it, if she just kind of pushed it off to the side, then she could just get on with life.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_02: She could create the family that she'd always wanted.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_02: She'd marry a man that was different than her dad and she would create this whole new family system that would give her what she never had.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_02: And that probably worked for a while, but there did come a day about 10 years into her marriage where she happened to be at a Christian conference where they were talking about forgiveness, where she realized that she still had all that resentment and it wasn't poisoning her dad.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_02: Like the quote says, it was poisoning her.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_02: And so she had to come to a point where she was willing to be honest with God and pour out all of that to him about how she felt about the way her father had treated her throughout her life and then leave Yeah.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_02: And when I
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_03: think about resentment, it's kind of complex.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_03: It's a layered emotion.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_03: It can be a mixture of disappointment, anger, frustration, disgust.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_03: Typically, when we're at a place of needing to forgive, it's because we've had a deep emotion on the other side.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_03: We've had deep hurt.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_03: And often hurt is combined with anger, frustration.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_03: And that's what resentment is.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_03: Resentment is a multilayered, complex, deeper sentiment or emotion that has all those things mixed in with it, right?
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_03: And so we have a tendency to...
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_03: if we don't deal with the initial hurt, it becomes anger.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_03: It becomes resentment.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_03: It becomes bitterness.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_03: And it just, it festers and it grows.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_03: And we have a choice where we acknowledge it or we bury it or we run from it and we cope with it in whatever ways that we can.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_03: But we all get to a place in our lives where we need to forgive.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_03: That's none of us are, we're not immune to having to forgive or be forgiven even.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_03: And, and, And so when something has been done to us, we typically think, well, we can just get over it.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_03: But when we start feeling that bitterness or resentment, I think that's a check for us.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_03: And so maybe that's a place in your life right now or in my life where we have to go, okay, you kind of have to gauge yourself.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_03: Am I feeling anything?
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_03: And I think oftentimes
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_02: the way I discover it is someone else comes and does something similar and the reaction is way bigger than it should be.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_02: You know, it's kind of like if you stubbed your toe and then someone else stepped on your toe, you would scream louder than someone just accidentally stepping on your toe.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_02: on your toe because your toe is wounded.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_02: And so I think oftentimes that's, I mean, sadly, that's what it takes for me to realize, wait a minute, there's something more going on here.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_02: And I am spewing something towards this person that really has nothing to do with them.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_02: So there's, there's some hurt, there's some wounding, some resentment or something is, is below the surface.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_02: But, you know, for some of us, we don't want to look at things and we don't want to think about forgiving them because the wound was severe.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, it was abuse.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_02: It was trauma.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_02: It was, it's a deep place and it's kind of hard to go back and revisit those places.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_02: And so it's just easier.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_02: You know, the example I've always used with people, it's like, you know, you can take a beach ball and hold it under the water for a while and and pretend like it's not there.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_02: But eventually that beach ball is going to come to the surface because that's what, I mean, it's full of air.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_02: So it wants to be lighter than the water.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_02: And so I think it's better if we can to take the time to slow down and go, okay, Jesus, where am I holding onto resentment?
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_02: Where is an area where I need to work on forgiveness rather than waiting for that explosion to happen?
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_02: And then you're like, oh, wow, there's a wound that needs some attention.
• 5:25
  UNKNOWN: Yeah.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it will, it will come out sideways.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_03: That's, that's often what I hear, you know, in the emotional circles, emotional health circles is that idea of if it's not dealt with directly, it'll come out sideways.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_03: And it's, it's going to come out because eventually, it's going to get hit, we can talk about why we need to forgive what happens to us that causes us to need to forgive.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_03: And then I think we also need to talk about like, what is forgiveness and what's forgiveness not?
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_03: I think the reality is, is that we, none of us Right.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_02: Well, first, I would define forgiveness by what it's not.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_02: It's not saying what you did was okay.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_02: It's not saying I trust you completely to be a safe person in my life again.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_02: But what I see forgiveness as is it's a choice I have to make to not hold on.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_02: Let's say, Kimberly, that you had hurt me in some way.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_02: I am choosing not to be judge and jury over you.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_02: And I am choosing not to hold you in contempt for what you've done to me.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_02: And it's really about...
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_02: getting my own heart set free more so than your behavior changing, because I can forgive you.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_02: And I would hope that would lead to change in a healthy relationship moving forward.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_02: But sometimes we have to forgive people that are not going to change.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_02: And that's where it gets really hard because sometimes I don't want to forgive.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_02: I don't want to let that person off the hook because I'm watching their life.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_02: I'm watching their actions.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_02: And in my mind, I'm thinking I'm going to forgive them, but they're going to keep acting the same way.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_02: And so that's what I think makes it so tough.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_02: But really, I mean, at its core, forgiveness is more about my heart than the person who's offended me.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_02: It's about saying to God, forgive.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_02: God, I'm going to let you be in charge.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_02: And that honestly is my other reason why I don't like forgiveness is because I have a control issue problem.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_02: And I want to be the one to make sure justice gets done.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_01: And
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_02: sometimes we have to forgive people or situations or institutions or whatever, and we never see the justice.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_02: And that's really hard.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_03: That's really hard.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_03: I had a friend who was talking to me one time and just said, Kimberly, I have this, this pictures come into mind as we're talking.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_03: And she said, I feel like you are, the picture I have is that you're wrapped up like a mummy.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_02: And
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_03: we were talking about forgiveness and unforgiveness actually really.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_03: And I can tell you right where I was standing when she said that, you know, and, and you remember those moments where that was such a clear picture to me of that's what not forgiving someone is.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_03: It looks like me being trapped.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_03: I'm bound.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_02: And what's so ironic about that is I don't want to forgive someone because I feel like it gives me power and I'm the judge and I'm going to decide when you've done enough to be forgiven or not.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_02: But honestly, what it does is it gives the one who offended me power.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_02: Because I am so wrapped up.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_02: I am that mummy.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_02: I don't have freedom.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm allowing that person to have that level of control over my heart because I'm not choosing to forgive.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_03: So what are some of those destructive consequences when we choose not to forgive that you think happen in our lives?
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_02: I think we quickly build walls of self-protection.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_02: that it's not just against that person.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_02: We start building them against everybody.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_02: And over time, you can cut yourself off from the body of Christ and the community that God designed you to be a part of because you're living in fear and all of your energy is focused on this wounded part of you that you're trying to protect versus being able to live open and freely.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_02: I think it also impacts your relationship with God.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_02: Because when you're so focused on the resentment and the need for justice, and I just need justice to rain down on these people, that doesn't leave you with a heart of gratitude, of worship, of love, of all the things that you need to be able to experience in your relationship with God.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_03: You and I both, Elizabeth, have a strong sense of justice within us, and that can often be like you're alluding to, that can be my driving force at times rather than freedom.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_03: And it's interesting because we think if we're chasing, like you said, we think if we're chasing justice and we're making people pay, because we're not actually going, I'm going to make them pay.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_03: Sometimes we are.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_03: Sometimes it's more passive aggressive, right?
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_03: Like sometimes it's more of, but in that, like you said, we feel like we're in charge.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_03: We feel like we're in control.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_03: We're in the driver's seat.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_03: But in actuality, we're trapped.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_03: It is absorbing my mind,
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_01: my
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_03: thoughts.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_03: It's absorbing my energy.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_03: I can't get done what I need to get done.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_03: It absorbs our time, all of our resources, emotional, spiritual, physical, mental, everything, right?
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_03: Social.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_03: It absorbs that because we're trapped.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_03: And so- Yeah.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_03: It's not saying I don't have to think about this again.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_03: It is
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_02: also not welcoming that person back into your life.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_02: If they're not a safe person, forgiving them and setting a healthy boundary of how you can and cannot interact with them is two very different things.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_02: Right, right.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_02: I've had situations like that where it's like, yes, I forgive you.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_02: And that person's like, great, then we can go back to the relationship we had before.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm like, no.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_02: We can't because we're toxic together.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_02: And so we, we don't need to have until we both have some healing.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_02: We don't need to go back into this same circle again, where it's highly likely that you're going to hurt me again, but I not going to walk around with resentment in my heart towards you.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_02: I'm just choosing to set a boundary for myself.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_03: And that's a hard concept.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, the quote on page 25 says there are times when we may need to forgive a person but not be fully reconciled back to them.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_03: You know, my primary vocation is mediation, conflict resolution.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_03: And there are not always ways to resolve the conflict.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_03: Sometimes it's we have to figure out how to manage the conflict.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_03: That's a tough question.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_03: Like, what does it look like to forgive someone and not be fully reconciled to them?
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_02: Kimberly, I think that is a case by case basis.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I'm kind of, I won't go into all the details, but I'm thinking through a few different scenarios in my mind.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_02: I have some people that I can email them, but I don't talk to them on the phone or see them in person.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_02: There's other people that I have just had to say, you know what?
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_02: I've watched your behavior over years.
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_02: Your behavior is not changing.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_02: You want me back in your life because it benefits you.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_02: not because it's a mutual beneficial relationship.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_02: And so I've just had to say, I can't be in a relationship with you.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_02: I release you.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_02: I forgive you, but this is not, this is not healthy.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_02: And they didn't particularly like it, but eventually they got the clue and they stopped trying to call me and email me.
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_02: And that's, I mean, I love the fact that we have caller ID on our phones.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_02: You don't have to answer just because they call.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_02: For each situation, also where you are in your own healing, how strong are you?
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_02: How much healing have you done?
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_02: Are you able to stand up for, if not yourself, Jesus in you when someone is speaking to you in a way that's abusive?
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_02: Then maybe you need to engage that to learn how to stand up to that person and have a way forward.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_02: But if you're not at a place where you're ready to do that, I think that's okay too.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_03: And I think some of that directly goes into what we say a lot, which is knowing who God is and knowing who you are in him, like being able to work through a healing journey, which can take time and we don't get to define the time.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_03: But being able to walk through a journey where you know who you are without the definition of that person's hurt on you.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_03: And so people in our culture today talk a lot about boundaries and we can, I believe that we can take boundaries too far, but I don't want to not take boundaries far enough.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_03: Because that does harm too.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_03: And so there is a place where reconciliation may not happen.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_03: But I think sometimes in our Southern culture, various cultures and little pockets that we live in, there's an element to which it's like, Oh, let's, let's make this.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_03: Okay.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_03: We have to be okay.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_03: We have to.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_03: And a lot of times that just becomes pretend, right?
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_03: It just becomes fake.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_03: It's not authentic.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_03: And then it's you're fostering fake and inauthentic relationships.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_03: And then that also breaks down your trust and your ability to know how to trust your ability to define yourself and know who you really are.
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_03: And as a daughter or son of the King.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_03: And so that, that gets layered and confusing too.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_03: So yeah.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_03: we don't have to push for reconciliation at all costs.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_03: Let's look at scripture and read places where Jesus talks about how he's the reconciler between God and man.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_03: And it's a complicated conversation.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_03: And we have a lot of hurt.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_03: A lot of people have experienced abuse and layers of that that have been traumatic and difficult.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_03: And so sometimes I think the biggest piece of to forgiving but not being reconciled is sometimes just your posture.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_03: And by that, I mean, like, if I can choose to forgive you, even though I may not be able to be reconciled to you, I am putting myself in a better position.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_03: With the Lord and relationally with you.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_03: So if I look at like my relationship with the Lord is the vertical lifeline, right?
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_03: And then there's a horizontal piece of where that lifeline flows out.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_03: Then I put myself in a position where vertically I can say, because Christ has forgiven me and I have experienced great forgiveness, then I can forgive you, but I may not yet be ready to be reconciled to you.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_03: And that's okay, but I'm positionally, I'm not bound up any further.
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_03: There's ways to work through reconciliation.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_03: There's layers of reconciliation.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_03: It's not the first step.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_03: Like, okay, I forgave you and now I'll reconcile you.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_03: There's repair that has to happen.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_03: There's rebuilding.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_03: And I think we jump too fast to reconciliation without recognizing that Repair and rebuilding are two other things that have to happen before that.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_03: And it's okay to give ourselves time to do that.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_03: So there's a choice to forgive.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_03: Forgiveness is a choice and it's a hard choice.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_03: But when we take that choice, as we take that choice, reconciliation looks different.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_03: And so we can't just say, this is what it looks like for everyone.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_03: And I just think people need to hear that message.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_03: If you're being encouraged to reconcile, it's okay to wrestle with that a little bit.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_03: And I don't want people to feel like they've got to jump to that.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_02: Absolutely.
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_02: The phrase that kind of stuck out in this chapter to me is, as my mom was talking about being unforgiveness, causing her to be captive to old pain.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_02: And you'll remember even in that first chapter where she read that she's driving down the road.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_02: She's like, I refuse to be a prisoner for war that ended 50 years ago.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_02: I've seen that even in my own life.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_02: This is many, many years ago, but there was a situation that was very hurtful that God brought healing.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_02: And then I began to use it when I was speaking places as a testimony of this is how God healed something.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_02: But I caught myself because I would always say, well, just a year or two ago, blah, blah, blah happened.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_02: And one time I finally caught myself and I realized what I was talking about as if it just happened a year or so ago had happened 10 years ago.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_02: And I had to kind of sit down in the middle of my own talk with Jesus and have Jesus go, yes, you've forgiven some, but you're still holding on to some resentment because you're stuck in time.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_02: It feels to you like it happened a year ago and it happened 10 years ago.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_02: And so I think that's another part of that rebuild and repair is I made the choice to forgive this person, but it's a continual process to allow that stuff to be healed.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_02: And until we do, we will be stuck in time.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_02: And I mean, who wants that?
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_02: You know, Jesus is the I am.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_02: He's, you know, he's not the I was.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_02: And so I want to be where Jesus is in the present tense, although he's, you know, yesterday, today and forever.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_02: But I want to be living with him in the present of what he's trying to show me versus carrying around this heavy baggage of something that happened 10 years ago that feels like it happened yesterday.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_01: And
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_02: what I also realized in that moment is the person who had hurt me had moved on.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_02: It felt like 10 years ago to the person who hurt me.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_02: I'm the one who's stuck.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_02: I'm the one who's still feeling like, oh, that was just a year ago and it's fresh.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_02: And so it really is, as we've already kind of already said this, but it's the freedom God wants to give us.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_02: And it's so hard because I am a person that is motivated by my feelings and what feels good.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_02: And oftentimes I don't feel like forgiving someone.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_02: And that is so hard when you don't, it's like, you know, I know I need to forgive this person, but I don't feel like doing it.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_02: And that's where it's just got to be a choice.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_02: And hopefully the feelings come along later.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_02: And, you know, some of these situations I'm alluding to, you know, I can think of those people now and I have no ill will towards them, no resentment, no nothing.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_02: I hope God is working in their lives and doing great things.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_02: And so it's the ability to really, truly find your own healing and let God deal with that.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_02: That's God's job, what he does or does not do with that other person.
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I think the other side to that that I've sometimes felt in other situations is I can't not forgive.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_03: Because there's times in other situations where I am feeling and facing and living the effects of of the unforgiveness and you get to a point where that's so exhausting that it's like, I can't not forgive.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_03: I have to, I have to forgive.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_03: And, and, you know, that leads to a kind of a piece of my story too, which is like, what's it look like to forgive someone who's no longer with you?
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_01: It's,
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_03: it's hard.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_03: It's, it's just, these are different kinds of hard, but it's hard to forgive someone that you have to forgive.
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_03: practice all these principles of I'm going to go to you and I'm going to acknowledge the hurt and we're going to talk through it and we're going
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_01: to,
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_03: I'm going to forgive you and you're going to forgive me if you need to or whatever.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_03: We're not going to have some beautiful reconciliation.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_01: He's
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_03: not here.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_03: But part of that was what I needed to forgive.
• 21:52
  SPEAKER_03: Like there's, he's my dad.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_03: Part of this book is talking about how there's, we all have some wounds based on our relationships with our fathers.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_03: And for me, Just by virtue of my father dying at the age of 52, I felt abandoned.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_03: Now, let's just be clear.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_03: My dad, he did not intend to abandon me.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_03: That was his story that, I mean, I can't make sense of it all.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_03: And God has helped me let go of trying to make sense of a lot of that.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_03: But what I do know is that experientially, there were some things relationally that Mm-hmm.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_03: And so I had the gift of a counselor when my dad was sick and we passed away.
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_03: She was such a sweet gift to me.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_03: And God really brought her, I believe, into my life during that season.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_03: But years later, after I'd worked through a lot of things, I was a different season of life, different location in life.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_03: There was another counselor that I had a short interaction with or two, and he challenged me and he said to me, I think you might need to forgive God.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_02: And
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_03: I was like, well, that seems like a really weird theological concept to grapple with.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_03: OK, right.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_03: Like God forgives me.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_03: I don't need to forgive God.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_03: But in essence, there there was that like it's hard to talk about.
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_03: We don't like talk about a lot of our religious circles.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_03: But the truth is, I felt like God had let me down.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_03: I felt like he was not good.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_03: I felt like he was not trustworthy.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_03: And so I needed to work through and talk through with my Heavenly Father, forgiving him and rebuilding trust with him and reengaging with more of who his character is.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_03: But it also meant that...
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_03: that was deeply connected to forgiving my dad for some things.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_03: And so I actually went and drove to where my dad's grave is.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_03: And I sat and talked with him.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_03: And I know he wasn't there, but I needed to have a place to go.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_03: And I needed to have a conversation for me to be able to forgive him and release him, even for things that he hadn't intentionally done, but that were hurtful.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_03: And so part of that was just the process of forgiveness and release.
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_03: That's the second part of the title of this chapter is releasing my dad, releasing God, which in turn releases me.
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_03: And sets me free and it frees up the relationship, even though there's not a tangible relationship that I still have with my father because he's not on this earth anymore.
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_03: There's still a relational component to that because he was positionally my father and there's a connection there.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_03: And so, you know, that's another element of what forgiveness looks like is, you know, it's it's not just always people who are hurting us in present time.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_03: It's people that have hurt us in past time and it's people.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_03: who aren't here anymore.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_03: This is where it's important to be able to reflect for us.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_03: I was thinking about when you were saying something earlier, Elizabeth, I was thinking about how if we're not aware of what we're feeling in certain moments and of the timeliness of things, like we have to be aware of those things so that we can lean in and go, okay, what's really going on here?
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_03: I need to deal with this.
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_03: So I wouldn't have known that I needed to deal with some of those things if I wasn't paying attention to some of the the indicators, right?
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_03: The things that are indicating, hey, there's something deeper here to acknowledge and deal with.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_02: Well, Kimberly, as our resident mediator and conflict person, I have a question for you.
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_02: We're talking a lot about when we need to forgive someone, but what about those times when you are the one who has hurt someone else and they may not be ready to forgive you?
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_02: What is your advice to someone saying, okay, I've blown it.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_02: I have really hurt someone I love.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_02: I recognize that I've hurt them, but they may not be at a point of this that we're talking about where they want to choose to forgive us.
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_02: What advice do you have for people that might be in those types of situations?
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I think that's hard because I think the truthful answer there is you have to give time.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_03: None of us can be rushed to forgive, but I do think that it's important if we are the offender, and I have been in that position many times and will continue to find myself in that position.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_03: If we are the offender, we have to have an incredibly large amount of humility and brokenness over what we've done.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_03: And we need to admit it.
• 26:57
  SPEAKER_03: We need to acknowledge it.
• 26:59
  SPEAKER_03: We need to seek to understand how it's made the other person feel.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_03: I think we need to say that we are sorry and we need to ask for their forgiveness.
• 27:08
  SPEAKER_03: And then we need to give them time to see when they're ready to forgive us.
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_03: And that's a hard place to sit because you're the one who's, you're kind of the guilty party.
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_03: But if you acknowledge that you're the guilty party, you're also free.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_03: You're free by acknowledging that, truly acknowledging and owning that.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_03: You don't have to sit in shame because that's often the dance that's on that side of it.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_03: If you are genuinely repentant and sorry, and you're owning it and you, I mean, the other piece of that is you gotta, you gotta realize what you're doing.
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_03: You gotta change.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_03: You have to change and you have to graciously over time show the other person.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_03: And it may not look, I mean, you may not be able to show them like you want to because they may not feel safe with you,
• 27:53
  SPEAKER_02: but
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_03: there are still ways to show someone that you're different and And that that difference is real.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_03: And that takes a lot of time.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_03: And this is one of those things where I work with a lot of family systems, meaning parents and kids or husbands and wives, brothers and sisters, whatever.
• 28:13
  SPEAKER_03: And there are times where these relationships didn't get here overnight.
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_03: The layer of hurts that are there, they didn't get there overnight.
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_03: It's been building over time.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_03: Oftentimes...
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_03: I'll have a couple that I'm working with, and typically there's one spouse who wants things to move along faster, and the other one needs time.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_03: And God's really great to put us with people who are different from us, to stretch us and grow us.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_03: But the reality in those situations, you can't force someone to forgive you.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_03: And if you are genuinely sorry and broken, Mm-hmm.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_03: Right, yeah.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_03: To go back to being on the side of the one who's offended, I'd like to offer five steps of forgiveness that you can work through and ask yourself.
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_03: So here's a couple of things that I would share with people.
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_03: And this has been helpful to me in my life as well.
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_03: So step one would be, are you willing to acknowledge the hurt?
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_03: So when you know that you need to forgive someone, are you willing to acknowledge the hurt?
• 30:16
  SPEAKER_03: Step two is, are you willing to acknowledge how it actually made you feel?
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_03: Step three is, are you willing to release the person from the debt they owe you?
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_03: That's a hard one.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_03: It's a very hard one.
• 30:29
  SPEAKER_03: And this is not like you're going to go through all five steps in five minutes or five days or five months, okay?
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_03: But being able to ask yourself, am I willing to release the person from the debt they owe me?
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_03: Step four, are you willing to accept the person unconditionally?
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_03: Now, This does not mean that you have to reconcile fully with them.
• 30:50
  SPEAKER_03: Okay, we addressed that a few minutes ago.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_03: But it does mean that you're releasing them from the responsibility to make you feel loved and accepted.
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_03: Because feeling loved and accepted is God the Father's job.
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_02: So
• 31:03
  SPEAKER_03: we have to put that in its right place.
• 31:06
  SPEAKER_03: And then lastly, which I think this is the toughest, are you willing to be hurt again if God allows it?
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_03: What if they hurt you again?
• 31:15
  SPEAKER_03: What if they never change?
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_03: What if your feelings don't change?
• 31:19
  SPEAKER_03: Those are some tough things to think through.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_03: Forgiveness is not just forgive and let go.
• 31:26
  SPEAKER_03: It's not easy.
• 31:28
  SPEAKER_03: This is hard, hard work.
• 31:32
  SPEAKER_03: And I just want to tell people that are listening, it's okay to take your time.
• 31:37
  SPEAKER_03: It's okay.
• 31:38
  SPEAKER_03: It's actually good to work through this with intentionality and honesty.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_03: And it's hard.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_03: So you may, you probably, not just may, you probably need someone to walk the journey with you.
• 31:49
  SPEAKER_02: You
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_03: definitely need the Lord to walk this journey with you, but you may need a really trusted counselor, friend, professional.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_02: And I think the other good hope in this is that it's not just you.
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, no,
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_02: it's not.
• 32:04
  SPEAKER_02: That's right.
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_02: It's, you know, as I'm having to choose to forgive, I can call on Father, Son, and Holy Spirit to even give me the ability to forgive.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_02: Because Jesus is the ultimate example.
• 32:18
  SPEAKER_02: How many different ways did he cry out to God and ask them, Father, forgive them because they don't know what they're doing.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_02: And he had every right to call down kingdom justice over this entire situation that he's in.
• 32:31
  SPEAKER_02: So we have someone we can lean on and be honest with and say, Jesus, I don't want to.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_02: This is hard.
• 32:38
  SPEAKER_02: I'm scared.
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_02: But would you help me?
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_02: truly forgive and let go of the pain of this particular situation.
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_02: As we close this podcast, we want to end by praying a prayer of forgiveness and a declaration of release.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_02: These are two tools that you can use as you think through people in your life that you may need to let go of your resentment, bitterness, unforgiveness for.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_02: This is simply a model.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_02: We want you to take this and make it your own, but let's pray together through this prayer of forgiveness.
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_02: I confess the sin of judging them, and their specific offenses against me.
• 33:41
  SPEAKER_02: Forgive me for the anger and hatred I have had in my heart against them.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you for forgiving me through the blood of Jesus.
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_02: I choose to forgive and release them of all of my judgments.
• 33:56
  SPEAKER_02: I will let go of all bitterness, resentment, and all ungodly attitudes.
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_02: All judgment belongs to you.
• 34:03
  SPEAKER_02: Where there has been injustice, I choose to let you be judge.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_02: And I trust you to take care of me.
• 34:12
  SPEAKER_02: Your power and grace are at work in me.
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_02: I receive all your gracious work in my life and choose to live in tune with your heart for this person.
• 34:22
  SPEAKER_02: In Jesus' name, amen.
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_03: Now that you have asked God to forgive you, a declaration of release is needed.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_03: Release is spoken to the offender, whether they are present or absent, living or dead.
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_03: It recognizes that our words and actions have bound them.
• 34:37
  SPEAKER_03: and equally as important, bound us to the person.
• 34:41
  SPEAKER_03: It is often very liberating to speak or write this release to them if we can.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_03: With God's power, it can be done.
• 34:47
  SPEAKER_03: Because Jesus Christ is my Lord, I free you from my judgments and sinful responses.
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_03: I give you back to God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_03: I place you at God's throne of grace.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_03: I want my heart to be free by His power.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_03: I entrust you to God for Him to work in you and in me.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_03: In His time and in His way.
• 35:36
  SPEAKER_03: I lose you and let you go.
• 35:37
  SPEAKER_03: We
• 35:38
  SPEAKER_00: are both free.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_00: I want to thank you for listening to the Father's Business Podcast.
• 35:47
  SPEAKER_02: Check us out at thefathersbusiness.com or follow us at The Father's Biz on Instagram and Facebook.