Forgive and Forget

Ever heard the expression “forgive and forget”? I’ve heard it lots and even said it a few times myself. But how often do we follow through with it? When you forgive someone, do you really forget what they did? I know I have a hard time with that. I have trouble remembering what I ate two days ago, or what I came to Walmart to get. But the hurts I’ve felt, those I tend to remember with frightening clarity.

So how exactly are we supposed to forget those things?  I’m not so sure that we are, but I’ll get to that in a moment. First, we need to put things in the proper order. Before we can forget the pains, we must forgive those who caused them.

And let’s be honest. For many of us, even when we say that we forgive someone, we hang on to the hurt anyway. We hold it against them. We refuse to let it go and we don’t move on. All too often, we don’t forgive and forget. Instead, we forget to forgive. Or more likely, we choose not to forgive.

The human race has a remarkable propensity for holding onto our resentment. We cling to our hurts and turn them into grudges. We seek vengeance or some sort of restitution. We probably even feel that we deserve to get payback. We want the ones who hurt us to suffer as well. An eye for an eye. And some of us can be patient with it too. We’ll hold onto to those grudges for years, decades, or for the rest of our lives. After all, revenge is a dish best served cold.

But even when that person does suffer in return, is it ever enough for you? Does seeing them suffer cause your suffering to be less? Does it make you feel better? And can their suffering undo or negate what was done to you? I don’t think it can. And that’s why forgiveness is so important.

Jesus had a lot to say about forgiveness. There are many passages in the Bible about it, but there is one that stands out for me. It happened at arguably the most important moment in the Bible. The most important moment in all history. It happened while Jesus was on the cross. Let me set the scene for you.

Jesus had been betrayed by one of his closest friends. He was arrested, questioned, and beaten. They beat Him with a whip made of leather, and there were pieces of bone and metal attached to the leather straps. With each stroke of the whip, the bone and metal would rip away the skin from His back. They struck Him with it thirty-nine times.

The soldiers mocked Him, spat in His face, and stripped Him of His clothes. They repeatedly beat Him over the head with a staff and took turns punching Him. Then He was made to parade down the streets carrying the very piece of wood they intended Him to die on. Then they nailed His hands and feet to that cross and drove a crown of thorns into His head.

In our culture, images of Jesus on the cross do not depict the scene well. Often Jesus looks clean and relatively unscathed on the cross. In truth, He would have been a mess. He was beaten to the point that He was likely unrecognizable. He would have had bruises all over him, and blood would have been everywhere.

The physical suffering He endured was intense and constant. But, the crowd was equally unrelenting. They continued to mock Him, hurling insults and laughing at His suffering. While He hung there on the cross, the soldiers even started gambling to see who would get his clothes. 

In the face of the emotional torment and physical abuse, it would have been easy for Jesus to hate them. He could have cursed them, but He didn’t. Instead, Jesus did something remarkable. Despite all that pain and suffering, Jesus cried out:

“Father, forgive them because they don’t know what they are doing.”

Take a moment and think about that. Let it sink in. Jesus forgave them.

There are a few things happening in that story that I want to draw your attention to. Notice that Jesus forgave them in the middle of His pain. He didn’t wait until the pain was over or until He felt better about it all. Also, none of them asked Jesus to forgive them. They didn’t come to Jesus with an apology and a heartfelt speech about how sorry they were. Yet He forgave them anyway. Also notice that when Jesus forgave them, it didn’t change their attitude or behavior. They kept right on hating and mocking Jesus. 

What an amazing model for how we should practice forgiveness. We should forgive even if we are still hurting. We should forgive even when they don’t ask for forgiveness and even if they don’t deserve it. And we should forgive them, even if their behavior doesn’t change.

In light of that, you might wonder why we forgive each other at all. If they don’t deserve it, they didn’t ask for it, and their behavior hasn’t changed, why on earth should we forgive them? It’s because forgiveness doesn’t change them, it changes you. And forgiveness can’t change the past, but it can change your future.

When we forgive someone, we aren’t pretending that the hurt didn’t happen. And the offending party isn’t off the hook. There can still be consequences for their actions, and at some point, they will have to face what they have done.

But when you truly forgive someone, something amazing happens. It sets you free. There is a beautiful depiction of what I mean in the book “The Art of Forgiving” by Lewis Smede. He writes: “To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you.”

When we hold onto our hurt and refuse to forgive, it traps us. We become ensnared in our pain. And the longer we stay in the trap, the more our hurt opens us up to other painful emotions: fear, regret, anger, and hatred. Those feelings fuel each other, and they can grow until they consume us. All the while, they never really fix the problem. They don’t make our pain go away. We stay bound by the pain and chained to the hurt we feel.

Forgiveness is a much better option. However, forgiveness doesn’t take away that initial pain. It can’t undo what’s been done. Instead, forgiveness opens the prison door. It loosens the chains that hold us. It shows us a path out of our pain. But we still have to choose to walk that path. And that is where the other half of the phrase “forgive and forget” comes into play.

Though, I don’t believe forget is the best word choice. I don’t think you can truly forget it. But we can let it go. We can choose to move forward and to not let what happened to you define or control you. We take one small step away from our pain, and then another step. Each time the pain comes rushing back in, we have to chose to let it go all over again. Do that enough and one day you will turn around and look behind you to discover that you can’t even see the pain anymore. You might remember that it was there, but you won’t feel it’s sting anymore.

Forgiveness can be one of the toughest things we ever do, but it is also one of the most beautiful as well. It is an act of love that is deep and profound. And it will change your life. If you are harboring hurt and resentment, I challenge you to let it go. Forgive those who caused it. Not because they deserve it, but because you deserve to have the joy and wholeness it brings.

There is a freedom that comes from actually speaking forgiveness to the person who hurt you. If you can, reach out to that person and declare “I forgive you.” They may respond to you, or they may not. Either way, it helps you to let go and begin to heal. And even if you can’t reach out to them directly, there is still power in speaking the words out loud. Something about actually saying the words helps to solidify it in our hearts. It makes it real and can be an important step in our healing.

I say all this from experience. It’s not just words on a page to me. I’ve been hurt a lot in my life, and every step of the way forgiveness set me free. But I wouldn’t be able to forgive if Jesus hadn’t first forgiven me. We all make mistakes and need forgiveness too. And sometimes the hardest person to forgive is ourselves.

Forgiveness isn’t a one-time thing either. We daily need to forgive and be forgiven. Holding onto your hurts is a heavy load to bear, no matter if the pain is fresh or if you have been holding onto it for years. Maybe its something you tried to forgive previously, but you find yourself still dealing with it again. Chose to let it go again. It's worth it. Make it your prayer today.

Jesus, today I need your forgiveness. I messed up again. I am so sorry. Thank you that you give forgiveness freely, even though I don’t deserve it. If I have caused pain to anyone, I pray that they would forgive me. Help me to make amends to them if it’s at all possible. And help me to forgive those who hurt me as well. Who am I to withhold forgiveness from them after you gave it to me so freely? Jesus, I forgive them.

To the man who caused the end of my marriage, I forgive you. I forgive you for the pain you caused me and my daughter. I forgive you.

To my ex-wife, I forgive you for taking our family down this path. I forgive you for all the sorrow you brought into my life, and for the pain and the heartache I have had to endure. I forgive you.

To the people in my life who have looked down on me and made me feel worthless, I forgive you.

To the kids from elementary and high school who bullied me, I forgive you.

To the girl in high school who led me on and broke my heart because of a dare, I forgive you.

To the athletic coach who belittled me in front of the other kids over something I had no control over, I forgive you.

To all the people who told me I was fat or ugly, I forgive you.

To the college professor who tried to fail me because I didn’t change my beliefs to match his, I forgive you.

To the person who stole my favorite guitar, I forgive you.

To all the people who took advantage of me over the years, I forgive you.

To the boss who tried to pass the blame onto me for their own mistakes, I forgive you.

And to anyone else who has ever hurt me, I forgive you.

Jesus, I forgive them all. I choose to lay the pain at your feet again today. I‘m not strong enough to carry it on my own, and I don’t want to be bound in those chains any longer. Thank you for the gift of Your forgiveness.

Nathaniel and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

Ever have one of those days where everything seems to go wrong? Where nothing works out the way you thought it should, and no matter how hard you try to fix it, you only seem to make it worse? Maybe it’s not a string of things going wrong, but just one really big important thing that went wrong? 

Over the last year, I have had more bad days than I care to admit. But right now, I want to focus on two very specific bad days and how they turned out very different from one another. The first was a day in late July, and to explain it, a bit of backstory is in order.

The last week of July was one of the toughest weeks I had ever had. The three months leading up to that week had been a whirlwind of ups and downs. My life and my marriage had been turned upside down and torn apart.  I was doing everything I could to pick up the pieces. There were precious few good days.

We were going to counseling. I was praying harder than I ever had before. I had made sacrifices in every area of my life, all to save and redeem my marriage. We were at the breaking point. A fork in the road that would set our marriage on either the path to redemption or destruction. In my heart, I knew that I wanted the path to redemption, but I wasn’t the only one who had a choice in the matter. 

There is a phrase I have heard throughout my life: Actions speak louder than words. It’s a very simple expression with a deep and complicated meaning. And it became all too real for me at the end of my marriage. You see, I desperately wanted to believe the words I was hearing, but the actions didn’t match up. I couldn’t reconcile the two, and the conflict between them was tearing me apart. 

I needed to know if I should trust the words or the actions. I needed to know once and for all if she wanted our marriage to work. In what would become our last counseling session, I decided to put all my cards on the table. I drew a proverbial line in the sand.

I laid out in detail all the mixed signals and conflicting behavior I was getting. How her words had proclaimed a desire to save our marriage, but her actions told the opposite story.  I was honest about the pain it was causing me and how our relationship wasn’t going to work if something didn’t change. And then, I asked her to make a decision.

Fight for our marriage, or choose to go her own way.

I was clear that if she chose me, I would continue to give everything I had towards repairing our marriage. But she would need to do the same. She would have to completely let go of the things that were holding her back. This was an all or nothing deal. And it was time to decide.

There’s always a pause while the jury goes out to consider their verdict. This decision was no different. We needed time and space apart to figure this out.

So I found myself spending the next several days staying with a friend and his family. They were amazingly gracious to me. I was an emotional wreck, and my unexpected stay had to be an inconvenience to them. But they never acted like it. They were warm and welcoming and made me feel loved at a time when I really needed it. They treated me like family.

One of the afternoons that I was at their house, we ended up watching a movie with their kids. The movie was: “Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.” In the movie, Alexander seems to have the worst luck. Nothing goes his way, and his family is all so wrapped up in their own problems that they ignore him and each other. So Alexander makes a birthday wish that his family would all have a bad day so they could know what it felt like to be him. The next day, he gets his wish. Each member of his family has their own really bad day through a series of comic mishaps. In the end, the family bonds over the bad day. They help each other and it reminds them of what is really important.

It was a surprisingly funny movie. But as we watched it, I found myself thinking about my own bad days over the last few months. Unlike Alexander, I didn’t want to wish them on anyone. I didn’t ever want anyone else to feel how I did. About halfway through the movie, I got a text. It was my wife asking if I could meet her the next night to talk. I was very nervous about the talk, but hopeful too. I still believed we could work it out and I wasn’t ready to let that hope go.

I woke the next morning believing that it could be the day that everything started to turn around. I believed that it was going to be not only a good day but a great day. Unfortunately, it didn’t work out the way I hoped, and that talk would prove to be the end of our marriage.

And so on July 31st, 2018, I found myself having a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. My marriage was over.

Technically, the marriage wasn’t completely over until the divorce became final in early November. But for all intents and purposes, July 31st was the day it ended for me. I gave up any hope I had that night. I had to let it go, and it was the single hardest night of my life.

In the months since then, God has been working a miracle in my heart. I know I have come a long way. Even so, there are things that come up from time to time that remind me of what happened and try to reopen those wounds. There was a pretty major one a couple of weeks ago, which leads me to the second day I wanted to share about in this story.

January 5th.

It should have been our wedding anniversary, and it would have marked 11 years.

As that day approached, I found myself filled with dread. It should have been a day of celebration, but I was afraid that it would be a day of nothing but grief and sorrow. I was afraid that the healing God had done in my heart would be undone by the pain of what that day should have been. And to make matters worse, it seemed likely that I would have to spend the whole day alone. I believed that January 5th was going to be another very bad day indeed.

I am happy to report that I was very wrong.

I ended up spending the bulk of that day with two friends. One of them has some land with an old, fallen down barn on it. He and his wife want to build a house where the barn is now, so they need it cleared off. At the same time, there is a lot of great lumber left in the remains of the barn. The three of us made a plan to salvage the useable lumber from the barn and to use it to build custom farmhouse tables for ourselves. And it worked out that January 5th was the perfect day for us to start on that project. 

The day was remarkably warm and pleasant for January. So the three of us headed up to his land and began the process of salvaging the wood. I admit that I was a bit unprepared for how difficult the work was going to be. I had pictured neatly stacked piles of 2x4s. I imagined that we would be sorting through it and picking out the best pieces. It’s okay, you can laugh at how naive I was about it. 

The barn had mostly fallen in on itself, and there were only a few beams and posts holding it together. We had to find a section of the barn where we could remove wood and not cause the rest of the barn to collapse even further. Then we needed to remove all the nails from the pieces we salvaged. Whoever built the barn had clearly intended for it to remain intact; they used a crazy amount of nails in it and these were not your average nails. Some of them were huge and very difficult to remove. 

The previous few days had been rainy, so the ground around the barn was muddy and the wood was still damp. We needed a place to store the wood so it could dry out. There was a second, smaller barn on the property, so we carried the lumber there by hand.

Even though the work was physically demanding, it felt refreshing to do. It completely took my mind off what the day should have been. We spent a huge chunk of the day there working and laughing together. In the end, we barely made a difference in cleaning up the fallen barn, but it had made a huge difference in my heart. 

Helping my friend start the work on clearing his barn felt uplifting. My own burdens became lighter as I helped him carry his. In the Bible, we are told to carry each other’s burdens. I think I understand that verse better now. It is as much for our own sake as it is for the person we are helping. It often gets our focus off of our own mess and draws us closer to God and to each other. It’s what changes a friend into a brother. 

Near the end of that day, I found myself thinking back to July 31st. It had been a day that I thought was going to be good but ended badly. And yet January 5th had so much potential to be bad, but ended up being good. 

As I stood there on his farm thinking about how different those two days were, I realized something. In a way, working to reclaim the wood and build something new from it, turned out to be very symbolic for me. During all those bad days I had, I felt like a total wreck. My life had collapsed in on itself, much like that barn. But God has been working too. He has been reclaiming the broken pieces of my life, refining them, and turning them into something new. God has a habit of restoring broken things. He looks past our mess and sees the fixer-upper hiding inside. And trust me, Chip and Jo have nothing on Jesus. 

 “Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.”

Galatians 6:2

 “And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm, and steadfast.”

1 Peter 5:10

A Dog With Two Bones

Once there was a dog who had a bone. It was a good bone, and the dog loved it dearly. He carried it around all day, and protected it fiercely. It was his bone and he was proud of it. It was the most important thing in the world to him.

One day, the dog strolled down toward the edge of a lake with his bone in tow. He looks out over the water and sees another dog with a bone reflected back at him on the surface of the water. Seeing the second bone, he ponders if it’s better than the one he has, and so he decides he wants it too. He opens his mouth to reach out and grab the new bone, but as he does, his bone falls into the water and disappears. It’s gone. And he is left standing there looking at himself, with nothing.

I paraphrased the story, and there are many variations on it, but I believe the original was told as one of Aesop’s fables. The moral is this: Don’t be jealous of what others have.

Jealousy can be either a simple or a very complex emotion. We see it expressed all the time. A kid can avoid a toy, not wanting to play with it, until he sees another kid playing with it. Suddenly, that’s the only toy that matters and he wants to play with it more than anything. Or perhaps, you see someone who has great athletic ability and you wish you had that ability as well. Maybe you are jealous of the way someone looks, and you think they are prettier or more handsome than you. Maybe they have more friends than you, or drive a better car, or live in a bigger house. 

I think we all feel jealous from time to time.

It’s so easy to compare ourselves to others and let jealousy creep in when we think we fall short or don’t measure up. We see other people who seem to have it all, and we think we need it too. The feelings of jealousy can be quite strong, but when you break them down to their most basic, those feelings are actually rooted in the lack of another feeling: contentment.

We find ourselves battling jealousy when we stop being happy with what we have or with what we are. “If I had what he has, then I would be happy. If I had the talent or skill that she does, maybe then I’d be content. If only I had just a few more of this or that; or a bigger and better one of those, then I would finally be really happy.”

Within the last year, I found myself dealing with jealousy. It has been hard to not feel jealous of people around me that are in happy, healthy relationships. With my own marriage broken and ended, it was quite difficult to feel content in this area of my life since being single again was not something I desired or had planned on.

At the same time, most of the people I know and spend time with are all happily married, so I found myself being the third or fifth wheel quite a lot. Or I would hear my friends talking about their spouses and their love for each other would flow out of them. Seeing them happy was a stark reminder that I wasn’t happy, and so jealousy began to try to fill my heart.

But thankfully, my heart was already given to God. And with His grace and mercy, jealousy wasn’t allowed room to grow. God did the heavy lifting, but I had a part to play as well.

Most of the time, when we find ourselves lacking contentment, it’s because of some unfulfilled desire in our hearts. Some hole or emptiness we have and we look for anything that can fill it. We see someone else who is happy and try to figure out what filled that hole for them, and maybe it can fill it for us as well. But nothing in this life ever really fills that longing completely. It might seem to for a little while, but in the end, we are never quite satisfied.

That longing in our hearts can only really be filled by God. He is the only one who can truly meet our needs. In Psalm 63, David summarizes it beautifully. He says, “My soul thirsts for You... because Your love is better than life.”

When I realized that I was fighting jealousy, I started to pray hard and asked God for help. I asked him to be enough for me. You see, that was my part to play. All I had to do was turn it over to God, to surrender those desires, and to surrender that unfulfilled hole to Him. And then He did all the rest. The jealousy gave way and I began to find joy in my situation.

I stopped feeling jealous of the happy couples I know, and I started rejoicing on their behalf. I am genuinely ecstatic for them, and seeing them happy and together really blesses my heart in a way that is hard to describe. I find myself praying for them, and I thank God for the joy they have, and I thank Him that they won’t have to know the sorrow I felt. And in doing so, my heart grew lighter.

God turned my jealousy into joy, but God is so amazing and loves us so much, that He doesn’t just stop there. 

You see, while God is ultimately the only one who can truly satisfy the deepest desires of our hearts, it doesn’t mean that the earthly things we long for are invalid. Love, companionship, friendship, success. These are not bad things in and of themselves. In fact, these desires are placed in our hearts by God. And He desires to see them fulfilled in our lives as well. The problem is that too often we don’t wait for Him and we try to fill them ourselves.

Turning over our desires to God, doesn’t mean that we let go of them forever and that we will never see those desires fulfilled. It is simply a matter of us saying, “God, I give this desire to you. You know better than I do about what I really need to fill it, and about when I really need it. I trust you.”

I don’t want to be like that dog in the story, and lose what I have because I am too focused on trying to get something else. I want to embrace being single during this time in my life. There is a purpose for it, even if I don't see it yet. So I chose to be content and not jealous. I’ve given God the desires of my heart to find love and companionship again. I don’t know if He will fill that need in my life tomorrow, two years from now, or twenty years from now. He might not even fill it at all. But I trust Him to know what’s best for me. And even if He never fills those desires, He is still enough for me.

If you are dealing with jealousy, or struggling with unfulfilled desires in your life. I encourage you to submit it to God. Trust Him with it. And though you may have to wait a while for His timing, and though the answer you finally get may not look exactly like you thought it would,  I promise He will take care of you. Jesus won’t let you down.

“Be Anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, and with thanksgiving, let your requests be known to God, and the peace of God, which passes all understanding will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.”

Phillipians 4:6-7

Who Are You?

Who are you? No, really, who are you? Take a moment to think about it. Then, in your own words, describe yourself. Write it down if you need to.

Did you start with physical descriptions like your height, hair color, gender, etc.? Or maybe you thought of your age first? Does the answer to who you are rely solely on your outward appearance?

Perhaps, you didn’t start with the physical descriptions. Maybe you described yourself by some external characteristics, like the the country, state, or city you were born into. Are you American, African, European, etc.? Do you think of yourself as a Kentuckian, Alabamian, New Yorker, etc.? Does your location or ethnicity determine who you are?

Maybe your first thought was of your family role. Are you a mom or a dad? Grandparent, aunt, or uncle? Maybe you’re the youngest in your family, or possibly the oldest. Maybe you’re a middle child. Or maybe you thought of your relationship status to define you. Are you single, married, engaged? Is that how you describe yourself?

Does your job describe you? Are you a teacher, police officer, social worker, farmer, student, etc.? Are you defined by your 9 to 5? Does your job title, or lack of a job title truly really tell the world all they need to know about you?

Did you describe yourself by your social groups? Are you an athlete or are you brainy? Maybe both? Are you popular? Introvert or Extrovert? What is your Myers-Briggs type? Are you the funny one in your group of friends, or are you the take charge leader of the group? Does that role define who you are in all the areas of your life?

We often choose to describe ourselves based on things we are proud of. Things we want to be known for, or things we can boast about. These are the things we want others to think about when they think of us.

But I think if you are honest, you probably also have a list of words you use to describe yourself that you are less proud of. We tend to keep this second list to ourselves, because we don’t want anyone else to know these things about us. Maybe that list contains words like this: fat, ugly, unimportant, talentless, divorced, unwanted, liar, drunk, boring, sad, unloved, sinner, etc.

Though less public, these types of descriptions are often the way we see ourselves. And I think we are all secretly afraid that those descriptions are who we really are, and the good descriptions are just a fake persona; a mask that we wear to hide from others. I think most people find it easier to believe the bad about ourselves more than the good.

But is that really who you are?

Is our identity more rooted in the good things about us or the bad? Is it founded in things we have little or no control over: where we were born, our height, or who our family is? Does our identity come from the choices we make? Does it come from how other people think about you?

What truly defines a person? It is a deep and complicated question, and many people spend their whole life searching for the answer.

From an early age, we tend to look to those around us for the answer. But can anyone really tell us who we are? I don't think so. I certainly can't tell you who you are. And for reference, here is a list of other people who I believe are also incapable of truly answering that question for you: Your parents, your spouse, your children, your friends, your boss or coworkers, your neighbors, your coach or teammates, the high school bully, popular celebrities, politicians, musicians, classmates, your boyfriend or girlfriend, etc. 

None of those people can completely tell you who you are. Not really. They might be able to point you in the right direction, but their answers are never enough. Any identity you get from them will be just a partial shell. It can never hold up and will always leave you feeling incomplete or inadequate.

However, there is someone who can answer that deep question of our identity. And He knows the answer because He is the one who created us in the first place. He made each of us unique and with a purpose. God did not mess up when He made you. I'm going to say that again because its worth repeating. God did not mess up when He made you.

And thankfully, He left many answers about our identity for us in His word. Here are just a few of the things God says about who you are:


You are God’s Child
Galatians 3:26
John 1:12
1 John 3:1

You were created in God’s image
Ephesians 4:24

You are a citizen of Heaven
Philippians 3:20

You are completely and utterly forgiven
1 John 1:9

You are Jesus’ friend
John 15:15

You are a temple of God
1 Corinthians 6:19

You are alive in Christ
Ephesians 2:5

You are God’s messenger to the world
Acts 1:8

You are made to be light in a dark world
Matthew 5:14

You are free from condemnation
Romans 8:1

You are righteous through God
2 Corinthians 5:21

Fear doesn’t have a hold on You
2 Timothy 1:7

God is the source of your strength
Phillipians 4:13

You are a conqueror
Romans 8:37

You were handmade by God
Psalm 193:14
Ephesians 2:10

You are valuable to God
1 Corinthians 6:20

God has a purpose for you
Romans 8:28
Jeremiah 29:11

God guards your heart and mind
Phillipians 4:7

God loves you
Romans 5:8
1 John 3:1
1 John 4:16-19
Galatians 2:20
Jeremiah 31:3
John 3:16
Ephesians 2:4-5
1 Peter 5:6-7
Romans 8:37-39


If you are reading this, please know that God loves you so very much. And He really does have a plan for you. He chose you and created you. He knows everything you have been, everything you are now, and everything you ever will be. He knows your successes and your failures, your triumphs and your mistakes. Nothing you do will ever change His love for you. He gave you life. He has a purpose for you, and it’s a great purpose. The only thing we need to do is believe in Him.

The answers we seek about who we are, can only fully be revealed through Jesus Christ. Your identity is found in Him. And when you embrace who you are in Christ, it will set you free.

The Road Goes Ever On

By the time you read this, 2018 will be over. Done. Final. It will have morphed into a new year with the same pace that time has always marched to. For some, this change will be celebrated, and 2019 will come in with a bang. For others, it will come with a whimper. But it will come. Time and tide waits for no man, or as Sam Cooke sang it so wonderfully: “A change is gonna come.”

For me, 2018 has been a year of change that I won’t soon forget. I won’t go into all the fine details here, but I will paint the picture in broad strokes. When 2018 started, my marriage was on shaky ground. We were hurting, but I held onto the hope that we could come out the other side stronger. What I didn’t realize then was that we weren’t just standing on shaky ground, we were standing in the epicenter of a major fault line and the Earth was about to quake.

I’ve never personally been in an earthquake, but I have seen aftermath photos and read survivor stories. As I understand it, the quake is more destructive and violent closer to its epicenter, but the shockwave rippling out can still cause destruction for miles. It can devastate cities and entire regions, and it can take years for an area to recover.

When that quake hit my marriage, I was devastated. I’m not sure that I will ever be able to properly put into words all the pain and sorrow I felt. But looking at the rubble, I knew I had a choice to make. Would I walk away from the destruction, or would I stay and clean up the debris and begin to rebuild? For me, that decision was surprisingly easy. In fact, I had made that decision many years earlier when my marriage first began with just a few simple words: for better or for worse. I made a vow to fight for my marriage no matter what the “for worse” would be.

When the worst did happen, I doubled down on that vow and decided to keep fighting for my marriage, despite how difficult the road ahead appeared to be. But as is often the case with us humans, I still couldn’t see the full picture. There were aftershocks coming, and they would be far more destructive than the initial quake. And try as I might, I would not be able to save my marriage from the destruction.

In life, we constantly have to face the consequences of our own decisions. But one of the pesky things about our “human condition” is that we are often left at the mercy of the decisions of others as well. Like it or not, the choices we make will affect those around us and their choices affect us in return. And often those we love most feel the sting of our choices more keenly. After all, they tend to be closer to the epicenter of our bad decisions. 

As my marriage ended, it did so much more publicly than I would have preferred. It quickly became apparent that the destruction would not be contained to just me. There were many close to the situation that were suddenly hurting just as much as I was, but in different ways. 

I confess though, that in the immediate aftermath, I became quite shellshocked, almost to the point of disbelief. Like many who endure similar events, I wanted to wake up to find that it was all a bad dream. I began a quiet downward spiral. I blamed myself. And though I couldn’t explain exactly why I was at fault, I knew somehow that I must be the one to blame. I should have tried harder, or done this or that differently. It was somehow my fault that I was hurting.

I also felt guilty whenever I would see others around me who were hurting from the fallout of my marriage. I believed I was responsible for their pain as well. I wanted to fix them somehow, try to make it better, but I was confident that I would only make it worse. I didn't really know how to make it all okay.

That guilt was quickly joined by shame. People all around me started treating me with kid gloves, like I was this fragile thing that was about to break. They would look at me with a sadness in their eyes and I would immediately know that they knew all about my heartache. They had front row seats to my pain. Often we try to hide or mask our pain from others, but mine was laid bare for all to see. And it made made feel ashamed.

Worse still, the people around me, would come up to me and say three simple words that cut deeper than anyone ever realized: “Are you okay?”

Spoiler alert, I wasn’t okay.

I was barely hanging on by a thread. And having every random person on the street pluck at that thread like it was a guitar string wasn’t helping. The majority of the people asking, weren’t even really true friends. Many of them were merely acquaintances who just wanted to rubberneck and gawk at the pile of debris that was the remains of my marriage.

Now don’t get me wrong. There were many people who reached out to me that do truly care for me. And even in the midst of my pain, I could tell the difference between those who really cared, and those who just wanted fodder for their gossip. I will forever be grateful to those who were genuinely there for me and who helped carry me through everything. It is a debt that I don’t think I can ever repay.

After the guilt and shame settled in, next came the despair. I felt hopeless and I felt like a failure. I looked toward the shattered remains of my future and all I could see was the debris and the wreckage. There was no happy ending in sight. I began to question whether or not I would ever feel happy again. Did I even deserve to be happy? And after the pain and heartache I was enduring, would I ever be willing to trust someone else with my heart? And even if I could trust someone again, would they even want me? Or would everyone just look at me and see the broken, discarded mess and choose to just walk on by?

There was a thought that began to coalesce in the back of my mind. Subtly at first, but louder with each passing day. The thought that I was so broken and so pathetic that I wasn’t worth the effort to love. I had been rejected by the person on this earth who was supposed to love me most. If they didn’t want me, why would anyone else ever want me? I felt worthless and dirty.

And that’s the moment that it happened. Jesus stepped into my despair and met me there. 

I remember it very clearly. It was an afternoon in early October. I was sitting on a park bench in the quad on the campus where I work. It was oddly warm and pleasant for October, and there was a gentle breeze blowing. Everything was calm and quiet, but in the midst of that stillness, I was raging internally and questioning God. Specifically, I was asking him why he made me so worthless and so unloveable. And much to my surprise, Jesus answered.

I believe it was audible, though it might have been only in my head. There wasn't really anyone else around to hear it. If it was just a voice in my head, it definitely wasn’t my voice. It was distinct from my own thoughts and there is no doubt in my mind that it was Jesus. But it wasn’t an answer that I was expecting to hear. What I heard was this:

“I’ve been rejected too. I know exactly what it feels like.”

I was suddenly reminded of the story from the Book of Mark about the rich young ruler and how he walked away from Jesus. And more than that, I became acutely aware that every single day, there are countless people in the world who still reject Jesus. As I sat there pondering it, God began working in me to piece my heart back together again. I could feel the despair starting to lift. 

You see, when Jesus chose to take the form of a man and step into this world, He didn’t do it half way. He was fully human and he felt every sting this world has to offer. He knew the sorrow and the hurt of betrayal and rejection. And it didn’t make him worthless or a failure, and it wouldn’t make me one either. Sitting on that park bench, Jesus reminded me that I was worth something to Him, and that my identity lies in that truth, and not in the rejection and pain I was feeling.

On that simple October afternoon, God began a good work in me. And he will be faithful to complete it. He has already been tremendously faithful with it in the months since then.

The events of this year could have destroyed me, but they didn’t. I should be feeling hopeless, but I’m not. The truth is I find myself feeling more hopeful now than when 2018 began. I could have taken the path laid before me and let myself become angry and bitter. Instead, I chose healing and forgiveness. After all the times Jesus has forgiven me, who am I to withhold forgiveness from others. Forgiveness is not an easy road to take, but it is worth it. Trust me on this one, because I took the road less traveled by, and that has made all the difference.

For now, I am embracing being single. I don’t know if or when I will find love again. I am open to the possibility, though I am not actively seeking it. But I can say one thing with absolute certainty. When love does come calling, I will embrace it with an open heart, because I have not let the pain of this past year shut down my ability to love or my willingness to trust people. When I do chose to share my heart with a woman, she will get a heart that is whole. It will have some scars, but it will be whole and strong.

And even though the journey ahead now looks nothing like I thought it would, I have come out of this year stronger. Not in my own strength, but in God’s. I don’t know what 2019 holds, but I am excited to walk the path God has for me. He has a good plan for me, and He has a good plan for you as well.

       The Road goes ever on and on

       Down from the door where it began.
       Now far ahead the road has gone,
       And I must follow if I can,
       Pursuing it with eager feet,
       Until it joins some larger way
       Where many paths and errands meet.
       And whither then? I cannot say.

       - J. R. R. Tolkien (The Fellowship of the Ring)