Episode Transcript
[00:00:17] Well, hello again.
[00:00:19] Happy Monday. Or if it's not a Monday for you, happy whatever day it is to you. I hope that you are happy having a good day. I hope that you're having a good week.
[00:00:31] Just in case you're not, though, I'm hoping I can share some. Some words with you that might, I don't know, hopefully encourage you this week. Although this is one of those things where it is a message that's a little more, I would say, like, abrasive or step on your toes just a wee bit, because I do.
[00:00:56] I do, like, listen to the Lord about what he wants me to talk about.
[00:01:00] And by the way, my name is Shana Strange Williams, and this is Grace and Grit Mindset podcast, where every week I'm going to be talking about, well, just whatever God gives me, honestly. But we've been in a series that's called the Mindset Shifts of Whatever over Whatever. I think this is probably like the sixth or seventh one that we are making these adjustments to change our minds in some ways so that we can move forward into all that God has for us, so that we can experience joy and peace and love at a whole other level. You know, I really believe that that's where life starts, is in the mindset.
[00:01:43] If you have the mind of Christ, because that's really what we're talking about here, is the mind of Christ, then I don't think anything can stop you, honestly. You'll be able to go through anything. You'll be able to survive anything. You'll be able to thrive. You'll be able to overcome things. You'll be able to be successful in the things that God's called you to do. All of it, it's all connected to this.
[00:02:03] And I feel the last few months or whatever that this is just something that the Lord is really saying to his body right now. And I'm not the only one talking about it. I've been hearing other.
[00:02:15] Other teachers, pastors, talking about some of these same topics, which gives me comfort to know I'm not crazy out here just making stuff up.
[00:02:25] But just want to say thank you for listening. Thank you for hanging in there. Hope that these are helping you and maybe changing these small shifts or changing some things in your life for the better.
[00:02:38] So this week I want to talk about the mindset shift of forgiveness over bitterness. Oh, that's a real fun one, isn't it?
[00:02:49] I think anybody who's ever lived on this planet has struggled with forgiveness.
[00:02:56] Because, you know, the thing is, it's a commandment it's not just like God's like saying, hey, I'd really appreciate it if you guys would forgive each other.
[00:03:06] He actually says things like if you don't forgive your brother or sister when they trespass, then your father won't forgive you.
[00:03:14] There's, there's a scripture about that. We're going to look at Matthew in just a minute. But you know, I really wish I could say that it's optional. But it's not optional. It's not optional and it can be super hard whenever you've gone through something with someone and they have hurt you, whether it be intentional or not intentional. Cuz sometimes people do intentionally hurt you. But you know the scriptures about forgiveness.
[00:03:42] It, it basically is saying, hey, it doesn't really matter if they meant to do it or if they didn't mean to do it. You still have to forgive them. Doesn't mean you have to let them stay in your life. Maybe that's something the Lord needs to reveal to you. You know, if this situation where it needs to be, hey, I forgive you, but I have to, I have to have some boundaries here and you can't be my life, you know, right now or ever or whatever.
[00:04:06] And then there's the whole aspect of forgetting, which I don't even think is biblical to say that we could forget something.
[00:04:16] You know, the Lord says that he forgives and he casts our sin into the sea of forgetfulness, which is crazy, right? To even think that God is forgetting on purpose. So I don't even know how that's possible, but that's what he does with us.
[00:04:34] He forgives us and literally throws it into the sea of forgetfulness. So what I think this is, and I'm just speculating, this is definitely just me trying to, you know, take this huge concept of forgiveness, God's radical forgiveness, and, and make sense of it. And with my human logic in mind and how small my brain is trying to figure out, like, okay, how does he do that?
[00:05:01] You know what I really think it is? I think it's a choice that he makes. I think it's him saying, I'm choosing to let this go and not dwell on it anymore. And that can be challenging, especially for us. You know, have you ever tried to stop doing something that like, let's just say you're going to go on a diet, you're going to stop eating junk food.
[00:05:24] So here's what happens if you try to stop, stop doing something, you think about it even more.
[00:05:31] You're like, I can't have Junk food, okay, I can't ever have that again, or whatever. But the more you try to stop doing it, the more you think about it. So the only for us as human beings, the way that we get around this is we actually have to think about something else.
[00:05:47] And I think that's what this.
[00:05:51] This is all about. This forgiveness in a biblical way, is choosing to think about something else that is good as opposed to dwelling on that thing that whatever the trespass was, or being angry and rehearsing it over and over and over and over and over in your mind, thinking about how you would have handled something differently, you know, when it happened, or what. What you would have said or whatever. The more that you rehearse it, the more you're going to allow the forgiven, the unforgiveness, to settle into your heart, which will eventually lead to bitterness pretty quickly. Honestly, it doesn't take long. As a matter of fact, I was just looking at a scripture in Hebrews 12 where he says 12 and 14. I'm going to be really quick and read this to you. In every relationship, be swift to. To choose peace over competition and run swiftly toward holiness, for those who are not holy will not see God. Watch over each other to make sure that no one misses the revelation of God's grace. Here it is. And make sure no one lives with a root of bitterness sprouting within them, which will only cause trouble and poison the hearts of many. It's a quick thing, this root of bitterness. It's like a weed. You know how quick weeds grow out in your yard and choke out the grass. You're, like, trying to grow the good grass, but you'll see, like, these stupid weeds popping up in your yard, right? They grow so much faster than the grass.
[00:07:30] And I feel like that's. That's the same way that bitterness is.
[00:07:34] It is such a quick thing. It's a. It's a quick jump from unforgiveness to bitterness.
[00:07:42] And the scriptures are warning us that, you know, it poisons you. He says it'll cause trouble and poison the hearts of many. So I'm thinking the way that's phrased is not only is it going to poison your heart, but it's going to poison hearts of people around you. You're going to spread that thing. Have you ever noticed that, like, if somebody hurts your friend and your friend tells you and they're unforgiving and bitter about it, even if it seems rightfully so and justified, then all of a sudden you're angry and bitter and hurt and then you tell your husband, and then he's mad at that person too. And it just keeps going.
[00:08:16] It sprouts up like a weed and it becomes a real toxic problem, which then, according to scripture, according to what Jesus said, by the way, in Matthew. I'm going to read this to you real quick.
[00:08:29] Matthew, chapter, chapter 11.
[00:08:32] Sorry, no, I think it's actually 22:6. Oh, no, I'm sorry. Luke 22:6.
[00:08:43] Let me back up and just find this real quick.
[00:08:48] I was in a different page. Okay, so Jesus is talking 6:14. Sorry, 6:14. He says here, if you forgive, if for you forgive men the trespasses or the things that they trespass against you, then your Father will forgive you in heaven.
[00:09:05] So let's look at this word forgive, which I can't even pronounce, to be honest with you.
[00:09:15] Afiamo, afiame, afiami, afiami, afiami. That's what it means.
[00:09:23] It means to cry, forgive, forsake, lay aside, leave, let alone omit, put, send away, remit, suffer, yield up. There's a lot of those, of course, you know what they're pulling from. This is forgive. This is the. The main word, but it means a lot more than that. It kind of takes on like this almost financial connotation to it because it. If you look at this word a little bit closer, it also has this meaning of basically releasing a debt that someone owes you. And that's how it kind of equates it to. I was trying to find that for you so I could read it.
[00:10:08] To send away.
[00:10:10] To go away or depart. To send, forth, to let go, to let go. I think that is the best way to describe forgiveness. To let go, to disregard, to leave. Not just not to discuss it. Now, to remit.
[00:10:31] Here's my favorite one. To let go. Give up a debt by not demanding it.
[00:10:37] So this is the heart of what I think this word means, is to let go, to remit.
[00:10:47] To let go of a debt and not demand it anymore. So for me, because I've been mortgage lending, a mortgage lender, or a lender in general, if you have a loan with them and you default, they can make a demand. It's called a demand letter. And they can say, because you haven't made the payment, your past due so many days, we demand that you pay off the entire balance. Here's the entire higher balance. And I think that that's kind of the picture I get in my head when I think about unforgiveness. Somebody does something to you, oh, okay, you owe me. XYZ now, and I'm demanding that you pay it in full. But here's the thing about the gospel, and I know you know this, but I just want to paint a word picture for you. Imagine that you have a debt. You have a huge, massive loan at the bank, and you got past due a little bit. Times are hard. You didn't have the money to pay it. You didn't know how you were going to do it. So you, you, you went, you know, maybe you went over your grace period. Now you're 30 days past due, and all of a sudden you get a letter in the mail. It's a demand and it's saying, okay, here is if you don't pay this within 10 days, then the entire balance is due. And here's what it is. Here's the payoff. Now imagine you're. You're looking at your bank account, you're looking at everything, and you're saying, I couldn't even sell everything I have and pay this. Like this is too big.
[00:12:07] Well, God knows that. And that's why he sent his son. Our balance, our sin balance was too big. And so Jesus came in and paid the debt. He went to the bank, so to speak, and he paid off the loan that we had. The demand that was against us from the enemy, that said, you know, or not just that, but the judgment, the justice that God must have for sin, right?
[00:12:31] So Jesus paid that. Well, he didn't just pay that for you, he paid that for everyone who's ever sinned. And this is so hard to grasp when someone hurts you because you want justice and there is time for that. God did say, vengeance is mine, I will repay.
[00:12:49] Right? But it's not going to be in the way that we think. Probably God has a way of handling that, right? And it's so hard sometimes to let that go.
[00:12:58] But I see this picture in my head and, and it's a. It can be a real struggle to not, you know, expect other people to pay up and. Or for you to let that debt go when somebody's done something to you, but you expect God to let it go when you do something to him or someone else. So it's a kind of a double standard. We do that a lot. We do that a whole lot. We make things a lot harder on other people than we do on ourselves. We give ourselves better breaks.
[00:13:27] But God is saying, this is inequality. I mean, you can't have it that way. It's the same across the board for all of us. And it took Jesus's Blood to pay our debt. So God is asking us to let it go, to remit, to give up. By not demanding that debt to be paid anymore, putting it on him, he repaid the debt.
[00:13:50] And I think when we do that, it opens the door for God to work.
[00:13:55] But if we don't do it, then God cannot work in this situation.
[00:14:00] And he really wants to bless you. He wants to bless me. He wants to bless us as his children. But one of the ways a blessing blocker is unforgiveness. Absolutely unforgiveness. I mean, there are scriptures. I wish I'd have pulled this up, but I didn't. Where Jesus is saying, if you're praying and you have unforgiveness in your heart, you have something against your brother or your sister, you're supposed to stop right then and go and make that right.
[00:14:24] Right? Because he's saying, you can't approach me with that in your heart because I've forgiven you. Now you must freely forgive others as well.
[00:14:34] It's hard. You know, I wish I could say that it would. It's just a flip of a switch.
[00:14:42] And I think in the beginning, it's not that way. I think at some point, as. As you walk, as you learn how to walk in this.
[00:14:50] And again, walking in forgiveness, it doesn't really mean, like, you don't have any emotional pain or you don't have any negative feelings from the trespass or against the person, but what it means is you're choosing to not require that debt to be paid.
[00:15:14] So here's what I do, and here's what I have done. And you guys that have been listening, you know my story a little bit about what I've been through in the last year of my life.
[00:15:25] I think the. The biggest thing I've ever had to forgive was what my husband did last. Last September.
[00:15:32] Finding out that he had had multiple affairs, that he had been talking to multiple women.
[00:15:39] That was a whole other level of forgiveness that I have never had to work through in my life.
[00:15:46] And I didn't want somebody throwing First Corinthians 13 at me. Love is patient. Love is kind. Love doesn't keep record of wrongs. I mean, when you're in that moment, all you can think about is your own pain.
[00:15:58] And so people ask me, and he and I have talked about this on. On our podcast, the Marriage Altar, how he. Because he asked me, how did you forgive me?
[00:16:08] And I can tell you one of the ways that I have worked through unforgiveness for people that have Hurt me is I have.
[00:16:15] I have asked God to let me see them the way he sees them.
[00:16:20] I have really allowed him to give me empathy for people, to let me see what. What was going on in their life, what led up to this moment. Because I think more than likely they probably didn't set out or intend to hurt you. Now, there are a few people in the world, obviously the devil has got them, and they actually enjoy hurting people.
[00:16:46] But I think most of the time, when you're in a relationship with someone and there seems to be a mutual love, especially if you're believers, I'm pretty sure you both love each other, it becomes this other thing because we're both hurting broken people.
[00:17:04] And sometimes we do stupid things and we hurt each other, whether it's intentional or not. But I would bet most of the time the other person did not mean to hurt you. And that doesn't always make you feel better when somebody says that, I didn't mean to do it. Well, I don't care. It still hurt. It still hurt really bad. Right? But what I had to do was, I had to see why the. Why. Why did they do it? Well, it had nothing to do with me.
[00:17:29] That was what was crazy.
[00:17:32] The trespass was against me, but it had nothing to do with me.
[00:17:36] So I had to let God show me the brokenness of the other person. That's what I'm trying to say.
[00:17:42] The absolute brokenness of that person and how trapped he was. For him, he was trapped in an addiction that he couldn't get out of. And he hated himself for it. And he's told me several times, you know, please don't think I enjoyed it. I hated myself for it. I hated myself for it every time I did it.
[00:18:05] And he hated himself for it so much that. That on September 20th, he tried to take his own life.
[00:18:12] 21st, I think. Actually.
[00:18:14] No, 20th. Right. It was his birthday.
[00:18:16] So can you imagine? It's your birthday and you try to take your own life. The devil has a plan, doesn't he? The devil had a planned. Had it all planned out in this scheme where he, you know, had worked his way up to this point in Mike's life and in my life. And he was betting on me not forgiving Mike.
[00:18:34] He was betting on it, but he doesn't know God.
[00:18:37] He doesn't know God. He doesn't. Well, he should after all these millennia and thousands upon thousands of years. But, you know, God's love in us, because it takes agape love to forgive it is a different kind of Love.
[00:18:54] And here's the thing, you'll never be able to forgive out of your own love or your own free will or your own strength or whatever. It's going to take God doing it through you. And so it's a surrender.
[00:19:09] It's not a forced thing. It's a surrender. It's. And it's. For me, it was saying things like, lord, and this was the prayer. He told me to pray. He said, pray, ask me to work forgiveness in your heart.
[00:19:23] He said, work. He didn't say, ask me to just give you forgiveness in your heart. Ask me to just do it. No, he said, work. Ask me to work forgiveness. Because it is a work.
[00:19:33] It is absolutely a process, and it's a work. And it's. It takes God digging around in your heart, uprooting things, planting things.
[00:19:44] It's not necessarily easy. It really hurts. And there are moments, even now, nine, ten months later, after all of that, that I wake up feeling a little bit hurt, sometimes angry, because I think I'm still walking through some grief.
[00:20:02] But I really am just surrendering to God in this.
[00:20:07] I do tell him it hurts. He knows that it hurts. He's not telling you that your pain is unfounded or that you shouldn't have pain.
[00:20:17] Maybe you need to tend to that. Maybe you need. Because you need to be healed when you're hurt, when you go through something traumatic. So I'm definitely not beating people up or saying, you're such a bad Christian because you can't forgive. That's not what I'm saying at all. It's a process. God has to work it into your heart. And it may take a while. And you. You may need to go through counseling. You may need to talk to someone. You're going to need time. You're going to need space, and you're going to need God's help. You won't be able to forgive without his love working through you. And that's the beauty of it. If there is anything beautiful about it is you get to experience God's love in a new way.
[00:20:58] And something that God did for me was a complete perspective shift that I never would have imagined was.
[00:21:05] As I was going through this with Mike, it occurred to me that I got to experience maybe just a smidgen of what God feels sometimes when we do things to him, when we turn our back on him, when we.
[00:21:24] Well, when we have an affair with the world, don't we do it all the time?
[00:21:29] And that's another reason I was able to forgive him, because I could See, see my own sin. And how can I not forgive Mike for his sin when I have done other things symbolically, you know, as far as cheating on God, you know, having these moments in my life where I chose the world over him. I came back, but he forgave me, of course. But that's just.
[00:21:57] That's just a fraction of it. And I think that really helped me understand that Mike's sin was no worse than mine, that I had done terrible things as well. And when you can see it like that and you have to step back a minute, you have to step back. It's really hard because you're in pain, but you have to step back and you have to say, okay, show me what I have done, Lord. Show me times in my life where I have had to.
[00:22:26] Had to be forgiven by you or other people.
[00:22:29] And that helps you walk it out.
[00:22:33] But there are tons of scriptures about forgiveness and what God expects of us and how to do it.
[00:22:43] I think, though, my goal today is not to beat people over the head with scripture and say, hey, you're not doing a good job.
[00:22:51] You need to try harder. And it's not about trying to harder.
[00:22:56] It's not about trying harder. That's never going to be the answer.
[00:23:00] I think the answer is surrendering. I think the end. I say that a lot, a lot of surrendering, but.
[00:23:07] But letting his love work through you in such a way because your forgiveness could save someone else.
[00:23:18] That's one of the things that Mike said to me. He was like, it was the way that you responded, like anybody else I've ever known would have not forgiven me and would have left me and have before, but you didn't. And I can tell you, I take no credit for that. That was the Lord, the Lord in me, him working through me.
[00:23:44] What choice do we have here? If you're like me and you've known the Lord for a long time and you know who he is.
[00:23:52] If I say I'm a Christian, I have to follow Christ and Christ forgave.
[00:23:56] And every time I think about my sin and me not wanting to forgive someone else because of their sin and what they've done to me, I see Jesus on the cross and I'm thinking, if he can look at these people and he can say to his Father, these people that had beat him, pulled his beard out, whipped him, and he says, father, forgive them, for they don't know what they're doing, if he can do that, how do I have any right to hold anything against anyone else?
[00:24:24] So that is Making the mindset shift of forgiveness over bitterness. And I pray that you forgive me if you're offended with this message. Because my heart is not to bring condemnation, my heart is to bring conviction so that you can be set free.
[00:24:44] Because what could be at stake here is maybe blessings that God wants to bring into your life. And I know so many people who have walked in unforgiveness and then ended up with some terrible disease. I really believe, I really, really believe that we open doors to the attack of Satan in our area, in our life, maybe in our bodies, in our mind, especially in our finances, all kinds of things.
[00:25:13] We, we open that door when we don't operate in forgiveness. Because this is a commandment. This is a commandment of the Lord and it's a sin when we don't do it.
[00:25:24] So the good news is, though, he's made a way for us to do it, we hold on to him, we ask him, we cry out to him for help. And I think it starts right there, asking, asking, you know, confessing. I think we come to the Lord so many times and we just don't tell him the truth. Like he doesn't know. And we try to act like we're super spiritual and we're not hurting and there's nothing wrong and we're so holy or whatever, but I think we just need to come to him and just say, lord, I'm an absolute mess. I'm a wreck. I am so hurt.
[00:25:55] Just like, tell him the truth.
[00:25:57] Tell him how angry you are. I'm angry. I cannot believe they did this. I need you to help me forgive.
[00:26:04] I need you to change my heart. I need you to work forgiveness here. I need you to show me, show me the way you see them.
[00:26:12] See, it's in the way that you pray. It's in the way that you ask for his help. He is more than happy to help you with this.
[00:26:19] So don't let the enemy bring condemnation into your life. If you are struggling to forgive someone, I think about in a marriage, you know, one of the worst places that you can end up is in that place of contempt. And I think contempt is basically full grown bitterness in someone's heart towards someone else. That's the best way I know how to say it. When you get to the place of contempt with someone, it's almost impossible to forgive them. I'm not saying you can't. God can do anything. But you have built up so much bitterness and there's so much poison running through you that it is so, so hard and it takes a lot more work to. For God to clean that thing up and to get you back on the right path and to fix your heart. You've done a lot of damage to each other at that point, you know, in a marriage or in a relationship.
[00:27:15] And most people who get to the point of contempt in their marriage don't make it. That's usually the death blow of the marriage, is when you get to that point, you just. You're just done.
[00:27:27] So I hope and I pray that you can hear my voice, hear the voice of the Lord saying, don't go that direction. Like, if that's something you're struggling with your spouse right now, it's just almost a place of content. Maybe you've been in the marriage a long time, and they just keep doing the same dang thing over and over, and you're tired of it. You know, you're tired of waiting. You're tired of trusting. You're tired of believing them. You're tired of. I don't know, maybe they have an addiction, you know, maybe. Maybe they just keep doing the same thing over and over, and it's hurting you. I get it. I really do.
[00:28:04] But there's always. With the Lord, there's always a way he can make it work. He can change it.
[00:28:11] There may be some things on your side that he wants to do in order to bring about those changes in your. In your spouse.
[00:28:18] I can tell you that what I did.
[00:28:22] And I had no idea that Mike was. Was having these affairs. I had no idea what was going on.
[00:28:31] But I prayed for him all the time. And I would say things like, father, I want him to experience you like I have experienced you. I want him to know you like I have known you, which is so intimately. I know you as Father, I know you. I want him to know you. I want him to experience you. I want him to encounter you in such a way that it wrecks his life. And, boy, did God answer that prayer. And so sometimes your prayer might need to be tweaked a little bit.
[00:29:04] Maybe you need to pray for your spouse to have an encounter with God or to have an experience or for them to fall in love with God, because that's. Actually, I would pray that I just want him to fall in love with you. And one of the things that Mike said after all this happened was he was crying. He said, I've fallen in love with God. Like I've fallen in love with him. And I knew that once God had him, there he was. Man, he wasn't going anywhere.
[00:29:29] Once somebody falls in love with God and they receive this gift that God's given them, it's really hard for them to leave, you know?
[00:29:37] So I don't know. I don't know why I went there, but maybe someone needed to hear that. I pray that this message was encouragement to you today and not condemnation. Definitely not what I wanted.
[00:29:51] Definitely.
[00:29:53] Don't give up. Don't give up on difficult relationships. If you're in a difficult marriage, God can do anything. If you can allow him to work forgiveness in your heart, he could do miracles. Absolute miracles. And by the way, if you are struggling in your marriage, you may want to check out our our marriage podcast called the Marriage Altar. I'll drop that link in the notes below as well so you can see that. You can also, of course, read my blog on shannastrange.net I do have a couple books. If you're a reader, you can definitely look at my website and you can see some of the books I have available. Music, of course, all that good stuff. Any resources to just help you grow closer to God. That's what I'm all about. So, hey, I pray the rest of the week is good for you and until next time, I pray you are blessed.
