Forgiving What You Can't Forget: Discover How to Move On, Make Peace with Painful Memories, and Create a Life That’s Beautiful Again

by Lysa TerKeurst

While I can look forward to eternity one day, I don’t have to wait to live out my heavenly citizenship. I can bring heaven to earth today by living in such a forgiving way that my choices line up with God. Think about the Lord’s Prayer: “[God’s] will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6:10). My heart is most at home in the safety of God’s truth. Like the verse from Hebrews says, He will equip me with all I need to do this. He will empower me to do what He instructs. And so I run toward the forgiveness God commands. And only then will I find the healing peace He offers. Refusing to forgive is refusing the peace of God.

Think about the Lord’s Prayer: “[God’s] will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6:10). My heart is most at home in the safety of God’s truth. Like the verse from Hebrews says, He will equip me with all I need to do this. He will empower me to do what He instructs. And so I run toward the forgiveness God commands. And only t...

On card after card, I spilled out every fact I could remember of all that had so deeply wounded me. Jim told me to place them on the floor facing up in a long line that snaked around the office. Then he handed me a stack of red felt squares cut slightly larger than each card and instructed me to declare my forgiveness for each specific fact. Finally, I was to seal each forgiveness declaration by placing a piece of red felt over the top of the card, symbolizing the blood of Jesus and His ultimate sacrifice for the sake of our forgiveness. Hurt feelings sometimes don’t want to cooperate with holy instructions.

The cross was the most holy act of forgiveness that ever took place. And it was His blood shed for our sins that was the redemptive ingredient that accomplished a forgiveness we could never have obtained or earned for ourselves. (See endnote for more explanation.)2 It only makes sense that I include Jesus’ shed blood into my act of forgiveness when accomplishing it on my own feels so hard . . . maybe even impossible. Jesus makes it possible.

“I forgive Art for keeping secrets. And whatever my feelings don’t yet allow for, the blood of Jesus will surely cover.” “I forgive Art for breaking our marriage vows. And whatever my feelings don’t...

My pain didn’t need to be validated by Art or vindicated by anyone else. It just needed to be verbalized—spoken out loud, acknowledged, recognized as real—and brought out into the light.

Forgiveness is both a decision and a process. You make the decision to forgive the facts of what happened.

The world can become a little darker or a little brighter just by the choice I make in this moment. So I bow my head and mentally pull out another 3×5 card and the red felt squares and cooperate with the forgiveness of the Lord. “I forgive this person for how their actions back then are still impacting me now. And whatever my feelings don’t yet allow for, the blood of Jesus will surely cover.” Another act of forgiveness means even more healing and clarity. Another intentional brushstroke of beauty slowly replacing the darkness with hues of healing light.

Five years ago, Art being this open would have shocked me. In the years before what we now refer to as “the tunnel of chaos,” I only saw Art cry four times. Those times are deeply etched into my memory, because they were so rare. Art was raised with the belief that emotion was intensely private and better kept to oneself. Performance was rewarded. So performance was preferred, even if that meant pretending. Being taught to stuff feelings early in life can sometimes mean you never learn how to properly understand feelings later in life. Feelings serve a purpose. Feelings inform us of issues that need to be addressed. They also help us empathize with others, bond with others, and know when we need to give and receive emotional support.

We don’t need to be ruled by our feelings. But we also don’t want to be actors playing out scripts that perform with emotion just when it is required or potentially rewarded. This is void of true relationship with those around us.

I had never made the connection before that Art and I were good at playing our roles and doing what was expected but we lacked the kind of depth needed for real emotional intimacy. He grew up in a house where feelings weren’t expressed. So he learned to keep secrets. I grew up in a house where every feeling was not just expressed but declared loudly and processed loudly. Secrets were kept, but they always found their way out in moments of emotional explosions and bold declarations. I couldn’t understand why he was so quiet...

Love is a thing of depth. When forced to stay on the surface, it flounders about like a fish out of water. A fish can’t live on the surface, because it can’t breathe. It breathes oxygen but not from the surface air. Fish pull water through their gills, which dissolve the oxygen from the water and dispense it into their bodies. If they don’t get below the surface, they will be starved of what gives them life. ...

With a childhood like mine, I swatted away any consideration that something was off with Art. After all, I was the one abused, abandoned, and bullied. I truly thought our issues were my issues alone. I didn’t know how to address what I couldn’t figure out. I wasn’t making the connection that Art was crying out for more as well. I just thought he grew up in a quiet house. And quiet means perfect, since people aren’t yelling at each other. Since Art didn’t yell, I thought he was fine. I never made the connection that people who are quiet are sometimes the ones in the most pain. It’s just that their screams are silent. Or, they are acting out in secret. My pain was never undercover, so it was easier to attach the issues to me than to try and question things I didn’t understand.

And here’s where I made another connection. Art was quietly keeping secrets because he didn’t feel acceptable. I was always pushing for conversations he didn’t know how to have, because I was so desperate to hear words other men never said to me. I wanted to know I was accepted. Acceptable and accepted were both feelings we wanted, but the way we went about pursuing those tore us apart instead of bringing us together.

1. FORGIVENESS IS MORE SATISFYING THAN REVENGE.

Forgiveness doesn’t let the other person off the hook. It actually places them in God’s hands.

If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.” To the contrary, “if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink; for by so doing you will heap burning coals on his head.” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. (Romans 12:18–21 ESV) 2. OUR GOD IS NOT A DO-NOTHING GOD.

Sin always masquerades as fun and games. But pull back the curtain of the deceived human heart, and what you’ll find hiding there will drive you to your knees to pray for that person. And maybe that’s the very reason God instructs us to pray for our enemies. Job 15:20 reminds us, “The wicked man writhes in pain all his days” (ESV). And Psalm 44:15 says, “All day long my dishonor is before me and my humiliation has overwhelmed me” (NASB).

There was never one moment when God was doing nothing. Casting all your cares [all your anxieties, all your worries, and all your concerns, once and for all] on Him, for He cares about you [with deepest affection, and watches over you very carefully]. (1 Peter 5:7 AMP) 3. YOUR OFFENDER IS ALSO SUFFERING FROM PAIN.

Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you. (Ephesians 4:32) 4. THE PURPOSE OF FORGIVENESS IS NOT ALWAYS RECONCILIATION.

If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. (Romans 12:18 ESV) Now the goal of our instruction is love that comes from a pure heart, a good conscience, and a sincere faith. (1 Timothy 1:5 CSB) 5. THE ENEMY IS THE REAL VILLAIN.

Yes, people do have a choice to sin against us or not. And certainly, when we are hurt the person hurting us willingly played into the enemy’s plan. But it helps me to remember that this person isn’t my real enemy. The devil is real and on an all-out assault against all things good and real. He hates the word together. And he especially works with great intentionality against anything that brings honor and glory to God. But we are told in Scripture that we can take a stand against the schemes of the enemy. In Ephesians 6:11 that word can in the original Greek form is dynasthai, meaning “I am powerful—I have the power.”2 We aren’t powerless when the enemy stirs up trouble among us. The secret is to be aware of this.

Ephesians 6:11–12 encourages us to “put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.”

There is nothing more powerful than a person living what God’s Word teaches.

Romans 12:15, we find that beautiful balance. Look at Romans 12:9–21

Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves. Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord. Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. Share with the Lord’s people who are in need. Practice hospitality. Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited. Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everyone. If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. Do not take revenge, my dear friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written: “It is mine to avenge; I will repay,” says the Lord. On the contrary: “If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

WHERE WAS GOD when this happened? And if He is all powerful, why didn’t He stop this? He could change this today . . . He could fix this right now . . . He could do a miracle . . . So, why doesn’t He? I made hundreds of suggestions to God about how He could fix all that was wrong while we were in our “tunnel of chaos” season. But God didn’t intervene like I kept thinking He would. I kept imagining all the ways God could stop all of this—the pain, the tragic destruction, the damage that kept compounding day by day. I prayed and prayed. Then I would get up from my prayers and watch in great expectation for glimmers of hope and small evidences of assurance. I kept setting up perfect scenarios for God to move. And then surely if I saw God do what I thought He should do—rescue and restore—then I would do what He was requiring me to do: forgive. I wouldn’t have said I was trying to make a deal with God . . . but I definitely thought we both had parts to play.

I was holding my breath, waiting for a glorious shift where I could finally exhale with relief. Day after day I prayed, watched, believed, cried, fell on my bed exhausted, prayed some more, dreamed of better days, and fought off all the worst-case-scenario visions that nipped at the edges of my mind whenever I tried to sleep. But the more I didn’t see any tangible evidence of God intervening with Art, the more unseen and unheard I felt. The more unseen and unheard I felt, the more my deal with God fell apart. “God, if You aren’t going to do Your part . . . how can you possibly expect me to do mine?”

Christian statements like, “I know God is carrying you. He is fighting this battle for you. He is working good even in the midst of this,” all started to feel like words good for posters that hang in churches or points for sermons or memes for Instagram, but not real promises for real pain. My prayers that used to fill up pages of my journal were reduced to one question: Why? Praise songs that I used to sing with bold assurance and raised arms were now mere whispers. I could barely make myself mouth the words. The word hope has always been one of my absolute favorite spiritual perspectives. I lo...

Webster’s gives this definition of hope: “It’s a feeling of expectation and a desire for certain things to happen.”1 But have you ever heard someone say they are just trying to “keep hope alive”? It sounds more like a patient on life support than a promise on standby. The more I felt like hope was a risk rathe...

And I shudder to say this, but I think that’s what was hiding behind my own disillusionment as well. What makes faith fall apart isn’t doubt. It’s becoming too certain of the wrong things. Things like: Forgiveness doesn’t matter. It’s not worth it. It’s not time for that kind of obedience. God isn’t moving. What I see is absolute proof that God isn’t working. That’s when I can find myself getting more and more skeptical of God’s love, God’s provision, God’s protection, God’s instructions, and God’s faithfulness. And most of all, when I start fearing He really has no plan at all, and I’m just truly going to be a victim of circumstances beyond anyone’s control.

The problem with that thinking is, while it may line up with what my life looks like from my place of pain and confusion, it doesn’t line up with truth. And before everything went haywire in my life, I had already put a stake in the ground that God’s Word is where I would turn and return to no matter what.

There are a few times in my life when I’ve seen dramatic moves by God happen quick enough for me to say, “Wow, look what God is doing!” But most of the time it’s thousands of little shifts so slight that the dailiness of His work doesn’t register in real time.

God was intervening and weaving and working, but my human eyes didn’t detect it.

There was a song I kept singing that was released by my church the same year everything fell apart. The lyrics say, “The resurrected King is resurrecting me.” I loved the assurance of those words. I wanted that to be the anthem of my situation. But when everything looked a lot more like death than resurrected life, I found myself singing that song more as a fearful and tearful whisper than a confident declaration.

I think Jesus knew this is where His disciples would be when all of their hope for a better future would soon be hung on a cross and buried in a tomb. I don’t often remember in my own times of disillusionment to read Jesus’ words to them just before He died, but they are so powerful.

Very truly I tell you, you will weep and mourn while the world rejoices. You will grieve, but your grief will turn to joy. A woman giving birth to a child has pain because her time has come; but when her baby is born she forgets the anguish because of her joy that a child is born into the world. So with you: Now is your time of grief, but I will see you again and you will rejoice, and no one will take away your joy. (John 16:20–22) He didn’t promise their grief would be taken away and replaced with joy. He promised the grief would turn into joy. The grief would produce the joy. The grief was a part of the journey, but it would not be the way it would all end.

Charles Spurgeon made such an incredible point about the writings of the apostles after Jesus’ resurrection: It is most remarkable and instructive that the apostles do not appear in their sermons or epistles to have spoken of the death of our Lord with any kind of regret. The gospels mention their distress during the actual occurrence of the crucifixion, but after the resurrection, and especially after Pentecost, we hear of no such grief.3

“Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34).

Forgiving God GETTING HURT BY PEOPLE is hard. Getting hurt by what God allows can feel unbearable.

If we have Jesus today, we are living in answered prayer and perfect provision. The one who brings about good, even from the awful we are seeing with our physical eyes, is actively working on our behalf right now. In 1 John 2:1 Jesus is called our advocate, meaning He sits at the right hand of God and intercedes for us (Romans 8:34). He is talking to the Father about you right now in ways that, if you could hear Him, would make you never afraid of what is in front of you. You wouldn’t question His love for you or His goodness to you. Therefore, we don’t need to forgive God. We need to trust Him.

C. S. Lewis created a beautiful word picture I like to think of when I cannot understand what God is doing. He told us to think of ourselves as a house God is renovating. We think we know what work needs to be done—maybe some small repairs here and there—and then He starts knocking down walls. We are confused and feeling the pain of this level of rebuilding. But maybe His vision is much different than ours. “You thought you were being made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it Himself.”1

We see a cottage. God sees a palace. We see destruction. God sees construction. We see only what the human mind can imagine. God is building something we cannot even fathom. It’s not what we wanted, but it is so very good. And in the end, maybe it’s not what God is working on but how God is working in us that matters most of all.

So, pray what you know to pray. Pray what you need to pray. Pray all the words and let the tears flow into sobs and demands and frustrations and doubts mixed with hope. But then let the faithfulness of God interpret what you see. Let the faithfulness of God build your trust. Let the faithfu...

I titled this chapter “Forgiving God,” not because God needs to be forgiven. But sometimes, in the middle of deep hurt, our hearts can start to wrongly believe God is at fault. When we truly feel we’ve asked God for something urgently necessary, good, right, and holy, like saving a marriage or a loved one’s life or preventing something horrific from happening, and God doesn’t do it? We wouldn’t say He sinned, but we very much may feel betrayed by Him. Or disillusioned by Him. Or possibly wonder if God even cares about us.

When the evils of this world rage around us and terrible tragedies break our hearts, it is understandable why we weep, bang our fists on the steering wheel, scream out very hard words, feel consumed by the seemingly never-ending unfairness of it all, and wrestle through all the questions berating our grief-filled souls. The problem is when we form conclusions from that place. Because, as we’ve been talking about, our perspectives—especially while we are here—aren’t complete.

For though we walk in the flesh, we are not waging war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ. (2 Corinthians 10:3–5 ESV)

No matter what we see, when an argument or opinion enters our mind that speaks against God’s goodness, we don’t entertain it; we destroy it before it starts causing destruction in us.

From the very beginning of Scripture, the enemy of our souls has used arguments against God to get us to doubt God and erode our trust in Him. With Eve, the enemy used the lofty opinion that having her eyes opened to good and evil would help her be more like God because she would “know” what God knows. What a lie that was. She knew a world without evil. What the enemy tricked her into wanting was the “knowledge of good and evil.”

We are living with our eyes open to good and evil. The enemy is such a liar. This awareness didn’t help mankind understand more. Sin only makes us think that what we see on earth is all there is to know. Only God sees both the earthly realm and the heavenly realm from an eternal perspective. So only God sees the full picture with everything we face.