6 min read
I want to gently untangle two things that get braided together in the Christian world: forgiveness and reconciliation. They are related. They are not the same. And the difference matters enormously for your healing.
There is a sentence I have heard in church pews, in small groups, and in my therapy office more times than I can count:
“I thought I was supposed to forgive and move on.”
And underneath it, almost always, is a woman carrying something heavy, a wound she has been told to release, a relationship she has been told to restore, and a quiet, aching confusion about why obedience has not made the pain stop.
What Scripture Says About Forgiveness
Paul writes to the church in Colossians 3 about how the people of God are to treat one another. He tells them to bear with each other, and to forgive whatever grievances they have against one another
12 Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.13 Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. 14 And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.
That is not a suggestion. It is a command rooted in the gospel itself. We forgive because we have been forgiven. The standard is not what the other person deserves; the standard is what Christ has already extended to us.
But here is what I want you to hear, especially if forgiveness has ever felt like being asked to hand your abuser a get-out-of-jail-free card:
Forgiveness is not primarily a gift you give the person who hurt you. It is a grace God gives your heart. For your sake!
Unforgiveness Is a Poison
Hebrews warns the church to watch carefully, so that no “root of bitterness” springs up and causes trouble (Hebrews 12:15). A root. Something that starts small and underground and ends up shaping everything that grows above the surface.
Unforgiveness does not stay contained. It does not sit politely in the corner of your heart where you filed it away. It spreads. It multiplies anger. It hardens into resentment. It teaches you to expect betrayal from people who have not betrayed you. It shows up in your body, in your jaw, your shoulders, your sleep, your stomach, your nervous system that never quite gets the message that the threat has passed.
Paul names this directly: put away bitterness, wrath, anger, and slander, and instead be kind and “tenderhearted, forgiving one another” (Ephesians 4:31–32). Notice that the command to release bitterness comes before the command to forgive. God knows what carrying it does to us.
Unforgiveness is a poison you keep drinking, hoping it will hurt someone else.
And it is not only a poison to your body and your relationships. It builds a wall between you and God, not because He withdraws, but because a heart clenched around a wound has a very hard time opening to anything else.
So What Is Reconciliation?
Forgiveness is something that happens in your heart, before God, and it does not require the other person’s participation. It does not require their apology. It does not require their acknowledgment. It does not even require them to be alive.
Reconciliation is the restoration of relationship. It requires two people. It requires repentance, changed behavior, rebuilt trust, and, this is the part we often forget, it requires safety.
Paul understood this. Romans 12:18 says, “If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all”. Read that again slowly. There are two enormous qualifiers built right into the verse. If possible. So far as it depends on you. The Holy Spirit inspired those words on purpose. Scripture itself acknowledges that peace is not always possible, and that some of it does not depend on you at all.
In an ideal world, we all agree that reconciliation is beautiful, and that restoration is the heart of God. And in the therapy room, I sit with women for whom reconciliation is simply not on the table:
The caregiver who left scars on her soul is no longer on this earth. The person who harmed her is unrepentant and unchanged. Reaching out to a former partner would put her in real danger. The relationship itself is the thing that keeps re-opening the wound.
There are a thousand situations in which reconciling is not the wise or safe option. In every single one of them, forgiveness is still available to you. That is the mercy of it. God did not tie your freedom to another person’s willingness to change.
A Tender Word to the Wife Whose Husband Was Unfaithful
I want to speak carefully here, because this is holy ground.
I have sat with women whose marriages ended in divorce because of infidelity. I have sat with women who found out last week and have no idea what to do next. And I have sat with women who have prayed, wrestled, and arrived at a place where they want to rebuild with their husband.
All three are women whose worst fear was realized. All three have lived the nightmare. And I hold each one gently, case by case, because there is no formula here.
Please hear me: my job as a therapist is not to tell you whether to stay or go. That is between you, the Lord, and wise counsel who knows the specifics of your life. My work is different. My work is to help you uncover what is happening inside you. To process the trauma you have been carrying, often for years before the betrayal was ever named. To help you be released from the beliefs that infidelity tried to write over your identity: I am not enough. I am not desirable. I am unworthy of faithfulness. I should have seen it. It was my fault.
Those beliefs are lies. They are lies whether the marriage is restored or whether it ends. And they are exactly the kind of lies EMDR helps the brain and body finally let go of.
When You Cannot Feel Him
I know there are nights when you lie awake asking where God is. I know the silence feels like absence.
“Jesus wept” John 11:35). He wept at a graveside for a loss He was about to reverse. He was not embarrassed by grief. He did not rush past sorrow to get to the resurrection. He wept with the people He loved.
“The Lord is near to the brokenhearted”(Psalm 34:18). Not near to the ones who are handling it well. Near to the broken ones.
It is completely valid to not feel that God is with you. Feelings are real data, but they are not always accurate reporters of reality. This is why we learn to worship from a place of knowledge rather than a place of feeling. The psalmist does this out loud, he interrogates his own downcast soul and then preaches to it: “Hope in God; for I shall again praise him” (Psalm 42:5). He is not denying his despair. He is refusing to let his despair have the final word.
Some seasons, worship sounds like a full-throated song. Some seasons, it sounds like getting out of bed and saying, God, I do not feel You, but I know You are here. Both are worship. The second one might be the braver of the two.
The Invitation
If you are reading this and reconciliation is not possible in your situation, I do not want you to walk away thinking your healing is off the table too.
Forgiveness is good for your soul. It is good for your body. It is good for your relationship with Jesus. It is not the same as saying what happened was okay. It is not the same as trust, and it is not the same as access. You can forgive someone completely and still never let them near your life again.
And forgiveness is rarely a one-time decision. It is usually a road you walk, sometimes daily, sometimes for years, with the Holy Spirit walking beside you. That is not failure. That is the process.
If you are in the middle of this, the betrayal, the grief, the confusion, the questions you cannot say out loud at church, you do not have to sort it out alone. I offer faith-based EMDR and trauma therapy for women and teen girls in Texas, in person in The Woodlands/Spring and virtually across the state.
You can book a free 15-minute consultation by clicking the contact button below.
A note on confidentiality: No client details are shared in this post. Any situations described are general composites reflecting common themes in trauma and betrayal work, and do not represent any individual person, session, or story. Nothing here identifies a client of Clear Mind Therapy & EMDR PLLC.
This blog is for educational and encouragement purposes only and does not constitute therapy, mental health treatment, pastoral counseling, or a therapeutic relationship. If you are in immediate danger, please contact local emergency services or the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233 or the Suicide and Crisis Hotline at 988.
Abi Carpenter, MS, LPC-Associate, is supervised by Dr. Sampson, LPC-S.