Excluded

When you’ve hurt someone repeatedly out of your own pain, immaturity, and ignorance and they were always silent about it, down the road, even after you’ve realized and apologized for your actions, more and more they exclude you from their life, instead, preferring others who are easier to get along with. Hurting people hurt people - even our loved ones.

When we realize the error of our ways and go to God in sorrowful repentance, He forgives and casts our sin as far as the east is to the west [and He remembers it no more] - Psalm 103:12.

Humans, not so much - particularly the ones you’ve been responsible for hurting, especially family. It’s a festering wound that cannot heal in the relationship when true forgiveness hasn’t taken place on their end. And it hurts.

Remember, there are always consequences to our actions - both good and bad. The consequence of our actions in this case is the necessary patience for those to forgive us.We must give them time and space to heal, all the while inviting God in to bless them and open their hearts and eyes to want to restore what had been broken in the relationship. Only God can do that.

“Remember, there are always consequences to our actions - both good and bad.”

It deeply hurts when you’ve admitted your wrong doing many times, continued to love with your whole heart and that love is not returned because of the damage done. Neither is your love acknowledged nor is appreciation expressed, unless perhaps in a birthday card - maybe. Mostly, it’s overlooked. And routinely you end up coming in as a third place, five-minute obligation - if at all. You are commonly excluded, while others are generally invited and preferred instead. It’s messy - wounded family heartstrings - especially when you’ve begun to heal and have taken responsibility for negative character flaws that have spilled onto others for far too long. Amends need to be made. Apologies need to be given and hopefully received so the road to restoration can begin. That is the goal. But sadly and all too often, those affected don’t really forgive. They say they do. But their actions show otherwise.

Let me speak into this. When we severely hurt someone or they deeply hurts us, a dysfunctional environment is created. The longer we are in it, most often, the longer it takes to heal and restore trust, especially when dealing with loved ones. Consistency is the key. Eventually our changed behavior will speak for itself and further words of apology are no longer needed. There is nothing we can do to expedite or rush healing in a breached relationship. Only God can change hearts and that’s why it’s so imperative to pray about and invite God into the situation.

Some people have the ability to go on living life and remain silent about their pain inflicted from past negative circumstances. They have deeply stuffed their feelings into a manageable box where keeping busy with others continues to serve in numbing their underlying emotional injuries; just “ignore it and it will go away” mentality. Unfortunately, a new cycle has begun in their lives, perhaps even more painful than their own past pain. And the only thing we can do is consistently walk out the changes that have occurred in us. Eventually, how you act or respond will require a change on their end, because change calls out change.

Healing doesn’t come by ignoring the obvious elephant in the room. The only way to get rid of the pain is to move through it, acknowledge it, and work it out. Easy in theory, darn hard in reality. If it were simply that easy, the world would be a much happier place to live in! But we are well aware healing is a process that takes time - sometimes a very long time.

Let’s go back to the beginning when we were hurt by the people who shaped our behaviors and thought processes. As we grew, had we simply been able to acknowledge and work it out along the way, why then have we gone on to hurt our own loved ones in the same manner?

The answer is we don’t know how to work these things out in our own strength. It takes supernatural truth and power to be set free from bondage.

That is why our life depends on inviting God into our circumstances.

“Healing doesn’t come by ignoring the obvious elephant in the room.”

Sometimes, the tables are turned as others have apologized to us and we are the ones who can’t move forward. It happens to all of us many times throughout our lives. And it’s ok. Human interactions sometimes go south and we are either the cause, the recipient or most often we play both roles. Healthy connections dictate that bumps in relational roads are commonplace but what keeps relationship alive, producing and thriving is our ability to intentionally reconcile and heal difficulties between us. Having this understanding and awareness is only one part of the solution. Bringing God into it is where true and lasting change will take place.

Karol K. Truman wrote a book back in 1991 entitled Feelings Buried Alive Never Die and although reading the book is on my list of desires, the title alone speaks for itself. We cannot expect inner health, peace and well-being if we ignore the wounds inside us.

Ask yourself these questions. If you’re dealing with someone who hasn’t truly forgiven you, are they other-centered, emotionally transparent and vulnerable, honest, and concerned about your well-being? Or are they self-absorbed, always busy, inconvenienced, unavailable, distant and pre-occupied with their own life?

Dear one, if your answer was the later, take heart, it’s not you. If you have gone to God and done everything you can to make your wrongs right and the other party still snubs you, excludes you, doesn’t make time for you and simply isn’t interested in you, I encourage you, if it’s family and you can’t imagine walking away from the relationship, keep trying and pray into your circumstances. As long as you are breathing, God isn’t done and the current situation is NOT your final outcome. But you have to do YOUR part - work on yourself and pray for the other party, and most importantly, wait well. Be patient. God is all about restoring important relationships. Remember we can’t see what He is doing behind the scenes on the other person’s heart. So pray - hard and don’t stop.

We don’t know the heart of someone else, only God does. Our job is not to judge why someone hasn’t forgiven us. Remember, we have no control over their feelings, actions or lack thereof. We must choose to “let go and let God do what He does best - restore hearts and relationships. We must choose to not resent them for not meeting a standard we have set up for them. No matter how painful it is for us to want that relationship to be a certain way, only God knows why their heart remains hardened.

I can assure you every single thing that happens in your life - every single day - points back to Almighty God, our Creator. Does the person you’re in fractured relationship with know and follow the Lord? That makes a HUGE difference in repairing what’s been broken between you. Our God is about repair, restoration and renewal and He yearns to have us seek His ways in dealing with others.

So how does God instruct us to handle breached relationships? God is ALL about relationship. The entire Bible is based on relationship and community. And we need to be about our Father’s business. We must make relationships matter to us, which means others need to matter to us; their lives, their experiences, their journeys, their challenges.

Caring  means being honest; with yourself, with God and with others, especially in challenging relationships. True healing comes in surrendering to the truth of what happened, giving it to God and honoring the person involved by being honest with them about their grudge, lack of forgiveness toward you, or their routine exclusion of you from events, holidays, or everyday milestones. It does not mean you are allowed to blast them. That goes nowhere. A gentle answer turns away wrath. Be kind, be concerned, be understanding of how they feel, what they think and what their experience was with you even though it may be very hard to hear. You owe them the respect and empathy of what their experience was with you when you hurt them.

Yes, we hurt people and we cannot dismiss that. They don’t just hurt us. We are perpetrators as much as anyone else. We are not innocent. Even when we have the best of intentions, if we do not submit those intentions to the Lord and ask for His permission and guidance to proceed with sharing something on our heart with someone, things will go south very quickly. If the other party isn’t ready for it and we go ahead even after God has said, “Don’t,” you will hurt that person. Be more aware of yourself. Are you acting in kindness and gentleness? Do you know when to zip it? Always ask God for discernment.

You can only be responsible for you; how you experience things, think about things, process things. And it’s common for us to have an expectation that others should think and experience life the same way we do. But they don’t. They have their own thoughts, defenses, triggers, perceptions, and ways of doing life and they need to be equally respected.

We are called to respect and take responsibility for ourselves first, however. How you feel matters. What you think matters and everything that makes you human needs to be honored, accepted and respected by the people in your life - especially if they are family. If they don’t then boundaries need to be put in place about how you will and will not allow them to treat you.

“You can only be responsible for you”

If we are followers of Jesus Christ, then we must make it a point to follow His Word. Proverbs 27:5 says “Better is an open rebuke than love carefully concealed.” If you hurt someone,  take responsibility, humble yourself, go and apologize.

If someone hurts you, gently confront them. And have a lot of grace. Express your hurt respectfully. If you are met with resistance, that’s ok. Let it be. You took care of yourself, shared that your boundary had been crossed and that it’s not ok.

Remember, Romans 12:18 If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.

A final note to ponder is perhaps God is allowing the exclusion to protect you. His grace covers us and His plan is ALWAYS good for us. If this breach is necessary and reconciliation seems way off in the distance, trust that it’s God’s hand protecting you for this season of distance.

Continue to pray and wait well.