Unpacking forgiveness: A conversation with Chris Brauns

PAUL BUTLER, HOST: Welcome to a special weekend interview from The World and Everything in It. I’m Paul Butler.

A few weeks ago we featured Chris Brauns 2008 book: Unpacking Forgiveness as our Classic Book of the Month—published by Crossway.

Chris Brauns is senior pastor at the Red Brick Church in Stillman Valley, near Rockford, Illinois. He’s been involved in pastoral ministry for more than 30 years. In that time, he has counseled many people with deep wounds and helped walk them through the often-complex issue of forgiveness.

He originally wrote Unpacking Forgiveness for every day Christians in the pews of his church. But earlier this summer, survivors of “The Troubles” invited Pastor Brauns to Northern Ireland to speak on the issue of forgiveness. Many in attendance personally had lost family members and loved ones during that 30-year period when hundreds of people were killed in bombings and other acts of domestic terrorism.

I spoke with Chris Brauns just a few weeks after he returned from that trip. He met me at The First Congregational Church of LaMoille, Illinois, for our interview.

PAUL BUTLER: Chris, just before you arrived, I did a quick search for books on forgiveness on a Christian books website. There were more than 4000 returns. I know you published this book 15 years ago—when there were fewer resources available—but do we really need to read another book on forgiveness?

CHRIS BRAUNS: Yeah, you know, the question, why do we need a book on forgiveness? And any time I'm asked that question, there's a part of me that wants to respond, “Really? I mean, really?” We live in a broken world, full of broken relationships. And when I was first a pastor, I realized very quickly, that people were all working through issues of forgiveness on one level or another. And the other thing I realized was that there wasn’t a lot of clarity, about a biblical understanding of forgiveness. So I write as a pastor, that’s the call on my life, with the goal of biblical or gospel shaped forgiveness. 

BUTLER: Well, let’s start right there. When you speak of gospel shaped forgiveness, what do you mean?

BRAUNS: I—and I think this is a biblical understanding—understand forgiveness. I’ll use a phrase from John Murray, a thinker, a theologian at Westminster Seminary in the 20th century. It’s a definite act that occurs between two parties. It is a gracious commitment to one party that this matter no longer stands between us. 

But you know what, maybe it's most helpful to talk about a specific instance. A lady actually about my age, she was a victim. And she, at trial testified that a particular man was the one who had assaulted her. It was horrible. I’m not giving all the details. He went to prison for over a decade. And eventually, he was cleared by DNA evidence. It was proven that she had wrongly testified against him. She was horrified. I mean, can you imagine knowing that you’ve taken a decade of someone’s life from them? She couldn’t live with that. And she reached out to him. A man named Ronald Cotton. And she asked to meet with them. And he graciously agreed to meet with her. So just just think of the grace of that. That’s a gift. And they met, and she said, “Will you please forgive me?” And he said, “I forgive you.” 

Now, there’s nothing she could ever do to give back that decade of his life. He absorbed that. He took that. And I think that’s an echo of the gospel, right? We—all of us—offended a holy God. God didn’t say, “It’s okay. I’ll look past it. It’s automatically taken care of.” He graciously gave his only begotten Son, that if we would repent and believe in Him, we are forgiven. That no longer stands between us and God. And that’s what forgiveness is. Forgiveness in this life doesn’t mean the elimination of consequences. 

You know, the most infamous case of adultery ever was King David, who repented. Psalm 51: “Have mercy on me, oh God, according your steadfast love, according to your abundant mercy, blot out my transgressions.” But he still faced awful consequences. So forgiveness is, it’s a definite act—a gracious commitment—that this no longer stands between us. That we don’t have to pay the penalty, as it were. Though, it doesn't mean the elimination necessarily in this life, the elimination of consequences. 

BUTLER: Now, your perspective seems to be a little different from many current resources on the topic of forgiveness, even within Christian circles. Early in your book, you warn readers about what you call a therapeutic view. What’s that? 

BRAUNS: What has come to be the dominant understanding even within evangelicalism has been a therapeutic understanding that understands forgiveness to be an emotional strategy: a private emotional strategy for how I feel. So one of my goals with Unpacking Forgiveness was to contrast gospel shaped or biblical forgiveness with the modern therapeutic understanding of forgiveness, which is really carried the day today.

BUTLER: So why is the therapeutic understanding of forgiveness counterproductive? Not to be too pragmatic about it, but what’s the problem with that definition?

BRAUNS: Yeah, well, the trajectory, to start with. Where it can go. One of the things that we really see now is this idea that it is a legitimate thing to forgive God. So one of the most influential books on forgiveness says, “Why shouldn’t we forgive God?” And then more recently, a book I reviewed, had the title: Totally Forgiving God. It was published within evangelicalism and promoted by leaders. Why would anyone say that we ought to forgive God? Well, here’s what they were saying: if forgiveness is ceasing to feel bitter and angry, if that’s what it is—a therapeutic strategy—that’s the first move. The second move is, then I don't want to feel bitter or angry at God. So it’s legitimate to totally forgive God. And they do not mean to argue that God is morally culpable. But I think that’s the inevitable implication of saying we ought to forgive God.

BUTLER: Well, one of the ways that you encourage readers to resist that pitfall is to reconsider forgiveness in the light of God’s justice. It’s actually one of the parts of your book I found most helpful. So take a minute and unpack for us how these two seemingly contradictory ideas relate forgiveness and justice.

BRAUNS: So that’s a big, big question. Take the extreme cases, which, in a broken world, we have, sadly, too many of them. You have a grave offense, and an unrepentant offender. What do you do with that? How are you to think of that? And, you know, II Timothy 4 the Apostle Paul says, “Alexander the Coppersmith, did me a great deal of harm.” Then he says, “The Lord will repay him according to his deeds. Beware of him yourself, for he strongly opposed our message.” He goes on to verse 16. He says, “And at my first defense, no one came to stand by me, but all deserted me. May it not be charged against them.” Now that’s beautiful. The theology behind II Timothy 4:14, 16, Paul lays out in Romans 12:17-21 where he says: “Beloved, never avenge yourselves.”

So first thing—and he repeats it a couple of times there—he says, never take revenge. So it’s never an option. “I'm going to go get Alexander. I'm going to hire somebody to get Alexander.” Or even the Apostle Paul didn't say, “I'm jumping on social media, and I am going to Tweet about Alexander every day.” He says the LORD will repay him according to his deeds. So number one, no revenge. But number two, proactively show love. Paul says in that same section, “So far as it depends on you, live at peace with all people.” If someone has hurt you. It's not just that you don’t take revenge. It's that you love them. 

Now, Bethge—Eberhard Bethge—Bonhoeffer's good friend, asked Bonhoeffer: “How can you ever feel compassion for the Nazis?” And Bonhoeffer said, “It's only when the grim reality of the justice of God is hanging over the heads of your enemies, that you are moved to compassion for them.” Bonhoeffer was compassionate for those who executed him eventually, because he understood that they would face a just judge. And a soft view—I often say this to people—a soft view of the justice of God makes for hard, bitter people. If you don’t believe that God is a just God, then you will be overcome by bitterness and vindictiveness. And see this is I think one of the errors of the therapeutic. It turns everything in on me. It’s all about what I do and who I am. We don’t say to victims, “Justice is gone.” No, God will sort it out. And I say what you do with all this offense is give it to God. Give it to God.

BUTLER: But Chris, sometimes that phrase, “Give it to God” feels a bit like a cop out. As Christians, we are called to actively give voice to the voiceless, to stand for justice for others.

BRAUNS: Yeah, no, absolutely. Absolutely. We are called to stand for justice. And you go all the way back to Oklahoma City and the bombing there. And you know, there was a preschool there, and children died there. And then we had churches after that saying to Timothy McVeigh, the bomber, “We forgive you.” That's very harmful. It’s very harmful. And can you imagine? Hey, you know, I’m a grandparent. Can you imagine if you lost a grandchild, and then you heard a church that wasn't involved in that situation that said, “We forgive the bomber.” That does not point an onlooking world to a just God. I think that’s our opportunity to say, “Listen, we were looking to our legal system first, for justice. God has given the state for justice. But beyond that, if through some legal maneuver, someone wiggles out of justice in this life, we have every confidence that a just God will sort this out. No one’s getting away with anything.” And a hesitation to point to the justice of God in those junctures doesn’t call people to the gospel, and the need to repent. 

And so, it is a terrible mistake to not point people to a loving but also just judge. A few weeks ago, I spoke to a room in which there were many victims. And speaking in a church where the pastor’s father and uncle were murdered in separate incidents. Speaking to people who had family members who were tortured and murdered. What do you say in that instance? And I said this carefully. I said it biblically. Talking about II Thessalonians chapter one and other passages. What you say very carefully is—and very lovingly—number one: hell will be hot enough for the justice of God. God’s justice is to be feared. It is to be feared. But then the second thing I said to that group: by the way, we too will stand before a just judge, and all our righteousness is as filthy rags. And this is where we have Matthew 18 and the parable of the unforgiving servant. Whatever someone has done to offend me, pales in comparison to what I have done to offend a holy God. So we have to keep that perspective. To summarize, you know, where grave offenses and unrepentant offenders are concerned, we show love. We don’t take revenge, but we trust the justice of God.

BUTLER: Where I’d like to go now is—and maybe we can come back to the severe forgiveness—but we do lift up the stories. Look at what God does for His glory in these horrendous situations. But then we give ourselves a pass.

BRAUNS: Or we give in to small acts of revenge. Whenever I teach about this, and I say no revenge, you know, people immediately think of some sort of vendetta and some sort of violent revenge. But listen, as a dad, as a husband, I know in our home, I am tempted—when I’m a little put out—to do things that are short or grumpy. And that’s a kind of revenge, isn’t it? If I’m put out with my wife—who was the most wonderful gift to me—and she says, “Do you want to take a walk?” And I said, “No, I'm okay.” It can be a little way of getting back. And so I think what we all have to do is identify the little pitiful ways that we take revenge and repent of those, and be gracious, and loving. Be defined by grace and love.

BUTLER: So give us some guidance of how do we know when there’s something that love should overlook and something that we should move towards reconciliation?

BRAUNS: That is such a great question. We have this tension biblically. On the one hand Peter says, “Love covers over a multitude of sins.” Or the book of Proverbs says, “A man’s wisdom gives him patience. It's to his glory to overlook an offense.” So we have that on the one end. On the other hand, Matthew 18, “If your brother sins against you, go and show him his fault, just between the two of you. If he listens to you, you have one your brother over.” So you're kind of like, “Which is it? Love covers over a multitude of sins, or if your brother sins against you go and show his fault just between the two of you?” Well, it's a wisdom decision, isn't it?

In Unpacking Forgiveness, I have some diagnostic questions: 1) Is it important? You know, somebody is two minutes late. Did it really matter? If not, get over it. And by the way, if you want to just cut to the punch line, in our local churches, in our homes, what do we do with most of it? Get over it. Man’s wisdom gives him patience, and it is His glory to overlook an offense. At church, at home, in the workplace. Don’t be too quick to confront. So is it a big deal? 2) Am I sure that I'm right? 3) Is there a pattern? If someone comes late—five minutes late, 10 minutes late one time—that’s not a big deal. Every time? Every time. If they’re always presuming on everyone else, then maybe it's like, “Look, I just want to point this out that we have to restart the meeting every time you come late.” 4)What do other wise people counsel me to do? Be careful of that one, because it can be an excuse for gossip. But often times people are aware. And you can say, “I mean, what do you think about this?” And they’ll say “Listen, I know that’s really important to you. But maybe you’re wound a little too tight in that area.” 

So I think we just work through these diagnostic questions. You know? And by the way, if you think everything’s a big deal, you might be too sensitive. And if you’re always sure that you’re right, you might be a little proud. So we’re constantly working on ourselves. And that’s what the Lord said, right? “Before you take care of the speck in someone else’s, take care of the beam in your own.” Now, we hasten to say in that same context, he said, “Don't throw pearls before swine.” So there are times you have to make an assessment about the responsible stewardship of what you do. And it requires making that kind of evaluation. Two of my favorite verses, Proverbs 26:4&5, you know, one of them says, “Answer a fool according to his failure, or he’ll be wise in his own eyes.” I say, “Okay, I got that down. I've got to deal with it.” And then the very next verse says: “Don't do it.” Because you’ll get—I'm paraphrasing—sucked into it yourself. So you say “Which is it?” Well, first of all, when dealing with foolishness, there’s not going to be a neat, tidy answer that you easily work through. You’re going to have to find your way through this. But this is why we need pastors and not just academics to write these books, because life is messy. Theory is relatively easy. But you know, almost always, there’s multiple factors when you take the really brutal cases. And okay, that’s clear. An innocent victim wasn’t doing anything and there was a random attack. But most of the time, it’s a complicated interplay between people where they both have something to own. It’s really, really difficult. It takes a lot of careful, biblical wisdom and love.

BUTLER: Speaking of careful biblical wisdom, we’re living in a time when political tensions are high—and in some ways, rightly so—but there are times when Christians of conscience and faith can’t see eye to eye on a way forward. Whether that be political candidates, policies, priorities. So what word do you have for us, rooted in forgiveness, that can free us from being bound by that reality and move us to experience true fellowship?

BRAUNS: Yeah, it is such an important question. When I began in pastoral ministry, right or wrong, political stance in the churches where I started, were fairly monolithic. And now we have an increasing political polarization. And, you know, I’ve dealt with situations this week where a local church was torn apart by those kinds of forces. And there’s not a quick, simple answer, but there is a sufficient Savior. And we must be defined by the love of Christ and His Word, and by grace, and very careful, biblical thinking. So I’m not saying we have to be soft or equivocate about the definition of marriage, or about the unborn. No, we have to stand for love and truth and grace. And, but we have to do it in very wise ways.

BUTLER: But I mean, there’s some really deep wounds in our country, you know, in dealing with CRT and all those sorts of things.

BRAUNS: Yeah I know. There are really deep wounds. And listen, you know, my church finding our way through the pandemic was really difficult. I mean, there are three highly volatile areas: politics, pandemic, and different issues about vaccines. It was really, really hard. I’m so thankful—our flock was very gracious—but there were times. You know, I remember one day, I went from one discussion to another with people on the other ends of the continuum. And, you know, there were tears and, and difficult times, and we have to be ready. We have to understand that this polarization is a part of where we’re at. It is the  reality of our day. The church is right now is—my kind of phrase is—the evangelical wood chipper. There are all these issues that are dividing and threatening congregations. And of course, social media and the internet have changed the velocity. They’re an accelerant for everything. We’re figuring out how to work through all of these things. It’s going to take a lot of grace, and a lot of forgiveness, and a lot of love, and a lot of patience.

BUTLER: Alright, what do you think about this word picture: that bitterness is the canary in the cage.? That bitterness is a diagnostic tool for us that I have not forgiven as I ought?

BRAUNS: That’s a really good word picture, although let me nuance it a little bit. I think bitterness is a canary in a coal mine, that I'm not responding in a gospel-shaped way. If you find yourself bitter, then that's a red light. And so what do you do with that? You go back to the Gospel. Do I trust the justice of God? Do I trust that God will set this right? That I can trust him even with the most horrific things? To take care of it? Do I trust the providence of God? 

I mean, one of the most beautiful passages has to be Joseph saying to his brothers, “You intended it to harm me, but God intended it for good to save many lives. And what God is doing through Israel is a bigger deal than what I had to go through.” This is spectacular, spectacular. And by the way, do not miss in that passage we have the repentance of Judah. Judah who comes forward has the longest monologue in the book of Genesis. He’s a different man. The Judah of Genesis 38 who’d said about his daughter in law, “Take her out and burn her.” This is not the Judah who goes forward at the end of Genesis and says, “My life for his life. My life for his life.” And, you know, just just read that story again of Joseph and the beauty of that, and and you will see. So, if Joseph had been defined by bitterness and hatred and anger, yeah, that would have been a canary in a coal mine. 

And listen, we all deal with it on some level. I’ve had some tough circumstances in life. And I think the hardest part is what I call the mental gerbil wheel. How can I stop thinking about it? There are times where I have my theology straight, but then I find myself running round and round again about it. Psalm 37, it says, “Don't fret about evildoers. Don't be overcome.”And by the way, Psalm 37 is where we first see the phrase that “the meek shall inherit the earth.” Christ is almost certainly alluding to Psalm 37. But Psalm 73 says, “When I tried to understand all this, it was oppressive to me, till I entered the sanctuary of the LORD. Then I understood their final destiny.” But Asaph there, he says, you know, like, I was just on this mental merry go round. The evil people seem to get away with it all. They they talk smack all the time. He has a word picture there, their tongues strut throughout the earth. And he says, when I was overcome by this, I almost became like an unthinking beast. 

You know, Psalm 32, says, “Be not like a horse or mule without understanding, which must be curbed with bit and bridle.” But he's saying, “I was so mad about it.” That's how I was. And he says, if I had continued—and paraphrasing Psalm 73—I would have betrayed a generation of children. I would have messed up not only myself, but a lot of other people that I influence. But he says, here is the tension, when I tried to understand it all, it was oppressive to me. When I moved in a God-centered way, I understood their final destiny. I understood that God’s going to sort this all out. And I gave it to Him. And he says, “As for me, I will dwell with the LORD.” 

You know, when I wrote Unpacking Forgiveness, there's a suitcase on the cover of the book. And I had this metaphor that you come home from a trip, and you have to unpack your suitcase. That was what I was kind of working with. Now, I think it’s not so much like coming home from a trip. I think it’s, it’s more like moving houses. And if you’ve ever moved houses, you know that you move on a particular day. There’s a definite act to move. You also know that you have boxes in the basement for a long time. And you think, you know, you’ve dealt with everything, and then you’re down moving the ping pong table, and you come across this box of junk that you got to work your way through. And that’s, that’s how forgiveness is. And listen, let me especially say to people who went through abuse, and have a lot of baggage from growing up, that’s a lifelong project. We wish it were only one suitcase. It’s not. It’s a lot of boxes. It’s a lifetime of unpacking.

BUTLER: It strikes me that one of the other things that you’ve just said is that forgiveness then is also not a one time thing. You keep moving things and tripping over something that you thought was taking care of.

BRAUNS: You know, so it’s a part of sanctification, right? And it’s a life-long journey. We’re justified, we’re declared righteous. We’re positionally sanctified, we’re set apart. But then throughout this life—till one day we’re glorified when, when we're with Jesus—we're progressively being conformed to the image of Christ. Well, forgiveness is a part of that. And we work through it and think we're through it and we've dealt with it. And then we find we have to come back and do it again. And listen, that's what that's why we've, we've got to be with God's people on Sunday. That's why we have to make diligent use of all the outward means by where God communicates to us the benefits of redemption. Make diligent use. Be in the Word. Be with God's people. Worship. Hear the word preached. 

I picture a man I met with in Northern Ireland, whose father was murdered during The Troubles. And the most well known tell-all book written by the IRA was a book called Killing Rage. And chapter one of the book is “The killing of Ivan Toombs.” Can you imagine picking up a book and reading it, and chapter one is about how the murder of your father was planned and carried out? What what do you say to someone in that situation? It’s not about what I say. It’s about what the Lord Jesus says: “Come to me all you who are weary and burdened, and I’ll give you rest.” And thankfully—not through my influence, but through the witness of God's people in Northern Ireland—he heard the gospel and responded, accepted the invitation, is a growing believer defined by grace and love, not by hatred. And the final word is Jesus who offers rest to those who come to Him. 

We keep working at this across a lifetime. I mean, it’s a road we walk. Right? I still like that part of the cover of my book, that there’s a, there’s a picture of a road that we’re on, and we have to walk. But here’s what Christ says, you know, you find yourself walking on the road in life, and you’ve got so much baggage, you’re crushed by it. And hearing how the words of our King, the Lord Jesus, “Come to me all you who are weary and burdened, and I'll give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I am gentle and humble in heart. And you’ll find rest for your souls.” Jesus doesn’t say, do nothing. He says, get in sync with me. Take my yoke upon you. Learn from me. But this is who I am: I’m gentle and humble in heart, and you’ll find rest for your souls. 

It’s absolutely critical that we say this because a lot of times when we start to talk to people about forgiveness, they don’t want to hear what we have to say. First time I ever said I was going to preach a series on forgiveness, a lady stopped me in the foyer of the church and said, “I don't want to hear it. I was abused. I don’t want to hear it.” And, and she was afraid that the teaching of our Lord would be burdensome and would weigh her down. And, and we have to give assurances. No, it’s in Christ that we find rest. And we have that great hymn “Jesus, I am resting, resting in the joy of what thou art.” And that’s what we need. Hear the words of Christ: “Come to me all you are weary and burdened. I’ll give you a rest.”

BUTLER: This has been an extended interview with author and pastor Chris Brauns. This is a longer version of the edited conversation featured during the most recent Classic Book of the Month on The World and Everything in It. If you enjoyed this longer interview and it is something you’d like to hear more often, please let us know. Just email us at editor@wng.org. That’s editor@wng.org. Or leave a review wherever you listen to your podcasts. Thanks for listening. I'm Paul Butler. 

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