Dear Gary - April

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We are United Faith Mortgage. People are catching on to "The 5 Love Languages" . We've been talking with Dr. Gary Chapman, the author of the mega-successful book, "The 5 Love Languages" .

The need to feel loved by the significant people in your life is the deepest emotional need we have. My boyfriend and I read it together, and we quickly realized, like, we are the exact opposite on the love language scale, because we took the quizzes. I'm on with the Gary Chapman. I mean, love languages, and I'm right here in the middle of it.

I don't believe this. Words of affirmation! Today on Building Relationships with Dr. Gary Chapman. I think you could probably write a whole series of books on my husband. There's no peace in the home. There's no love or harmony. There might be a fixed love language.

Women can be very, very catty, gossipy, clicky towards other women. Welcome to Building Relationships with Dr. Gary Chapman, author of the New York Times bestseller, "The 5 Love Languages" . It's time for our Dear Gary broadcast for April. Today, new calls, questions, relational struggles, with a focus on the love languages. From that love language expert, author, pastor, counselor, Dr. Gary Chapman. And a featured resource today is the memoir that I've been nagging Dr. Chapman to write for more than a decade now.

It's finally out. And Gary, you tell it all. There are no holds barred in this, right? Well, I am trying to be open, Chris, because I do believe that we can learn not only from what we consider to be our successes, but I believe we can learn from our failures. So I share some of my struggles in the book and what I learned from those things, because the whole concept is, you know, just looking at my life in terms of what are the lessons I learned on my unexpected journey?

Yes. Unexpected meaning what? That you didn't expect the success that you've achieved or what?

Yeah, it didn't turn out the way I anticipated. I had plans for my life, but I never dreamed that all the things that have happened to me would have happened in my life. So, yeah, there's a whole lot of unexpected things on my journey.

And I think that's true for most people, you know, maybe some more than others. But, yeah, for me, a lot of unexpected things happened in my life and, you know, God was working through all of them. You know, one of the things that I picked up, there's one section you go through all of your early life as you're growing up and the moves that your family made all through the, you know, when you became a pastor, the educational things and as well as meeting Carolyn and love problems. But the part that I went to was when you started doing this radio program, you have a section in there about lessons learned on doing radio. And the thing that surprised me was that you didn't feel adequate. You didn't feel like it was something that you really could do. So you had some questions. And I think part of the lesson in that is sometimes the task ahead of you, you feel like you feel unequal to the task, but that God will fill in the gaps there.

Does that, that's what you're saying? That was certainly true, Chris, because when Moody Radio first approached me about doing a program like the one we're doing right now, my first response was, I don't know. I mean, I'm a counselor.

Counselors listen. We don't talk. We listen.

You've talked some, yes, but we're listening two thirds of the time so that we know what to say and how to talk, you know. And then they came back and said, what if we give you a really good co-host? I said, well, I'd think about it. I'd pray about it.

Yeah. And then they came back and said, well, how about Chris and Andrea Fabry? I said, well, I'll definitely pray about it. Because I knew you guys. I knew you were radio people, you know, and I thought, yeah, I'll pray about that. And so I did. And I came back and said, well, I said to God, you know, if Chris and Andrea say yes to their request, I'm going to take that as a sign that I should try this. So that's where it all started, Chris.

13 years ago, this was in 2007, 2008, when we, I think it was 2007 when we started, so 14 years this year. And so all of those lessons are put in this new memoir that's just out. The title is Life Lessons and Love Languages, What I've Learned on My Unexpected Journey. We have it linked at FiveLoveLanguages.com.

FiveLoveLanguages.com. One more question. Did anything surprise you as you wrote this, as you went back over your life, something that kind of popped up that you didn't expect that you would write about? Well, Chris, there were things that I remembered that I had not thought about for many, many years. Some of those were in my childhood and some things that I did in my childhood. I'm talking about young childhood, you know, that were kind of pranks that I thought were getting, I was getting fun out of them and I was really hurting people. And I realized that, you know, when you hurt people with something you think is fun, it's no longer fun and it's certainly not love. Yeah.

Turning the outhouse over, pushing the, that kind of thing, letting the air out of tires, it all happened. It's all there in the book. If you go to FiveLoveLanguages.com, you'll see some of the life lessons in love languages.

What I've Learned on My Unexpected Journey by Dr. Gary Chapman. Again, go to FiveLoveLanguages.com. All right, let's get to the questions. The first is a call from someone who wants you to add to the love languages. Let's see what Gary will say about this.

Hi, Gary. I've had some time to think about your five love languages. And something came to mind after, you know, learning to love someone very special to me. And I realized that, you know, there might be a sixth love language and it's called the element of surprise. And somebody who appreciates all of "The 5 Love Languages" , but it's really tied into the fact that it's really about feeling the excitement of being surprised in that moment.

And I feel like maybe if you ever did a new edition of your book, I feel like that might be something that you should consider because I feel like somebody who needs to be loved in that way should be also, you know, identified. Thank you. Have a great day. Bye.

Well, I appreciate that call. That's for me a unique idea. Surprise, though I do know some people really like to be surprised and some people do not like to be surprised. Don't surprise them.

Let them know what's coming. I guess in my mind, however, I would view that as a dialect maybe on maybe some of the other love languages. Because you can surprise people with gifts, for example.

You can surprise people by giving them words of affirmation in a unique way. In fact, almost all of them you could there's an could be an element of surprise. So I would kind of view it as a dialect of maybe any one of the languages.

But I'll give some thought to that. You know, who knows? Maybe they'll come up a sixth love language. Maybe that's it.

Well, that's a familiar question that we've had. Could the sixth love language be, you know, chocolate or other some of the other things. But I think she's on to something about the surprise and I anticipated your answer too because I thought, you know, gifts or words of affirmation. There are people who go on trips and they say I'll open up my suitcase and there my wife has left a note for me or dad has left a note for the kids when he goes on a trip. So there is a an element of surprise to this and I guess it's just the the whole idea of I was thinking about you in a special way and I want to do this in a surprising way so that it touches you deeper in the heart.

Yeah, I think that's true Chris and even quality time. You know, I've heard of many people who share with me, you know, I told my husband we're going to take a ride on Saturday morning. He had no idea where we were going, but we were going to spend the whole weekend away so we could have some time together, you know, God knew that was his primary language and I just surprised him with it because we kept driving. He said where are we going? I said you'll see and I drove to a vacation spot, you know, weekend vacation spot and we had a great time and he was absolutely amazed that I would have thought about that and to spend that time with him.

So yeah, I think almost all of them you can have an element of surprise and for people who appreciate that that's meaningful. Multiple marriages and a big age gap. That's part of our next caller's experience. Hi Gary.

I have a question for you. Actually, I think you could probably write a whole series of books on my and my husband's marriage. My question today is how do you overcome the difficult boundaries of previous marriages between my husband and I we have a few previous marriages of that baggage. Not only that, but there is 22 years difference between my husband and I and that in itself is a hill to climb. I am interested to hear your input and it is my honest desire to help my marriage with some of these things.

We have 10 years invested in this. We have one biological child together and children that I've brought into this marriage from a previous point in time. Thank you for all you do to try to help the marriages out there. Well, I think a lot of our listeners can identify with this question Chris because many of them are in somewhat similar situations. That is they've had previous marriages and now they're in a marriage. It's been going along for seven years ten years or whatever and perhaps they're struggling and the caller of course mentions one other difference and that is a 22 year age difference between the two of them.

Let me speak to the first one. I do believe that whenever we marry and we divorce or even our spouse dies and we move into another marriage, we do bring baggage with us and that's the word that the caller used. We bring baggage with us. We bring memories. We bring emotional hurt and pain many times and those things are there. We don't erase our history.

Our history is always there. Everything we've ever done is stored in the human brain and these things often come back and they color the relationship we're in now. Sometimes we're comparing things that our spouse now is doing that were different from the other spouse or maybe the same thing and we're thinking, oh no, not again. They're treating me exactly like my other husband did or my wife did.

So yeah, there is baggage there. I think we have to process it in our own minds. First of all, I hope that we're open and honest with each other before we get married about our past so that they know what our history has been and whether it's been positive or negative and in what ways it's been negative or positive. The more you can talk about this before you get married, the more likely you are to be able to process some of those emotions even before you come to the wedding.

But I think if you haven't done that, it has to be done in the marriage. So looking back and trying to learn, what can we learn from the past to me is a positive way to process this because your husband probably knows that you've got some things inside of you that stimulate hurt or other emotions that he doesn't understand, but they're tied to your past marriage. And the more you can try to learn, first of all yourself, you know, say, why did I respond that way to what he said or did? And it may well be tied to what happened to you in a previous marriage.

And then also he can ask that question, you know, of you. What do you think triggered that? Why did you get defensive? Why did you get angry when I did that or said that or whatever? The more we can understand ourselves and see what's behind our behavior, the more likely we are to process it in a positive way.

So those are my suggestions. I think we have to acknowledge where we are, acknowledge our history, try to learn why we respond the way we respond, and then work on new responses so that we are not controlled by the memories and the emotions that are stimulated inside of us. It's okay to have them, but we can't allow them to control our behavior. Controlled by the memories. That's a really good way to put that, Gary. The 22 year age difference. She can't change that. He can't change that.

That's real. But is there anything you would say about that? Yeah, I think, Chris, they knew this was true before they got married. Sometimes when we're in love, we think, well, that makes no difference at all. As we get older, we realize, oh, one of us has a whole lot more energy.

One of us has better health, you know, or one of us has very serious health problems and all of that. But some of those things would be true, whether there was a great age difference or not. And some of it has to do with our interests and how we want to spend our time. So again, these are things that are fairly normal in relationships, even if there's not a huge age difference. And so I think talking our way through those and learning how to sometimes push ourselves, maybe to do things that our spouse would like for us to do with them. And we don't have the energy or we don't have the interest or whatever. But we all have to develop an attitude of how can I enrich your life? How can I make this marriage better for you? And if we both take that approach and listen to what the other person says in response to that question, we can have a good marriage even if there is a large age difference.

Yes. One other thing that she said, she used the word invested. We have, I have 10 years invested in this marriage.

And I like that verbiage. You are investing your time, your talent, your treasure, your love. You're turning your affection toward that other person and you are investing.

Now, of course, you're vulnerable when you do that. You know, the investments can go sour on you. But if you look at marriage as an investment, that changes your perspective. It does, Chris, because we're going to invest our lives doing something. Everybody invests their life doing something.

It's a matter of whether you're going to invest your life in bringing hope and help to other people. You know, doing and saying things that are going to enrich their lives. We feel better about ourselves when we are indeed loving each other. Because at its heart, that is what love is all about. It's an attitude of, I want to enrich the life of the person to whom I'm married.

If you're talking about marriage. And if you have that attitude and you're asking, how can I enrich your life? How can I make things better for you? And you respond to that. And both of you are doing that. You're going to have a good marriage because you both are loving each other in very meaningful ways.

And when we feel loved, we can tackle the other difficulties that come along in life much easier. That's Dr. Gary Chapman. This is our April Dear Gary broadcast and our featured resource. If you go to the website, FiveLoveLanguages.com is his new book, the memoir, Life Lessons and Love Languages. What I've Learned on My Unexpected Journey.

Again, you'll find it at FiveLoveLanguages.com. All right, our next call is from a dad who's concerned. Hi, Gary. I'm calling about for my daughter who is about 40 years old. She's been married for 14 years and she has five kids. Her husband is what I would call a narcissist. He controls everything.

He controls all the money. He is abusive to her emotionally. He criticizes her. He blames her for everything whenever anything goes wrong. There's no peace in the home.

There's no love or harmony. He goes to church, but he doesn't have relationships with people because he doesn't get along with people. He wants to control everything. His or his father's the same way. So, finally after 14 years of this abuse, she decided she's not going to put up with it anymore. So, she made him move out. She's overwhelmed with taking care of five kids by herself. She doesn't know what to do. She's praying and trying to get help from God, trying to get direction.

Should I let him back in the house? She needs him. She needs help from someone, but she's going to have to put up with this abuse.

And I just wondered if you have any suggestions. She's waiting for an answer from God and I know I don't know what to do. Thank you.

Bye. Well, I can feel the pain of this father. I think anytime our grown children are in situations where they are being abused in one way or another, we're pained for them. I do feel like that when abuse and what this caller has described has gone on for a number of years in a marriage, it is time to apply what we typically call tough love. And that's essentially what she's done. She's asked him to get out and apparently he has gotten out of the house. But now she's suffering the consequences of that decision, which is taking care of five children by herself. And I don't know what her financial situation is, whether he is contributing to that or not at this juncture. So she desperately needs help. And my first suggestion would be that she reach out to a pastor or a counselor, someone who can hear her pain and see her situation and hopefully point her in the right direction.

If she needs financial help, you know, there are people, there are organizations, there are churches that have funds that can help at least for a period of time. So she needs someone that will be there and hear her and help her process this. Now, how he responds to all of this is another factor. You know, does he just walk off and have nothing to do with her and the children? And the other part of it, she can't keep him from seeing the children unless, you know, a court rules that they would be unsafe in his presence. So you got all that to deal with as well.

So there's a whole lot of issues that have to be dealt with. I personally don't think the answer is simply letting him come back in the house because things aren't going to change if he moves out for three weeks or three months and he moves back in and we haven't dealt with the problems. I think if she says to him, I'm going to get counseling, whether it's with a pastor or with a professional counselor, I'm going to get, I'm going to see a counselor because I want to do what I can do to seek reconciliation eventually. But I cannot sit here longer and let you do what you've done to me and the children.

I don't see how you could be happy with yourself with what you've done, but I'm going to go get help and I would like for you to go with me. Give him that opportunity. But if he doesn't, you go and let someone work with you as you walk through this difficult situation. There's no easy answer. You know, there's no one, two, three, do this, this, this and things will be okay. But there is always hope for two reasons. Number one, we are human. Humans can change and God can touch hearts and change attitudes. So because those two things are true, there's always hope even in marriages that seem there is no hope.

So those are my suggestions. You touched on this right at the end, but she is waiting for God to intervene, waiting for God to speak to her and tell her what to do. And I think that's a good place to be, to be open to what is it that you want here. It's also dependent on interpretation. You know, if you you look for a sign out the window or you open the Bible and you put your finger down, that can be problematic, can't it?

Yes, it can, Chris. And that's why, you know, God typically uses people to help people. He brings people who have training and who have a heart and who have gifts designed to help people who are struggling in their relationships. And God uses people. He uses pastors. He uses counselors.

He uses close friends if she has close friends. But I do think often God's direction comes through a caring person that is familiar with the kind of thing we're facing and has practical ideas. This is Building Relationships with Dr. Gary Chapman, author of the New York Times bestseller, "The 5 Love Languages" . Here's a really fun question, Gary, that will take us back to a previous program. So if you call here today, you can ask a question like this dad who's concerned or maybe you hear something on today's program and it spurs a question in your mind. See if this brings up a good memory for you, Gary.

Hi, Gary. I was just listening to the program called The Grumbler's Guide to Giving Thanks. And I listened to the part you were talking about how you told your assistant that you were going to your hometown to remember your mom and your dad and your sister, which I thought was really special.

And I couldn't help. The first thing that popped into my head was, did you stop at the little restaurant and get a footlong coney or chili dog, whatever you called it, that was your mom's favorite every time you took her to lunch? I've always remembered that you said that on another program. And so I thought that would be kind of neat.

I just wanted to see if you if you could answer that for me. Thank you. Love your program. Thank you. Bye.

Well, that's exactly what I did. I went to Gary's barbecue and got a footlong hot dog after I had spent some time at the cemetery. My mom and dad and sister all buried at the same place and spent considerable time there, just reflecting on our relationships, each one of them and what they did in my life. And then I drove down by the house where I grew up and again, just reflected on things that happened in the backyard, in the garden, you know, and all those things. But when lunchtime came, I went and got me a footlong hot dog and sat there and thought about my mother. As a matter of fact, I told the owner of the restaurant who came around.

I said, I'm remembering my mother today. He said, oh, really? And I told him, you know, how we had often come there and she always ordered a footlong hot dog. So he said, well, that's that's neat. That's a wonderful memory. So I'm glad I can be a part of it. Isn't that great? And he was a part of that.

As I recall, she said she wanted everything on it. Wasn't there something like it all the way or all the way footlong hot dog all the way, onions and all. So I eat onions too.

I don't normally eat onions, but I eat onions that day. You will find these kinds of little snippets of Gary's life in this new book. And again, we're going to talk about it next week here on the program, Life Lessons and Love Languages.

What I've learned on my unexpected journey. You can find out more at FiveLoveLanguages.com. If you enjoy Building Relationships with Dr. Gary Chapman, visit our website, FiveLoveLanguages.com. There you'll find out more about Dr. Chapman, his New York Times bestseller, "The 5 Love Languages" and more. You can hear a podcast of the program and find out about our featured resource. It's a new book by Dr. Chapman, Life Lessons and Love Languages.

What I've learned on my unexpected journey. Just go to FiveLoveLanguages.com. And don't forget, you can ask Gary a question. Call us at 1-866-424-GARY. Call that number, leave your message and you may hear an answer in a future Dear Gary broadcast. 1-866-424-GARY. Here's an interesting question about the love languages and the deeper issues they represent.

Hi, Gary. I've been considering the love languages and it seems to me that touch is about trust. The receiving gifts is about being provided for. And have you ever looked at what the reasons behind the different five things are?

What the people are actually getting from doing that? Have a good day. Well, that is an interesting question, Chris.

I have to be honest. No, I have not thought about that. There's a lot of things I haven't thought about. I understand what he's saying and I can see the two examples that he gave that touch is often related to trust. In fact, I've had people in my counseling office say, I don't want him to touch me because I don't trust him. But whether trust is really the motivating factor, you know, for those for whom touch is their primary language.

I don't really know. I can see the connection which I just described. And I can see gifts. I can see the idea of providing for. But really, providing for is more acts of service as I would see. Because when you say a husband providing for his family, he's working, he's doing things. It's acts of service to provide for them.

So it could be tied with that as well. So whether or not there is an underlying need that's behind each of these, that is uniquely behind each of these, I'm really not sure. It's something to reflect on and I will give some reflection to that. I appreciate you bringing this concept.

So that's my response. So you stimulated some thoughts for me. As I was listening to it, I thought you could maybe the easier way to think about that is to go to the negative. How can touch be used in a negative way? Obviously physical abuse comes in there or let's say quality time. How could you negatively use quality time? Well, you could withhold it from the people that that's their love language. You could not spend time with them. And so with all of that, you devalue the person or you express not love, but at least indifference or something worse, right?

Yeah, I think so, Chris. Quality time, as you mentioned, people are deeply hurt. If this is their language, quality time, they're deeply hurt. If you forget that you were going to have dinner tonight and you came home an hour and a half late, or you promised them that this weekend we were going to be together, going somewhere and doing something. And at the very last minute you say, oh, there's a ball game that came up and John asked me to go and I'm going to go with him. I mean, quality time people are devastated by that because you're taking what really would have made them to feel love. And you're saying something else is more important than my spending time with you, you know?

So, yeah, there is that aspect for sure. If you'd like to ask a question or follow up, maybe to what you've just heard. 1-866-424-GARY. We took a call from a concerned mom whose daughter was thinking about getting paid for a medical procedure. And here's a response to that call.

Hi, Gary. I just listened to your broadcast and there was a mother who was concerned about her daughter selling her eggs for money. And if it's my daughter I would be horrified and say, absolutely not. This is a very dangerous physical thing to do.

First of all, they're going to fill it up with a bunch of hormones to make these eggs very productive. And then it's a surgical procedure, it's a painful procedure and it can introduce things, infection, et cetera, into her body. She can end up with kidney problems and all kinds of things.

I have studied this and I had this question and did research. This is very dangerous. Tell her, don't do it. It's not worth it. I'm sure that God will provide something else for her if she just surrenders herself to him and says, Lord, Jesus, take care of it. And somehow or other he'll help her out to get out of her predicament. It's not worth the danger to her body and her soul as well.

It's just a bad thing. Anyway, take care. I hope you're having a good day. God bless.

Bye-bye. Well, I appreciate the caller sharing what she shared. To be honest, Chris, I have not studied the physical part of all of that which she was describing for us. And I'm assuming what she says is fully true. I think for most of us there are question marks that are raised when we talk about selling eggs or selling sperm for that matter.

There are question marks raised in our minds. There are parents who have received an egg or who have received sperm, you know, gone through that process, who have a child now and they're very grateful for the person who was willing to provide this. It does seem to me, however, that money should not be the motivation for doing this. It seems to me if it's going to be done, and I don't know, I don't know, I would certainly not want this. I certainly would not encourage my daughter to do this or my son to do this for that matter. But at the same time, the Bible doesn't specifically address this because this was not a possibility in biblical times. No possibility at all in biblical times.

And so the question is, you know, though modern science has made this possible, is it wise? I think there are also, Chris, emotional, and this is what I've dealt with more, is emotional trauma that sometimes go with all of this. For example, when that child grows up who has been conceived by either someone else's egg or someone else's sperm and they don't know who that person is, sooner or later as they grow up they're going to struggle with who's my real father, who's my real mother. There's something inside of us that wants to make contact with that person. This is true even with adopted children, even though they're adopted very young. Most of them, as they get older, they have this desire to meet their mother or their father, you know, their biological mother or father. So, you know, there are those emotional aspects to this as well. So I would certainly encourage this daughter to talk to some trusted people in her life. Again, pastors, counselors, before she simply makes the decision in order to have money.

That seems to me to be a rather unworthy motivation to do something like this. One of the things that you say in your new memoir that's out, Life Lessons in Love Languages, is that most of the questions that we get here on our Dear Gary broadcast at the end of the month, most of them you've had in counseling situations or at seminars that you've given. This one may be on the edge. You may not have had to deal with this one specifically, but all of these are good questions. And if you want to ask one, 866-424-GARY is our number. Before we take a break, let's talk about the workplace. You've written with Dr. Paul White about the love languages in the workplace. See what you think about the observations of our next caller.

Hi, Gary. I wanted to make a comment about a lady that had phoned into you much earlier about a workplace environment that she was about to maybe to be fired. And I just wanted to address something that happens a lot in workplaces and has happened to me on more than one occasion is that if you've heard the term mean girls, women can be very, very catty and gossipy, clicky towards other women. And it's very, very destructive. It's in the churches.

It's in your workplace. It's very, very common. And I believe that that may be what's happening to that woman. I don't have a victim mentality, but I have had this happen to me on more than one occasion.

I believe it can also be spiritual. You're targeted if you are a Christian. And I've even been targeted by other Christian women who are not very nice. And when you don't participate in it, you tend to be the target.

And you can try to correct it, but it's almost like being in high school or I would even say junior high school, not very mature, but very mean and nasty and destructive. And they have gotten people fired and they don't seem to have a problem doing that, even Christians. And I just thought I would address that because I don't believe that men understand this kind of behavior in women, because the ones that are catty, they can be very, very manipulating and nice to their bosses or other men. They might even be the lady that brings in the desserts and does all of the things that seems beneficial for the business.

Meanwhile, behind the scenes, they're really, really harming other women. And anyway, I thought that this should be addressed. Thank you so much.

Bye bye. Well, Chris, I am glad the caller said those things rather than me saying those things. She was a woman critiquing women and their behaviors.

You know, I don't want to take on that task. I'm afraid I'd get a whole lot of other calls if I did that, but I am sure there's some truth in what she's saying. And I think there are women out there who are probably saying, yes, yes, yes, I've been there. Whether it's more prevalent with women than with men, I don't know.

I know that there are also men who do some of those kind of things she was describing. I wrote a book with Dr. Paul White on a toxic workplace, and she's describing some of the characteristics in a toxic workplace where these kind of things go on. Sometimes it's a toxic leader that is just causing pain for everybody in the organization. So if you happen to be working in a situation that's just really, really unpleasant and you dread going to work every day, you might want to check on that book. You could find it at 5lovelanguages.com, of course.

It's a toxic workplace. And if you have a comment about that question, 1-866-424-GARY is our number. This is Building Relationships with Dr. Gary Chapman. Again, our featured resource is Dr. Chapman's new book, Life Lessons and Love Languages, What I've Learned on My Unexpected Journey.

You can find out more about that when you go to our website, 5lovelanguages.com. Well, if you're unable to forgive someone, don't miss our final segment straight ahead on Moody Radio. Gary, in this last segment, I want to deal with a conversation I had with a man who called our listener line months ago. And the story that he related is basically his father sexually abused him and his brother, and eventually he was sent to prison.

But this went on for a long, long time. And now his dad has been released and the caller has been through counseling. He's been trying to deal with this.

The father wants a relationship of some sort. And the son is saying, I don't know what forgiveness looks like here. How do I forgive somebody who never really owned up to the wrongs they've done?

He spent years in prison for what he did, but I don't feel like he's ever owned it. So what does forgiveness look like? Would you talk to that person? Well, you know, Chris, I think anyone who hears that story would feel deeply and be very empathetic with this adult son. You know, forgiveness, I think, is often misunderstood. We're told in the Scriptures that we are to forgive others as God has forgiven us. The question then is, how does God forgive us?

Well, the biblical answer is, if we confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive us. God doesn't forgive everyone. God forgives people who confess their sins and turn to Him. And God forgives them because Christ has paid the penalty for their wrongdoing. So God can still be just and holy and yet forgive them. So if we're to forgive the same way God forgives, then before there can be genuine biblical forgiveness, there has to be a confession of wrong on the part of the person that we want to forgive. It's very popular in Christian framework that Christians forgive everybody for everything they've done, whether they apologize or whether they don't, we just forgive them. And they say that's biblical, and they use the verse that if we don't forgive others, God won't forgive us.

And that verse is true. If we have an attitude where we will never forgive somebody, we're just choosing not to follow God's example. But what I would say is, we seek to confront the person. If they haven't come with a sincere, heartfelt apology to us, we seek to confront them.

So if the Father is desiring a relationship of some kind with these two sons, my suggestion would be that they talk with their Father. He is a person that God loves, and whether or not he's confessed his sin to God, I don't know. But have a conversation with him, share with him the deep hurt that they have felt, see how he responds. Jesus said in Luke 17, if your brother has sinned against you, you go rebuke him. And if he repents, you forgive him.

So you can take the initiative to do that with your Father. It sounds like he's open to a conversation in which you share with him the pain and hurt and all that this has caused in your life. And if he has a genuine response, a genuine confession of wrongdoing, and wants to be forgiven, then, with the help of God, yes, you can forgive him, even though what he did has been extremely painful for you in your life. And forgiveness means that you're going to pardon him. You're not going to make him pay for this. He's already paid, you know, to society for what he did criminally. But you're not going to make him pay for this. You're going to forgive him.

You're going to pardon him. And you're going to remove the barrier and be open to some type of relationship. It may not be close. It may never be a close relationship. But at least you can talk to him on the phone.

Maybe you can visit from time to time, and so forth. But I think, to me, that's the approach on your side. That's the approach to take, is to have open, honest conversation.

If you and your brother want to do it together, to me, that would be ideal. If you feel like you'd rather do it in the presence of a counselor or a pastor, that would be fine as well. But to say, I'm just going to forgive him, you know, because, Chris, you said that he said the Father had never really owned the wrong that he's done. And that's why I just think it's not biblical forgiveness when you do that. Now, you can release the person, and I think that's biblical. And release your hurt and release your anger to God, and you put him in God's hands. And you say, Lord, you know I've confronted my Father, you know I've done everything I know to do, and he is not willing to repent, he's not willing to acknowledge what he did and the pain he caused. So I'm going to turn him over to you, and I'm going to release him to you. And that's precisely what Jesus did.

You know, it says that Peter says when they railed against Jesus, he didn't rail back. He committed himself to the one who judges righteously. He turned them over to the Father. And we can turn them over to the Father and release them, and release our anger, and release our hurt, and we can move on with our lives.

So, to me, that's the biblical approach. I heard in his voice just the struggle. He said, I still, he's had panic attacks, you know, through his life. He said, it's getting better, my wife is helping, counselors have helped him.

But even in discussing, you know, just talking on the phone about what had happened, you could just tell that he was having to take, you know, a few more breaths in order to kind of calm down a little bit, because he said, I'll have these flashbacks, and I still have nightmares, and it's like my dad is chasing me. And so this is not something that happens overnight. It is a long process, and it takes other people coming alongside. And I think that's what you'd say to anybody who's going through something like that now to receive help for this, right? Yes, and that's why I think it's good that he has been getting counseling, and I would suggest this would be a good time to re-engage with that counselor if he hasn't seen them for a while, and share where he is in the journey. You know, and let them help him also walk through this process if there's going to be any possibility of a relationship in the future.

But all will be told in one week, right? Ah, we'll share as much as you want to, Chris, as much as we have time for. Well, before we conclude, here's how you can leave a question for Dr. Chapman.

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It's what we'll talk about next week with Dr. Chapman. Life lessons and love languages, what I've learned on my unexpected journey. Again, find out more at 5lovelanguages.com, and join us next week. Well, we hope you'll join us then. A big thank you today to our production team, Steve Wick and Janice Todd. Building Relationships with Dr. Gary Chapman is a production of Moody Radio in association with Moody Publishers, a ministry of Moody Bible Institute. Thanks for listening.