Moving Forward After Messing Up | Chris Rappazini

Oh, looks like it's going to be a little...short.

I thought it was going to be on the green. Oh man, sorry. That's a tough one, Jim. I'll lay it up in front of the water. No, no, no, wait.

Here, take a mulligan. Oh, really? Yeah. You deserve it.

Put it on the green. All right, if you insist. Some people think, I'll just sit back and let God do everything. But no, we actually have some work to do.

We have some responsibility because, hey, we got ourselves into this mess. And God gets us out, but he helps us to get out. Welcome to Building Relationships with Dr. Gary Chapman, author of the New York Times bestseller, "The 5 Love Languages" . We'll know anyone who needs a second chance at something, maybe a mulligan on the fourth hole, maybe a do-over at work or a little forgiveness from a spouse. Today, some help and hope for those who need help moving forward after messing up. That's the title of our featured resource today. And if you're the one in need of a marriage mulligan or maybe a parenting do-over, don't miss the practical help that is straight ahead.

You'll find our featured resource at buildingrelationships.us. Gary, I think this is a really important topic because at some point in life, we all need forgiveness. We all will want a second chance. Have you, Gary Chapman, ever needed a do-over? Oh, no, no, no, Chris. No, no, I've been perfect. Listen, I've had to do a lot of do-overs in my marriage in those early years. In fact, you know, after we finally got things together, I asked Carolyn one day, I said, honey, when I die, you think you'll ever get remarried?

She said, oh, no, I'm not going to train another one. That's a good answer. Oh, yes, we all need forgiveness. This is an important topic and I'm excited about our conversation today. Well, let me introduce you to Dr. Chris Rappazzini. He's a speaker, life coach, professor of leadership at Anderson University in South Carolina. For 11 years, he was professor of pastoral studies and preaching at Moody Bible Institute, served in various pastoral roles throughout the nation as well. His degrees are from, get this, Gonzaga, the University of Edinburgh, Gordon Conwell Theological Seminary and Moody Bible Institute. Our featured resource is his book, Moving Forward After Messing Up, A New Future with the God of Second Chances.

You can find out more at buildingrelationships.us. Well, Chris, we're glad to have you. Welcome to Building Relationships. Gary and Chris, thanks so much for having me.

I'm honored and humbled to be with you all. Tell me why you wanted to write a book about second chances. Why is this important for us from your perspective? Well, Gary, if I can be completely honest, I didn't want to write a book, as you all know.

It takes a lot of work, hard work to write books. And I'm more of a preacher. When I was teaching at Moody, I taught preaching classes. I also pastored a little bit. But at Moody, I was able to write for Today in the Word, their monthly devotional. And the theme that they had me write on one month was titled The God of Second Chances. And we got a lot of great feedback from people about, you know, just people's stories, testimonies and how God has given them second chances.

And my editor said, Chris, you should see if you could turn this into a book. And it just so happened at the time that my family, particularly my brother and I and his relationship with my mom and others in our family was going through a crisis, if you will. He needed a second chance. We needed a second chance as a family. And so all of those things converge at the same time. And I just felt the Lord leading me to, yeah, write a book proposal. And it turned into moving forward after messing up a new future with the God of second chances. Yeah. Well, you know, sometimes what we're going through is what we end up writing about.

You're exactly right. So tell us about your older brother and his reaction to your father's death. What happened? Sure. So we are very close in age. And when we were teenagers, 18 and 19, really, my father passed away somewhat suddenly of cancer.

So within a few months. And let's just say we went in our opposite direction. So I was a freshman at Moody Bible Institute at the time. And after he died, you know, thankfully, I was surrounded by other believers.

I was able to grieve and mourn with the help of them, professors through prayer, through the word of God, reading scripture through the local church that was a part of there in Chicago. My brother, on the other hand, he went to a state school. And I like to say he majored in college life. And so he didn't have those those people, those things to turn to. And he grieved and mourned through drugs and through alcohol. He eventually dropped out of college and moved to Colorado back when Colorado changed their marijuana laws.

And he found his community there. And so we were went on total separate directions and we even lost touch a little bit through that time. His addiction got worse. He eventually became homeless. He was very difficult even just to get a hold of. And when we could get a hold of him, sometimes we didn't want to get a hold of him because he may have been drunk or hung over and was just mean, rude, or maybe he was high. And so he burned a lot of bridges with particularly my mother.

You know, she who wants to see their son become a prodigal, really? And he was off off in the distance. And to make a long story short, then when, you know, fast forward 15 years later.

And again, we're not really talking that much. I needed to get a hold of him to let him know that our 94 year old grandmother had passed away and I couldn't I couldn't find him. I couldn't. His phone was either not working or it wasn't charged. My mind started to go to dark places like, well, is he even still alive?

Where could he be? And thankfully, though, I got in touch with the one friend that I knew he had in Colorado and she let me know that he had recently been arrested. And so in some sense, it's a relief because I knew that he was safe. But on the other hand, it's like, what a mess he has got himself into. What do we do now? And that's really where I pick up in the book is, OK, how do we move forward together?

Yeah. Did you hope during all that time that your brother would somehow be able to recover and move out of that situation? Or what were your thoughts and feelings during that period? Well, I think I always hoped, but, you know, my brother was not a believer. And spoiler alert, he still is not a believer yet.

You know, we're still praying for him. But, you know, I was a pastor at the time, and so I had hope because, of course, you know, you have hope in the gospel. You have hope of what Christ can do in people's lives.

And I would see it as a pastor. You know, I'd see prodigals come home and see marriages restored, you know, brothers and sisters come back into the fold. And so you always hope that it happens to yours. The sad truth is, though, for every one prodigal that does come home, there's probably five or 10 that don't.

And so it was hard to keep that hope and not lose hope. And I still have hope that he comes home. Now, thankfully, he is doing better. He is not in jail anymore. He got into rehab and is actually, yeah, doing a lot better. And our relationship is doing a lot better as well. Yeah.

Yeah. Now, today on this program, of course, we're talking to many people who love someone who has had or is now addicted to some kind of drugs. What do you want them to hear in this program today? Well, I think they need to hear that they're not alone. I was talking with a friend who does a morning radio show in Tampa. And they said just after Easter, they said, hey, if you have a prodigal son, child, sibling, parent, just text us their name to the radio station. And they said they had thousands of names roll in that day, that morning.

And it's true, too. You know, after I told people I was going to be writing a book about this, it was amazing how many other stories people shared with me about a family member that they loved who is a prodigal. But I hope that they know that, one, they're not alone, and that God is a God of second chances, and that He's not given up on them, and nor should we. You know, Chris, there are many parents out there who have family members who are prodigals. Not necessarily drugs involved, but for some reason, they just have a fractured relationship with their prodigal.

What do they need to hear about second chances? I think they need to hear that we also, as loved ones who are walking with God, have a responsibility, I think, a duty to go after the prodigals as best we can. One of the stories from the Bible, passage of scripture from the Bible that really spoke to me during this time is, of course, and we've alluded to it, is the story of the prodigal son in Luke 15. But the interesting thing that I learned in that passage is it actually is in a triad, or three stories are there that Jesus is telling to the Pharisees. And just to do a brief overview of them, the first one, there's a shepherd, he's got 100 sheep, he loses one, he leaves the 99, searches for the last one, finds it, and there's a lot of rejoicing.

And then the next story is there's a woman, she's got 10 coins, she loses one, she searches for it everywhere, she finds it, and there's great rejoicing. And then you get to the story of the prodigal sons, and there's a son, and he goes off, but nobody goes to search for that son. And if you're following the theme, the thread of those stories, somebody was supposed to go off and to search and to look and to bring that son back, yet nobody did. And whose responsibility was it?

Whose duty was it? Well, in that passage that Jesus is alluding to, he's alluding to that it's the Pharisees' job, or those who are walking with God, it's their responsibility to go after the prodigals, to search for them, and do what they can to bring them home. And yet, in that story, nobody does, the older brother stays home. And that really hit home with me, because here I am, a Bible college student in seminary, and then a pastor, and what was I really doing to go after the prodigal? A lot of it was me just folding my arms, just thinking, okay, well, I'll just wait till he hits rock bottom, and it's not my responsibility, and I'll wait till he, as the text says, comes to his senses, and then we'll see what happens when he asks for forgiveness and returns home. And that's the same attitude that the brother in the story had.

And so what does it mean? Well, I think it means that for believers, that yeah, we do have a responsibility to do what we can. Now, we can't do everything, but to do what we can to at least leave that door open and to search for them and to let them know that they are loved, and that love will not stop regardless how bad they mess up. Well, the person who may be listening and thinking in their own mind, wait a minute here, I'm not the one that did wrong.

They're the one that made all these wrong decisions, and it seems like you're putting the responsibility on me to try to get them straightened out, and not really focusing on the problem, which is what decisions they've made. How do you respond to that person? And I hear that, and I remember one day I called the local Alcoholics Anonymous group in Colorado where my brother was. I said, hey, my brother, he's an alcoholic. He really needs to go to your group.

What can I do to help him? And I remember her words, but they were so heartbreaking. She told me, there's nothing you can do.

It has to be his choice, his decision to come. And I thought, well, there's got to be something I can do, but in reality, there was very little I could do at that point. Now, of course, I could still pray. I could have, I suppose, had harsher conversations with him of saying, hey, you really need to do this.

You really need to go. I could have sent him maybe some more materials. I could have maybe flown out there.

I lived in a different part of the country and visited with him a little bit more. And so I think there's always things to do to go after the prodigals. I mean, the shepherd in the story, yeah, he could have just called out to the lost sheep. The woman who lost the coin, yeah, she could have looked for a minute and then just said, well, I still got nine other ones.

I could still buy a loaf of bread. But they didn't. They kept going and they never stopped. They kept pursuing because they knew that that coin, that sheep and the brother, they have value. They have value to the owner. And so we know that those prodigals, they have value to God. And so we also then, I think, need to keep going after them as best we can.

Yeah. If there's a prodigal who's listening to us today, who has the sense that I've gone too far, God wouldn't forgive me for all that I've done. And I'm just, there's no way out.

There's no way up. What would you say to that person? I would say you fall in line with everybody else. Because here's what I mean by that. I've been studying the scriptures for 20, 30 years. And essentially what it is, it's a book about people who've messed up and God has given them a second chance. I mean, you start from the beginning. Adam and Eve, did they mess up? Oh yeah, they did. And yet, God continued to love them.

I mean, just go through it. Noah, yeah, he messed up. Abraham, yeah, he messed up. David, yeah, he messed up several times. The disciples, yeah, they definitely messed up. And yet, God continually pursued them, continually brought them back.

Trust me, they committed a lot more sin than we did, than any listener did. What do you think about Moses? He killed somebody. You know, David, he killed somebody and, you know, had an affair. I mean, they just, the list goes on and on and on. And that's what the Bible is.

It's a book about people who've messed up, but it's also about a book about God, who brings people back, who forgives them and continually loves them no matter what. And that's what he continues to do for us today as well. Yeah, yeah. Now, early in the book, you do talk about the importance of taking responsibility for our actions as individuals. Talk more about that.

I had a mentor in seminary. His name is Haddon Robinson, who would say, in life, you make decisions and your decisions make you. And it's true. We have choices in life. But hey, those choices, those decisions that we make, they make us as well. And we have a responsibility to own up to our mistakes and to face the consequences.

Just like my brother, right? I mean, he got arrested and yeah, he still had to face the consequences of his actions. And unfortunately, it was the judge who had to humble him and send him into a rehabilitation center.

And he almost got through it, but then got kicked out. And so then he had to go face the judge again and then finally got into another rehabilitation center. But all that to say is, yeah, we have to take responsibility.

And he continued then in those rehabilitation centers and in those homes that he was in to fix and heal those broken relationships, those bridges that he burned with me, my mother in particular, and other family members. So it wasn't just him sitting back and doing nothing. Some people think, hey, I'll just sit back and let God do everything. But no, we actually have some work to do. We have some responsibility because, hey, we got ourselves into this mess and God gets us out, but he helps us to get out, is how I like to think about it. Hmm.

Yeah. What's the difference between having a problem and having a condition? Well, that's a great question because I think a lot of times when people look at alcohol, drugs, their spending habits, their jobs, their difficulty with their boss or their spouse, they think, oh, well, that person is the problem or alcohol is the problem.

Or my spending habits are a problem. Well, that's a problem, but there's something deeper than the problem and it's called a condition. And problems, you know, are a scratch, a cut, and they heal. Conditions are chronic illnesses, cancer that take time and effort and a lot of work to overcome, to heal from.

Or it's something that you just live with for a long time. And I think that's what we need to realize is that we all, yeah, we have problems, but we also have a deeper condition. And the condition is sin. I like to call it the sin within. We're all depraved. As Isaiah says, we are a fallen person in the midst of fallen people.

We are sinful people and that's our sin condition. But thankfully, through Jesus, God has made a way that He can heal us, not just of our problems, but also that deeper issue, which is our condition. You know, when people are making some efforts to move from where they are to a better place, what are some of the common obstacles that they run into when they're trying to get over messing up?

And how do you overcome those obstacles? Well, I think I'll answer that with a story, if I may. So when we moved into our house a couple years ago, I noticed that there was a brown spot in our upstairs. I have a little office there and on the ceiling, there's a brown spot on the ceiling and it was right next to the ventilation system.

I thought, oh, it's probably just condensation, nothing major. So I didn't decide to do anything about it. Actually, well, I took a picture. I took a picture of it.

Just chronicle it. And then a couple of weeks later, I looked up and I thought, did that brown spot just get a little bit bigger? And you would think I would, I don't know, go up in the attic, investigate, but no, I didn't. I thought, maybe it's just my imagination and it's probably fine. Well, several months pass and there's a terrible rainstorm outside and it's thunder and lightning and I'm trying to put the kids to bed.

My wife was out of town. So, you know, they're scared because of the lightning. It's raining cats and dogs outside. And I hear something in my office and I put my head in the door and what do I see but it's practically a waterfall coming from the ceiling onto my desk. And so what do I do? Well, I run down to the kitchen. I get the biggest bucket or pot I can find, bring it there, actually go up into the attic and see, oh, yeah, it's coming down from the roof. And so I put the bucket or the pot there and, you know, go to sleep. Now, you would think that the next day or the day after I'd get up in the attic and I'd, you know, fix that or I'd call somebody. But no, I don't.

I don't do anything about it. I left the pot there for, I think, three months and just, I don't know, praying, hoping that it would fix itself or that it wouldn't rain. And it wasn't until, like I said, about three months later that I saw there was a roofer on my neighbor's house and I was outside mowing the lawn. And I thought, you know what, I should go talk to him, but no, I'm not going to. If he's still here by the end of my mowing the lawn, then I'll go talk to him.

And he was. And to make a long story short, he eventually came up onto my roof and said, yeah, you got a big hole up here. You need to get your this patched up or your roof replaced.

And so I eventually did. Now, there's a word for all of that. And I think it's a word that we can talk about when it comes to, OK, what do we what is the major problems or issues, obstacles that we face? The word for that is denial. Denial.

I was in denial that there was a problem with my ceiling, with my roof. I think a lot of people are in denial that they actually have an issue going on. And so the first common obstacle is just being able to say, yes, there is there is something going on that needs to be fixed. Things are not right. Things are not what they should be. Things are not where God wants me to be. So it's owning up.

It's confessing that it's coming to the reality of what is really going on. And once we're able to overcome that obstacle, I think then we still face an upward journey, but it's one that becomes a lot more clearer because we know what mountain we're trying to climb. I think anyone who has interfaced with people who are going through those kind of difficulties have heard exactly what you just said. You know, no, no, I don't really have a drinking problem. You know, no, no, no, I don't know. It's not a problem.

Yeah, that was my brother for, you know, 15, 20 years. No, I don't have a problem. I don't have a drinking problem. I have a drug problem. It's like you're homeless. You have I mean, you're homeless.

You don't have you know, you get drunk every night. Like, yeah, I think there's something major going on here. Yeah. So, Chris, what do you say to the spouse listening who can see in their spouse there's something that's going on here and I can't get her or I can't get him to see it with your brother? It's like, you know, the person said there's really nothing you can do. Is there something that if you're living alongside with that other person that you can help them see?

Or is there a way that you can do that? That's a great question, Chris. I almost want to throw it back to you guys. You guys are the experts on at least in the marriage department. Gary, what do you think? Let me ask you, Gary, what would you how would you answer that question?

Well, I think there is a place for a spouse to say to the other spouse, I don't know how you feel about this situation, but I am gravely concerned about your well-being. And I've mentioned this to you several times. You seem to have no interest in it. But I am going to ask a friend of mine who deals with this kind of issues to give us his opinion. And I want you to go with me because I want him to hear or her to hear your side as well as my side. But I just can't sit here. I love you too much to sit here and do nothing. And you can get mad at me for what I'm telling you, or you can recognize that it's an act of love.

But I have got to do something because you're destroying yourself and you're definitely hurting me and the family. You know, there's a place for that. It's a tough love approach. And you never know how they'll respond.

You know, sometimes they'll get real mad at the moment and then they calm down and then they agree to go with you. But at least you're reaching out to bring in an outside voice to the situation. So it's just not you that they feel like, well, you're just criticizing. You're just down on me.

You just don't understand me. You know, that sort of thing. That would be my response. That's pretty good, Chris. I'm glad you asked that question. Well, I like what you said, Gary, in saying I love you so much. Because if you center it on love, if you ground it in love, then you're coming at it with an attitude of openness, of humility, of saying, hey, I want to walk through this with you. I want to walk this journey with you. And it's because I love you.

And I think that's I think that's really powerful. You know, Chris, when a person is beginning to work on things and we know that there has to come a juncture in which they repent. And as they turn away from their part in the behavior, and they may even reach out to parents or others and say, you know, I've been wrong, I've done wrong. Will you please forgive me? And forgiveness, as I understand it, you can clarify your thought on it, is forgiveness is I'm going to pardon you for what you've done. And I'm going to remove the barrier that it's created between us so that we can have a relationship. But are there situations in which you can forgive a person, but it won't necessarily lead to reconciliation with that person?

I think so. I don't think we'll ever forget. You know, God might, but I don't think we will forget the harm that's been done. Yeah, we can extend forgiveness. We can ask for forgiveness. And it might just take years, though, to be reconciled into.

Well, I'll put it this way. I don't think it's going to be the same as before, but it'll be a renewed relationship. And I see that in several ways. One is I think of just scripturally Adam and Eve when they sinned and they were kicked out of the garden. We will have a renewed relationship with them, with God. So creation will have a renewed relationship with our creator. And there will be a new heaven and a new earth, and we will have a renewed sense and a renewed place to be with them, to be with God. And then same with us as well. I think our relationships will change, but I'm not saying that will be changed and be worse.

They'll actually be changed for the better. And then personally, my own example is, yeah, I think my brother and I and our relationship was very, very rocky for many years. And same with his relationship with my mother. But now that we've been able to get all of our baggage out as best we can, ask for forgiveness, open up the lines of communication.

They're a lot better and they can become even better than they are now. And so that's because we've put effort into it. We put effort into communicating, to talking. I think one of the things that was a big indicator, a mover for my mom and my brother's relationship was when he was in rehab. One of the things, one of the practices that he had to do was to ask for forgiveness, but not just ask for it over the phone or something like that, but actually put it in writing and then send it to the people that you want, that you're asking for forgiveness from. And so he wrote my mother a letter. In fact, I include it in the book about how he apologized for what he'd done, how she became a victim of his addiction.

And sometimes he didn't even realize it, but now he does realize it. And so he continued to ask for forgiveness and he put it in writing. And I think for them that that was a real game changer because for their relationship to be reconciled, because it was not just said, but it was written down and those words were meaningful.

Yeah. I like the point you made about forgiveness doesn't remove the memory. For the individual or for the family member that they're relating to, the memory is there. And even when we forgive, the memory comes back and sometimes the pain, the emotions come back when we remember all that's happened.

Either the person that was guilty, they remember and they have negative feelings. So forgiveness is not a feeling. Forgiveness is a choice. So I really like that point. And the other reality is, of course, that there are consequences to sinful behavior.

There's always consequences. As you mentioned, Adam and Eve, they were taken out of the garden. And even though God gave them life, they were not back where they were.

So we always are worse, I think, for having sin, which leads me to ask this question. What's the role that faith or relationship with God plays in the process of moving forward after we've messed up? And I think it's crucial. I mean, I know that people move forward. I know that they can have help with their marital problems, their problems with their siblings. They can go to counseling and they can, you know, yeah, I guess they can get on working terms with others.

It can become better than it is. But I honestly don't know how people can be fully reconciled with their loved ones if it wasn't for Christ and what He's done for us on the cross. We know forgiveness because He's shown us forgiveness. We know love because He's shown us love. We know reconciliation because He has demonstrated that for us and He's done that for us. And so I think if we want to be truly transformed, if we want our brokenness to be fully healed, it can only come through a God who has already done that for us and that God is Jesus Christ. You know, why do you think God is so forgiving and so willing to give second chances and third chances?

That's a good question, because I don't know. I mean, I wouldn't be. If I was in charge, if I was God, I might give one opportunity. You know, we titled the subtitles A New Future with the God of Second Chances. But really, He's a God of multiple chances.

You know, maybe if it was me, yeah, I might forgive somebody once or twice, but man, after multiple times, I don't know. But God does. And why does He do that? Well, I think that's what makes Him God and me not God. It's part of His nature. It's part of His DNA. I like to say it's part of His divine natural attributes.

It's what He does. It's because He is a God who loves. You know, I think of one of the persons in the Bible that stands out to me the most is the apostle Peter, and how, you know, he was like Jesus' best bud. And yet, when Jesus is arrested, He denies him three times. In fact, Peter thought he was outside of the fold, because at Mark, at the resurrection, Jesus tells the women, hey, go tell my disciples and Peter. It wasn't because Jesus thought He was outside of the fold, because if they would have just said, hey, go tell the disciples, Peter would have been like, well, I'm not a disciple anymore, because I denied them three times. But they told the disciples and Peter, and then in John chapter 21, you know, some of them, they're back fishing, but kind of back to their old life, and then all of a sudden, Jesus shows up on the shore of Peter's life. There's a miraculous catch, and then, you know, Peter swan dives into the water, does his best Michael Phelps impression, and swims as fast as he can to the shoreline. And who's waiting there?

None other than Jesus. But there's something else waiting for Peter on the shore, and the text, John puts this in there. It's a small detail, but I think it's a huge one, especially for Peter. It says that Jesus was there, He was cooking breakfast over a charcoal fire. And the only other time in the scriptures where the word charcoal fire is used is when Peter was warming himself outside the courtyards during his denials of Jesus Christ. And I think that was a reminder for Peter and for readers in the scripture that, hey, Jesus is standing on the shores of our lives, and He wants us to come back, and He wants to reinstate us. Because shortly after that, Jesus says, hey, after breakfast, Peter, I want to take a walk with you. We've got some work to do.

We've got to create an avenue for a deeper relationship. And with each question, Jesus was giving Peter another chance. Do you love me? Do you love me? Do you love me? And Peter said, yes, you know that I love you.

You know that I love you. And so Peter then, ultimately, the fisherman would retire, drop his nets, and the follower of Jesus would never turn back again. So I think no matter how many times we've turned away from God, He never stops loving us because that's who He is. He's always standing there on the shore of our lives, calling us back to Him. He may even want to use our past then to change other people's future as well.

Yeah. Now you talk about the role of humility. After we failed, and we're dealing with it, and we're now trying to move forward, you talk about the role of humility, and then you also talk about true and false humility.

Share with us your thoughts on that. Well, false humility, I don't know about you guys, but I see that a lot, usually on social media. Because if you're wanting to post something about how humble you are, I question, are we actually being humble if we're posting and telling other people about it? I think that the aspect of humility is doing it not for praise and applause, but doing it because, hey, I love people. I see value in people.

Philippians 2, where Paul says, hey, take on the mind of Christ, and that is put others first. I had a professor in seminary who would often say there's two types of people in the world, not extroverts and introverts, but there are here I am people and there you are people. Here I am people go into a crowded room and they say, hey, here I am. Let me tell you what's going on in my life. Let me tell you about what's going on in my business or what I've done lately.

There you are people come into a room and they see people and they say, there you are. Hey, how's your marriage going? Hey, there you are. How's your ministry? How's that project that you're working? There you are.

How are your children doing? Because they have a genuine concern and interest in other people. And what Jesus is doing is he's turning here I am people into there you are people. And I think he does that by allowing us to practice selflessness by recognizing that, hey, we have limitations. You know, we aren't everything. We fall short in many areas and we have to admit that we have to look at others with true compassion. And the word compassion means to suffer alongside someone.

We hear of the passion of the Christ and that's the suffering of the Christ. Compassion is alongside. And so what we have to do when we see other people who are grieving, who are hurting, we suffer alongside them.

We have compassion for them. I think we also true humility is expressing a genuine gratitude and an open, open mindset and a willingness to learn about them, about other things, about ourselves, and of course about God. I think that's what true humility is. And if we're going to move forward, we have to start with finding true humility. Do you think a part of that humility also is recognizing that without the help of God, we're probably not going to be successful? You know that John 15 passage where Jesus said, without me, you can do nothing. It's not just self-effort, but humility seems to involve that kind of response to God. What are your thoughts on that?

Exactly, Gary. And I think we have to remember, right? We've been, no matter how old you are, I mean, you walked with God for years or without God for years. Some of us maybe walked without God for, you know, 10 years, 15 years, 45 years. We've walked without God. And then all of a sudden it's like, well, now I need to become humble and I need to be like Christ.

How do I do that in a weekend or in a week or in a month or in a year? It takes time. You know, we and it takes God to help us in those years of recovery, if you will. I mean, we're all still going through recovery of our sin because we were born sinful and we can't recover on our own. Just like an alcoholic can't recover on their own, a drug addict can't recover on their own. We as sinners, we can't recover on our own. We need help. We need help from God who who can help us take one step at a time. Turning as we turn from our old sinful ways and continue to, well, like Philippians 2 says, right?

Have the mind of Christ to be a humble believer, to be a there you are person. Yeah, yeah. In the process of recovery, whether it's alcohol or any other addiction that we might have, why is it important to identify potential triggers that can cause you to, you know, flip back and relapse on whatever you're trying to get over?

Sure. It's those triggers that I think are the hardest part. It's easy to make a decision first off. Say, hey, I'm just going to stop doing this. I'm going to stop spending, you know, over our budget. I'm going to stop, you know, the way that I speak to my wife and I'm just going to change and, you know, speak in a more loving manner to her.

It's a great it's a great start. But the reality is then we get into situations or something happens that boom, we find ourselves right back where we are. It's like we've we've fallen again and we need help getting back up. And so being able to identify the context, the situation, whether it's the place that we're in, the people we're associated with, when we're at the store and we see that thing or shopping online, we see that thing or, you know, when our spouse does that or doesn't do that, we know that, hey, it's going to cause a reaction out of me. So if we can ahead of time identify those triggers, then we can be able to pause and to think through how we're going to handle those situations so that when they do happen, we can pause and we can handle them in a godly, loving manner in a way that we weren't able to before. But now that we are moving forward and we have God on our side helping us through that, it can help to restore those relationships and we can get over whatever it is that we've been going through. Do you think it's helpful for that individual to actually sit down and think their way through these things? You know, what are the situations that I'm likely to be tempted in and that sort of thing so that they've got that in their mind ahead of time and how to avoid that?

I do. The term for that is situation mapping. And for instance, several years ago when the Navy SEALs went to go capture or kill Osama bin Laden, it's not like they just showed up one day and they said, okay, I guess he's in there.

We'll go do our duty. No, they spent months planning, preparing, trying to think about any and every situation that would happen so they would prepare for it so that when the time came for their number to be called, they knew exactly what to do. And then if there were anything that happened out of the ordinary, they could handle that as well. As if you know the story, things did happen that were out of the ordinary that weren't supposed to happen. But because they had planned and had contingency plans, because they had mapped those situations out in their minds beforehand, they were able to pull off a successful mission.

And I think it's the same thing with us. If we can identify those triggers and then visualize and even have a plan for what's going to happen the next time I go to a party and they're drinking, what's going to happen the next time my spouse forgets to bring the garbage cans in? What am I going to do in that situation? And then run through that scenario in your head and map it out so that you actually have an answer for the circumstances of the situation that you find yourself in. And I think that's one of the ways, one of the many ways that we can continue to move forward is to have those plans ready.

What advice do you give to the person who feels stuck in their past mistakes and they're just really struggling to make any step forward? Well, I think the first step, Gary, is to get with a supporting network of people. There are people out there, believe it or not, that they want to help.

They do. They genuinely want to help. And we're not meant to go through life alone.

COVID taught us that, right? We're not meant to be isolated and try to figure everything out on our own. We're meant to do things with people. And there's no better way to get through something than to ask for help from other people.

Now, that's hard. We have to put our pride aside and we have to ask and admit that we need help. I know that's challenging, but that's oftentimes the most difficult thing. But the most important thing is to get surrounded by a great group of people, whether it's a group from your church or from your community. I think there's great churches, great ministries out there as well that can help. And so I think that's one of the main goals or the main things I think you have to do is to get with people who are ready and willing to help because they want to help you.

Yeah. And in terms also of our relationship with God, what steps can they take to renew that relationship with God? I think it starts with honesty, and that's with the support group as well, but we need to be honest with God.

We need to be honest with ourselves and have an honest conversation with God. He's not an angry father. He's a loving father. He's not going to punish you. He's going to forgive you.

And so why not start with an honest conversation with Him and hopefully in that conversation, that that conversation leads to repentance or to asking for forgiveness. And He will. He does.

He does it every day. He's done it for me. He's done it for you, Gary. He's done it for you, Chris. And He will do it for everybody.

That's who He is. And so I think having an honest, open conversation with Him, with God, asking for repentance and then helping and then asking for guidance through the power of the Holy Spirit to put those people that we need in our paths over the next several days so that we can find the next step on our journey forward. Chris, as we come to a close to our program today, you talk about in the book four steps that an individual can take to build a new future for themselves. Just briefly share those.

Sure. So step one, and we just mentioned it, surround yourself with some kind of great support network. I think that's really important, whether it's Celebrate Recovery, Alcoholics Anonymous, whatever that may be. Get around people that can support you. I think then step two is to create some own personal goals, some development plans for you. Where do you see yourself in the next year, in the next six months, in the next month, next week? And what are you doing today to help you prepare yourself and to get to that place where you want to be next week, next month, in the next six months?

So I think that that's step two. I think then, as we alluded to as well, is how can you seek amends, restore those broken relationships, those broken connections with family members, with friends, maybe with ministry leaders? Whether it's through writing them a letter, sending them a text message, calling them up, taking them out to lunch. But it's so important to connect and to try to rebuild those bridges that had been burned and broken down. And then finally, the last step, and I think this is crucial too, is share your story with others. I had a friend who said, God takes our tests and he turns them into testimonies. He takes our messes and he turns them into messages, messages of hope for other people. And they need to hear your story. They need to hear in your voice what happened and how God has restored and renewed you. And you can use your story to help somebody else's future because, hey, that's what ultimately we're here to do.

We're here to worship, glorify God, enjoy him forever. And along the way, hey, tell our story about what God has done because other people need to hear it so that they can have a story of redemption and hope as well. Chris, I want to thank you for being with us today. I mean, this is a pertinent topic in our day because all of us, all of us fail from time to time.

And so I think there are many listeners today. I hope not only will they listen to what we've been talking about, but I hope they'll get the book because moving forward after messing up is a really practical book. And I think working through that can help those of us who are trying to help others as well as the person who is experiencing a failure. So again, thanks for being with us today.

My pleasure. And yeah, the book hopefully will be read in groups. There's discussion questions. There's a leader's guide, and that's what it's meant for to anybody who wants to take their setback and turn it into a comeback. This book is for them. And if you want to find that resource, go to buildingrelationships.us. You'll see it right there, Moving Forward After Messing Up, a New Future with the God of Second Chances, written by Dr. Chris Rappazzini.

Find out more at buildingrelationships.us. And next week, how to deal with the epidemic of lonely, hurt men who are hurting themselves and their families. Hear Dr. Patrick Morley talk about going from broken boy to mended man in one week. A big thank you to our production team, Janice Backing and Steve Wick. 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.