Team Not Tired
Team Not Tired is a podcast and community for busy Christian women who are ready to live their lives as ministry—without losing themselves in the process. Here, burnout is not a badge of honor. Together, we discover a better way: one fueled by grace, purpose, and sustainable rhythms that honor God and who He’s called us to be.
Team Not Tired
The Unnecessary Weight of Unforgiveness
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What if the thing slowing you down isn’t your schedule—it’s what you’re still carrying?
This week, Ashley and Shareen talk about the weight of unforgiveness, why offense is so easy to hold onto, and what it looks like to actually let it go. Because forgiveness isn’t pretending it didn’t hurt—it’s choosing freedom.
If you’re ready to run a little lighter, this one’s for you.
What unnecessary weight do you need to let go of that you're carrying in unforgiveness because it's it's ultimately hurting you. Like we know this. Forgiveness is for you. Right, right. You you think you're extending forgiveness to someone else. You're freeing them from the burden of your judgment or I did what? Yeah. You know, but but really forgiveness is for you. It's for it's for me. It's it's the it's setting me free. I'm I'm released of the burden of carrying what ultimately Jesus was meant to carry.
SPEAKER_01We are very excited that you're here for Team Not Tired. I don't know about you, but I always look forward to Tuesday when a new episode gets released, or it's just a nice friendly reminder that I get to go back to episodes that maybe I need to catch up on. And I think that, you know, I kind of love, I'm a little bit biased, but I love Team Not Tired, especially on a Tuesday. And my name is Shereen Crawford, and I'm here to welcome you and my co-host, Ashley. Yep. How's it going? It's going good.
SPEAKER_02We've got a little bit of a weightier topic today. Perfect. So I think it's it's something that I see everyone struggle with, not just women. Yeah. But I see it as a point of women getting stuck. And at Team Not Tired, you know, we talk a lot about running our race and finishing strong and what we can do to make sure that we're focused on running our race at a sustainable pace. And there's just this unnecessary weight that I see women carrying that I just felt led to address today. And so I just want to remind us though, first before we get into the conversation about the unnecessary weight of unforgiveness. Okay. That we read Hebrews 12, because it says, Let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up, and let us run with endurance the race God has set before us. And so I want to talk about unforgiveness as this weight that I think slows us down. And anytime I think about forgiveness and this topic of unforgiveness, which I think all of us can relate to.
SPEAKER_01Yes. And if you are no one's getting into driving and thinking, that's not me.
SPEAKER_02Nope. No, we're calling you out. We love you enough to tell you the truth. Like big or small, this is a this is an issue that we all have to wrestle with and deal with and overcome at some point in our lives. Some bigger than others, some things harder to conquer than others, but everybody has to wrestle with unforgiveness and the fact that God calls us to forgive and to be good forgivers. Um, but it always makes me think of this trip to Africa that I took a couple years back. And I got the opportunity to go to Rwanda. And beautiful. We spent time visiting this place that was called a reconciliation village.
unknownOkay.
SPEAKER_02I don't know if I've ever told you about this, but we went to Rwanda, which was about now 30 years removed from this genocide that happened there. And it still blows my mind that I'm old, like a genocide happened within the years that I've been alive on this earth. Like that just blows my mind.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02But to visit this place in this community that just 30 years prior, they saw about a million people killed in the span of a hundred days. Which is wildly incredible. It like mind-blowing to me. And so it and not only that, but this genocide happened between these two people groups. It wasn't a result of government and military action. It was these neighbors, it was these civilians, it was brother against brother, and people who knew each other committing these murders. It was personal. And so I show up to this reconciliation village, which was full of about 54 families, which is a couple hundred people. And these were people that had been perpetrators in the genocide and survivors of the genocide. And here they were in this village choosing to work shoulder to shoulder, to live neighbor to neighbor, and to do the work of reconciliation and to actually live out forgiveness. Yeah. And you think about so impact. It was an incredible. So moving to look into the eyes of these people and hear their stories. And I I remember this one gentleman, you know, said he had lost about a hundred family members in the genocide. Like brothers, cousins, children. And I remember him talking about how the Lord had enabled him to forgive. And he said, How could I waste this gift of forgiveness and not share it with others and not teach others to do the same? And so these people were just telling their stories of having to work through the fear of what it meant to forgive someone or to live next door to someone who had murdered one of their family members. And I think, man, I can hardly forgive someone who gossiped about me or, you know, slandered my name or hurt my feelings. Yeah. And so I just think, man, if if these people can forgive something like this, you know, what what does it say about my heart that I struggle with with unforgiveness about these hurts and these wounds and these hangups and stuff. And so I just I see unforgiveness as this just like incredible weight that the Lord doesn't want us to carry, which is, I think, why he's so adamant in scripture about the command that we have to live as people who forgive, which is so much easier said than done.
SPEAKER_01I would say so. I would say so. And and just what a beautiful testimony for you to see lived out in a and I would say that's a very extreme example that you got to witness and see, but to your same point of like someone that is gossiping about you or someone that is doing something of you know, that's not as wild and crazy. Are we very quick to forgive? And and sometimes the answer is like I am forgiving nobody, you know, because like the the hurt is deep, or there's so many different layers of our own trauma that we bring into the unforgiveness.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. And I think in talking, there's there's so many times where I see unforgiveness holding ladies back because their their wounds speak louder than their words. And so I see I see too many women stuck because they're holding on to old hurts and it's keeping them from being able to move forward. It's it's holding them back. And so that's just my heart in this conversation today is to go, what unnecessary weight do you need to let go of that you're carrying in unforgiveness because it's it's ultimately hurting you. Like we know this forgiveness is for you. Right, right. You you think you're extending forgiveness to someone else, you're freeing them from the burden of your judgment or whatever have you. I did what? Yeah, you know, but but really forgiveness is for you. It's for it's for me. It's it's the it's setting me free. I'm I'm released of the burden of carrying what ultimately Jesus was meant to carry.
SPEAKER_01Yes.
SPEAKER_02And so one of the one of the practices that I've learned over the years, because this has been a journey for me as a ministry leader, I've I've dealt with my own levels of hurt and betrayal and had to really work through forgiveness and found that it's it's both a decision and a process. Like forgiveness is not a one-time thing. It's it's a one-time decision, but then the healing process is a process. Yeah. And letting your feelings catch up to your decision sometimes takes longer than we would like.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02But I think that's why in, you know, when Jesus is teaching his disciples to pray, he includes in this very short prayer the fact that we ask God to forgive us and then we forgive the term, you know, the old terminology is our debtors. Our debtors. Those that trespass. Those that trespass against us, as the King James says. But I I love that it's included, like that line is included in the Lord's Prayer, because Jesus is modeling to his disciples this simple prayer that they they would have said every day.
unknownYes.
SPEAKER_02They're going, teach us to pray, Lord. Like, what do we include? And if he's gonna tell them anything, it's gonna be what's most important. And in my mind, I'm going, oh, if this is what's most important to Jesus, that we daily have this habit of of asking for forgiveness for our own sins, but then also extending that same level of forgiveness to others. To me, that means, oh, this is a daily habit. This is a spiritual discipline that I'm called to is to be someone who quickly and daily will let stuff go.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. And like you said, to take note of how important, especially like in the Lord's Prayer, that's like top. He starts off very, very much at the top of that of like, okay, we not only do I need to repent of my own sins, but I also need to forgive those that are in my proximity, those that are outside, you know, like there's different levels of that that we have to walk through. And you're right, women can can nurse this baby.
SPEAKER_02That's a great picture of what it actually is.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, of like, you know, I just I've always kind of had this analogy in my own mind because like I have been there myself of like I'm just gonna sit here and nurse this baby of unforgiveness, and I'm just gonna feed it and I'm gonna nurture it in all the wrong ways. And then it's not until I have to, like you said, strip off that weight that I sometimes unknowingly kept around or never fully healed from. And the more you feed it, the more it grows, and the more it grows, and then I mean, like, I'm sure you know this, but misery loves company. And so women were very good at at bringing people in community, but when we do that in in our unforgiveness, like, whoo, that is a dangerous thing to bring in others to kind of sow those seeds of unforgiveness with other women, and you're just like, ooh.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. That's that's why I always talk to people at the at the root of like this journey of going, okay, I really want to learn how to how to forgive people. Like, I'm not good at it, I don't know how. Help me, help me, you know, take what I I know at face value, which is God's word, but how how do I put that on top of how I feel?
SPEAKER_00Right.
SPEAKER_02And so many times it starts with bitterness. Like it's a seed of bitterness or hurt that's been planted that then grows into unforgiveness. So I go, how do we get there? How do we stop it before the seed is planted? Yeah. And I always go back to Matthew, Matthew 18, which there's this very clear four-step plan that is laid out by Jesus Himself on what to do when someone sins against you. Right. It's really clear. Like, go read it for yourselves. It's very clear. But the problem is that we don't follow like many things. Imagine that. Like God's very clear instructions in his word. And so I like to joke that like rather than starting with step one of this reconciliation plan that the Lord gives us, which is go to the person. Go talk to the person who has hurt you, who has wronged you, who is, you know, whatever there's confusion or conflict with. We start at step zero, which is we talk about it to other people. Yeah. And so I need you to pray about that. To your point, like we ask, we innocently ask for someone's advice or perspective about this situation. And now, and this is where those seeds are planted, and this is where we feed this community. We're bringing other people into our sin now. Yeah. Which is even worse. Because now I've invited you into unforgiveness or bitterness or gossip into a situation that I should have been taking care of myself by just going to the other person and seeking resolution. And so I would say the first step is really to follow the Lord's instructions when it comes to forgiveness and working on forgiveness, because when we get wrapped up in offense, which we know is the gateway to unforgiveness. It's the gateway drug. Yeah. Um, our offense can oftentimes become greater than our obedience, which is to forgive others.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02And so I would start right there is to go before you do anything, look at God's word, follow his instructions, don't allow bitterness to take root, because you're gonna save yourself a lot of heartache and a lot of unnecessary weight in the long run.
SPEAKER_01And it it's it's kind of making sure that we're living unoffendable in some ways, because if we have to be really aware of our own triggers and our own traumas, because that's the lens that we see through. And that might not be that person's intent, but because we carry different things as women, and you know, just being human, I think that's really important to, you know, know thyself and making sure that I am really putting into practice this every day. Easier said than done. Like you said, sometimes it's that one-time decision, but the process in and of itself is very much a process.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Yeah. I think the there's just one last piece of the puzzle that I would want to talk through today. Like I could talk about this topic a lot because I've just done a lot of personal study. But I had an opportunity when we were at that village in Africa to ask some of the people questions who lived there. And one of the questions our group asked them was, What was their biggest challenge when finding and fighting for forgiveness? Like, what was the hardest thing they had to overcome? And like it was a resounding communal answer. And they said fear. Wow, was the hardest part in extending and walking in forgiveness. Fear, fear of being hurt again, right? Like fear of being betrayed, maybe fear of the past. The some of us have a fear that like our forgiveness will be taken advantage of. There's a lot of fear that comes with extending forgiveness because it makes us vulnerable. Vulnerable, yeah. And yet I see in God's word, we're invited to forgive with faith. Yeah. And how like how many times have you seen the shirt, like faith over fear?
SPEAKER_01You know, too many times. You don't have that one in here. I absolutely do not.
SPEAKER_02I don't. But I don't have the shirt either, but I think it makes my point for me today when it comes to forgiveness, is too many times we let fear keep us from forgiveness when Jesus is inviting us to extend forgiveness with faith. Because in Luke 17, there's this passage, and many of us are familiar with it, but it says the it's the faith as a mustard seed. And he says, if you had faith, even as small as a mustard seed, you could say to this tree, be uprooted and plant it, and it would obey you. But the the part that we miss is that when the apostles are asking Jesus, show us how to increase our faith, the verses right before that, they're talking about forgiveness.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Jesus is saying, you must forgive. And then they go, Show us how to increase our faith, which means we have to have faith in order to walk in forgiveness. And I think we miss this part because we're trying to do it out of our own willpower. Yeah. We're trying to do it out of our own strength. And then we're wondering why we're failing. We're wondering why we keep waking up with this unforgiveness, with this bitterness, with this hurt in our heart. And because we're not asking the Lord to help us and partner with us by asking him to increase our faith.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Lord, give me the faith to believe that I can actually extend forgiveness to this person. Give me the faith to believe that I can move beyond this awful hurt and situation. Give me the faith to believe that you're gonna heal me from this pain.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Like we don't invite faith in to our journey of unforgiveness. And so I just see too many of us not inviting Jesus in. We're trying to obey him without his involvement. And so I just I want us to be women who can really run unhindered and and put off the weight, take off the unnecessary weight of unforgiveness that keeps so many of us stuck and lagging behind where we need to be. It's just not it's just not what God has for us. It's not the best that he has for you.
SPEAKER_01Right. And there's so much freedom when you do shed that weight. And in God's goodness, he does help you along the way in that process. And so I love what you have brought to us today. And I understand that that might be a little bit of a of a heavier topic, but I think here on on Team Not Tired, we we need to talk about these things, and oftentimes we shy away from difficult conversations. But we are trying to run our race, and we can't do that if we're hindered, if we have weight that is bogging us down. And so, friends, if you're listening today and you're thinking about the people that maybe wronged you, maybe turn that around and say, Lord, give me the faith to forgive them. And I want you to know that Ashley and I are, you know, not only do we pray for you guys, but I I think that like we truly want you to run your race at a sustainable pace with the utmost grace. And I think it starts there with learning how to forgive. And so maybe take it take a minute to really evaluate who do I need to forgive and see just how much freedom you have when you're running your race. Until next time. Join us on Team Not Tired.