My friend Suzie just released her book, The Unburdened Heart, and I’m so excited about the power and potential of her life-changing message. I had the honor of writing the foreword for her book, and I’d love to share my heart with you about it – today:
I don’t know exactly when it started. I just remember feeling angry and frustrated with my husband – almost every single day – on and off for months. One evening after an argument, J.J. told me that no matter what he did or how hard he tried, it was never enough.
He was right, but I didn’t know what was wrong with me. I was tired of being mean and miserable so I started asking God to show me what was going on. To help me figure out how, after seven years of a fairly happy marriage, we had gotten to this ugly place.
Over time I sensed God was showing me that I wanted J.J. to make up for what my dad had never been as a father to me and as a husband to my mom. I think I was trying to create my own version of “happily-ever-after,” and in doing so I became very controlling and critical.
You see, years as a child in a broken home with a broken heart had led to a significant sense of loss and deep disappointment. But I had never processed, grieved or let go of what I thought I deserved yet didn’t have.
My unforgiving heart and unfulfilled hopes had created bitter expectations. I thought if I could get J.J. to be the husband and dad I wanted him to be, maybe my broken past and shattered dreams could be put back together.
I knew I needed to deal with my pain, but I couldn’t just forgive and forget it. It wasn’t that easy. There were layers of hurts and issues I’d never dealt with.
I took the first step by acknowledging my pain and giving myself permission to feel it. Then I carved out time each week to unpack the memories and events that led me to this hard place and then I allowed God to heal them.
I asked Jesus to help me grieve the loss of things I wanted that I would never have from my dad. And I asked Him to walk me through the steps of forgiving my father so I could release the anger, abandonment and hurt that had held me prisoner for so long.
It was a process that took time, prayer and courage, but it was worth it. I was worth it. My marriage was worth it.
Like most people, I didn’t want to face my pain. I didn’t have time and I didn’t want to dig it all up. But I am so glad I did! Through it all, God showed me how to let go of my past hurts so I could take hold of hope and healing I never thought I would find.
As I worked through what happened in my childhood, and how it was affecting my marriage, I realized I needed the help of a friend. I needed someone who had walked a similar road to come alongside me to offer wisdom and another perspective in my healing journey.
Through the pages of The Unburdened Heart, Suzie Eller is that friend. Offering wisdom and a heart full of compassion, Suzie will come beside you and mentor you each step of the way. Yet Suzie doesn’t just share from a place of knowing about forgiveness; she writes from a place of living it and giving it, when it’s hard.
One thing I love about Suzie and the message she lives, is that she’s not a cookie-cutter Christian. She won’t just say, “You need to forgive.” She knows it’s not that easy, but she also cares too much to leave you in that hard place. Instead, she’ll take your hand and walk you through the process, sharing her story as you look at yours.
Bringing depth to the layers of a forgiving-life, Suzie will help you explore the different meanings of forgiveness as she walks with you through your unique journey. She’ll also introduce you to amazing women and men who have offered their hearts, their stories and their courage to help you recover yours!
Chapter by chapter Suzie will invite you, even urge you at times, into a place of hope and healing because she wants you to experience the sacred transformation that forgiveness brings.
I hope you’ll accept her invitation. It will require time, courage and perseverance but you are worth what it takes. You see, forgiveness is a gift we give ourselves when we offer it to others. In doing so, we don’t forgive so we can forget. We forgive, as we have been forgiven, so we can be set free from our past and live with confident hope in our future.
I’m giving away 2 copies of Suzie’s book – The Unburdened Heart: Finding the Freedom of Forgiveness. This your invitation to discover the freedom of forgiveness. Enter to receive a copy by clicking “Share Your Thoughts” to share your thoughts or simply let us know why you’d like to win a copy of Suzie’s book. {If you are reading this via email, click here to enter to win.}
Rene:
I would love to read this book. My husband tells me that
I am angry all the time. Maybe I am, I need to delve
Deeper into my past and see if there is really something
There that I need to resolve. I really need to do this before
It destroys our marriage.
God bless you!
Would love to read this book!
what a blessing!
thank you!
This would be a great follow-up read to The Confident Heart. Thanks for offering it.
I would love this book. I actually teach a class on forgiveness and it may give me different perspectives to teach from. I also struggle in the area of my husband…. I do find myself irritated (bitter and snappy too) with him often and maybe this will help me get past this and move forward and hopefully, help others to move forward as well.
Thank you,
Lord Bless
I have been a Christain for many years. Although my life is nothing like it was before I trusted Christ as my savior, I still have much to learn and lots of growing up to do. I’ve felt guilty whenever the subject of forgiveness comes up. I have felt so entitled to the hurt and unforgiveness I’ve grasped so tightly to my heart. I know I should forgive because I’ve been forgiven so much. I am reminded daily as I read about and pray to God – I can trust Him and his plan(s) for my life.
This Thursday will be my son’s birthday. Our 2-1/2 year old daughter was strong willed but didn’t stretch us as parents like our son would. He was unique, artistic, loving, fearful, and troubled. He died of an overdose 6-1/2 years ago… was only 21… was my baby still… and his death would change us individually as well as a family. We struggle yet with what we are without him. I have come to understand that God’s ways are not our ways. I will never understand. I will never ask why. I am sure it is God who has sustained me throughout the turbulent times that have followed. I am sure of His love for me.. His love for my Kyle.. and His desire to help and not hurt me. I trust Him – every day.
This is why I trust when He tells of my need to forgive. I just don’t know how to do it. I don’t even know how to want to do it. It sounds like this book would be a great companion for me to walk through this in a Godly way.
I have a friend whose husband has left her for the second time and I believe this book would help her tremendously! She is a christian, but is not where she needs to be. I have been where she is and I know that without the Lord to heal and help me thru the pain and forgiveness, I would not be where I am today. I would love to have a copy to read and pass along to my friend!
I am presently reading A Confident Heart, and this would be a wonderful companion book for me. When she said she was” trying to create her own happily ever after” that hit the nail on the head for me. I’ve spent my whole life trying to do that and then end up being disappointed when nobody can meet my expectations (especailly myself). I so desperately need this book and would love to win it!
I would love this book! I was wounded by a previous church. I thought I had put it behind me but recently something happened. That has made me realize that the wound is still there under the surface after all these years. It has caused me to be afraid to connect with not only people but the church itself.
I need this book, I have realized over the last few months that I have so much in my life that is affecting my abilities to be a wife, a mom, and a friend. I just don’t know where to begin. I hope to be chosen for this book so that I am begin the journey to helping myself.
Wow this sounds exactly like what I need. I’ve been working with a counselor on this very issue and I’ve been afraid that I won’t have the strength and time to put into this. Renee, you make it sound like something I CAN do. Thank you for your encouragement and opportunity to win the book!
Wow would love to win a copy of this book. The topic of forgiveness is so crucial to our lives and mostly our health! Thanks for the chance to win this book!
I carry around the burden of insecurity, and therefore become overly sensitive to comments from others, especially from my husband. To consciously and deliberately take the time to pour this out to God and bask in His healing is what I need. To remember and know that He loves me for who I am. I don’t need to prove my worthiness.
I would love to share this with my 21 year old daughter. At 15 her relationship with her father ended and as a result she carries so much pain and anger. This sounds like just the book she needs. Thank you for the opportunity to win a copy.
Sounds like a great book! I would love the chance to win the book!
Thank you!
I need this.
Your testimony about you and JJ hits so close to home. “Its never enough” were words commonly used in my own marriage. And even though I can now confess that I was looking to my husband to fulfill what was missing coming from a broken home, I still have a hard time with forgiving not only him but myself. You see after 3 years of trying to “fix” my marriage my husband had an affair. Possibly 2. We attempted to repair a now even more fractured marriage only for him to walk out on me and our 2 boys for being “too hard” to deal with. He’s been gone for almost 5 months with an almost non-existent relationship with our children. He says he needs his “individuality”. Everyday he decides to stay gone is another day I struggle to forgive for the unsurmountable amount of pain he has caused on our family. And yet I know even though no one deserves to be betrayed by an affair I struggle with forgiving myself for my part in this mess.
i would love to win this book for myself and my Mom! Forgiveness is so important and i know it will bring us closer to the LORD and to those that we need to forgive and break the cycle of unforgiveness and bitterness. Thank you for the opportunity to win this book!
I thought I had gone through the process of forgiveness when I re-married but I found that there is still the lingering doubts and insecurity that tries to bring me into a “poor-me” state. It is wonderful to know that the Lord has given me a second chance to make this marriage one that glorifies Him. But the enemy knows I have not allowed the baggage from my first marriage to be cast off and resolutely scourged from my being. This book sounds like one that will lead me to full deliverance and forgiveness of the past. I look forward to reading it.
I would love to read this book . Suffering from abuse I need to learn how to forgive myself for all that I blame myself for. Forgiving is very hard for me to do because of my background.
Forgiveness and forgetting are a tough pair. I have a very hard time letting go. I would hope to glean what the Lord wants me to go forward with. I have been trying to make myself a better person by reaching out to a Christian woman who will help hold me accountable. This book would also help.
Forgiveness, is something I have been strugling this last 10 years with my ex-hunsband and his wife( my ex-friend). I say everyday to God that I forgave them because of his love to me and because he forgave me in the first place, yet somedays Is so hard when a storm from my ex’s come to my direction trying to destroy me. Just recentlyI enjoyed a group of ladies(bible study) that very much I believe that God put as together, for a reason that we don’t know, yet we know that was his plan on putting us together. Hope I could win this book and I could share iy with my friends so we can read together on our bible study.
I am enjoyind your book “A confident Heart”, this book has been following me as I believe was God telling me to read. So finally I got it and I am enjoying very much, thank you.
I want to win 🙂
I am very intrested in this book I dont want to give Satan any stronghold in my life and he has been using so I am excited about being set free!!
I recently, over this past year, met a man, got married, separated, and filed for divorce. I never did follow through with the divorce and we have reconciled, and I am now realizing how my past, and not being forgiving (and also needing healing with deep scars left by that past) has effected my relationship with my husband. I have struggled for years with relationships, always settling for less, trying to make up for my father never being there for me because his alcohol was more important. Trying to find someone to build me up, because when I was growing up I was always being torn down by people verbally. I have been sexually abused by a relative for years, as long as I could remember, finally ending when I was a tween. I was told it was “okay”, it was “our secret”. I have had relationships involving verbal, emotional, and physical abuse, always thinking “this is the one”. I have felt for a few years that I have forgiven them all, but know SOMETHING is not right. I want to know how to COMPLETELY let go and let God, to find what that SOMETHING is that is missing in my process of forgiving people in my past.
Thank you so very much for your transparency and sharing your heart along with your own struggles. God is so good. I too lost my father at a young age and felt much pain and abandonment from foster care, adoption, then loss and abuse. I know God still has much to help me forgive and heal through. I am always so encouraged through your posts. I thank God for you. I would truly LOVE to win a copy of Susan’s book. I have commited to simplicity this year and no new purchases to help us get where God wants us financially this year in obedience. Winning one would be awesome as I do not know if the library will have a copy. Thank you for the opportunity. Be abundantly blessed!
Not sure I wanted to read this, it brought up a past I have tried to hide and forget. I have never told anyone what happen to me and really I didn’t know till I was older and realized what things were all about. I still can’t seem to put it in writing yet or even talk about it so please just pray that one day I will be able to forgive and forget.
I can’t wait to read part 2 of A Confident Heart, The Unburdened Heart. Renee, you are the one who taught me forgiveness is so much more than voicing forgiveness. It’s living with acceptance and in order to accept our past, we have to unpack the baggage, try everything back on tossing what we don’t need and realizing there are pieces that are still useful for our today life. Putting words to my past, feeling emotions I packed away a long time ago has been hard and painful and worth it!
I can’t wait to read ACH for a third time with you next month and I can’t wait to add this book as a companion.
xoxo Lisa
I have been through many things that I have had to forgive including a mother who was abusive and an unfaithful husband. At this time I am struggling to forgive my best friend who killed herself last year. I just keep thinking if she had only called me I would have ran to her side. I would love to win this book to help me.
Thank you for sharing this…..needed to read it and would love to read this book.
Forgiveness is crucial. It was only when I forgave my parents for their abuse was I able to be healed. Forgiveness is not absolution. When we forgive our abusers, they still have to answer to God. We just don’t carry the excess baggage around with us. I don’t want to have my parents taking up space in my mind. Have a blessed day. HM at HVC dot RR dot COM
I keep thinking I have forgiven, but I get angry and resentful with a few people I k owning struggle to forgive. 70×7….think I’ve reached that and still working on it. 🙂
I deal with this issue also.I wold love to win this book.
This season for Lent I am gviing up my “rights” to what I want my husband to do, say or act like. It is a struggle some days more than others. I felt the leading of the Lord in this as I have never given up anything for Lent before. I felt freedom almost instantly but it is still a battle. I know that God will want me to continue on this journey and I think this book might be a part of that.
Thanks you!
Oh I need this book! My entire life has been one betrayal, rejection, abuse after another. I have come to a place of forgivness for my ex-husbands unfaithfulness but continue to have bitterness in my heart for my mothers life long abuse, verbal, physical and emotional. I pray for her daily, haven’t spoken to her in 2 years but she continues to write hateful, hurtful letters. I believe this book would help me find lasting forgivness. God bless all of you at PS 31!!
I’m living in the midst of a struggle that keeps leading me to question, “where do unforgiveness and apathy intersect?” “Is apathy just another word for unforgiveness?” “Will my apathy keep me from God’s promises rgarding honoring my parents ~ specifically my mother?”
I’m a hot mess; living with an unburdened heart seems light years away right now. I’d love the insight offered in this book. Thanks for the opportunity.
I want to thank the Lord for a recent experience. I had a rough time in Jr High with a certain teacher. I understood he did me wrong but thought I had moved past that it had been so long. This past week while trying to shuffle through old papers and collections of stuff I ran across this paper. I took it right to the shredder so it could not be brought up again. To my surprise I felt so free that the paper was gone and could never be held against me. I was surprise because I thought I had forgiven him and moved on. With this experience I wondered how many other things may be harbored somewhere in my heart that needed cleaning out. “The Heart is deceitful above all, who can know it” God knows just what we need and when. Thank you for letting me share this. I think it would be awesome to study Susie’s new book!
I’m following on a path of “next steps”. God has graciously lead me from here to there and onward by affirming for me when I’m on the right path – something I’m very grateful for because I am a wandering wonderer at times. I opened your email about this book and your forward story caught my heart for God. I’d like to win this book in order to read it as an affirmed next step, but whether I win it or not, I’ll be reading it. Thank you for your openness and thank you for the chance to win.
A year ago, I was at the lowest point of my life. I was desparate. God has used your words to make changes
In my heart and start the process of forgiving. I still struggle but my relationship with Christ
Has evolved in a beautiful way. If I were to win a copy of this book, I would share with a friend
Just as you have shared with me. I now can see how God can use terrible events to bring hope to others.
I distinctly remember ‘getting it’ as I felt God’s presence and realizing how God has forgiven me.Amazing Love!
This book sounds like it would be an awesome tool to bring forgiveness to ourselves for the things we blame ourselves for and also to help bring forgiveness in our hearts to those who have hurt us. I would love to have a copy of this book for myself and one for my friend who is really struggling with forgiving herself and others from her past that have seriously damaged her self worth. Please send me two copies so that we can get to work on forgiveness. We want to deepen our relationship with the mighty King!
I SO need this right now! Dealing with trying to forgive a couple friends who have really hurt me lately. This is VERY timely! Hope I can win and get started on forgiving!! Thank you and God Bless! Julie 🙂
Proverbs 3:5-6
I have recently been introduced to “The Cleansing Stream” class and information which is about digging up those past hurts and how to deal with them to release them to God. Sounds like this book goes along those same lines. I think this book would make me a better teacher in the CS class just by being able to incorporate it’s ideas along with those I already am aware of. Each of us has so much garbage within us, sometimes that we aren’t even aware of because we’ve pushed it down so far and don’t want to deal with it. Well, ladies, time to dig it out, deal with it, let go and let God handle it.
Forgiveness is something that can take years. Patience and hardwork are needed. Sometimes when we think we have forgiven we really are not quite there and a new circumstance can bring back old hurts. I would love to get a new perspective on forgiveness.
I would love to win a copy of the book, since it sounds like a message I definitely need to read, process and put into practice with a personal situation of my own. Thanks for offering to share this with others!
Hi Renee.
I would love to win this book because I feel I have areas in my life that I need to forgive that I thought I was already over (losing my mom, sister, illness and dad not being there as I was growing up). Blessings
I believe this book is going to be a saving grace for my future. I have some life changing events about to happen and I know I’m going to have to forgive some people for things said and done and I’m not real good at forgiving.
Thanks,
This sounds like a wonderful book written from someone who has been there and can encourage others. I’ve read many books on forgiveness but I think this one might be one I might be able to relate to. I believe I’ve forgiven my brothers and their wives for their treatment of me but at times I wonder if I’ve truly forgiven. I think the world’s view of forgiveness and God’s view of forgiveness are very different and at times it gets confusing. This is a book I may share with others.
This past year just accept Jesus Christ as my Savior. It’s been amazing and I’ve forgive others but I don’t think I’ve forgiven myself for the mistakes that I made but it’s getting so much easier to let go but I would love this book…
The person I love the most and am closest to has hurt me deeply and I’m struggling to let go of the anger and let God control my situation. This book would be an asset on my journey to forgiveness and healing.
So many times I find myself replaying the old critisisms and putdowns from my past in my head. This almost always ends up with my self-esteem going into the toilet and then I end up sad and upset, sometimes for several days. I also tend to be so hard on myself during these times that my work and other relationships are colored with my sefl-doubts. Perhaps I need to seek God to help me to walk in forgiveness of others and myself so that the old hurts no longer affect me. Sounds like this book would be a great help in this area of my life. Thanks for sharing your thoughts on this book and how it will be helpful.