Freedom to Forgive

Forgiving Forward: Experience the Freedom of the Gospel Through the Power of Forgiveness 

Forgiving Forward Website 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Hi, and welcome to The Table podcast where we discuss issues of God and culture to show the relevance of theology to everyday life. I'm Milyce Pipkin, and I'm a communications associate with the Hendricks Center on the campus of Dallas Theological Seminary. And I'm joined here by my executive director for Christian Leadership at the center. Bill Hendricks. Thank you so much. I'm so glad to be co-hosting this with you, Bill, and today- 

Bill Hendricks: 

I am too. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Yeah, our topic is so interesting. It's on the freedom to forgive. 

Bill Hendricks: 

You have to talk about everyday life. Everybody's got somebody they need to forgive, right? 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Absolutely. 

Bill Hendricks: 

At least I think so. And we've got two people here with us who are absolutely key to helping us understand this. Bruce and Toni Hebel who have a ministry called Regenerating Life Ministries, and they've been doing this for gosh 30, 40 years, trying to help Christians and church leaders and churches practice this whole discipline, I'll call it a discipline, spiritual discipline of forgiveness. The Hebels live south of Atlanta. They have three adult children. Bruce is a graduate of Dallas Seminary- 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Yay! 

Bill Hendricks: 

… both at the THM level and a doctoral level. And is also adjunct professor at Carver Bible College. And Toni has a whole speaking ministry in her own right and working with women to let them hear what you like to call your latest God story. 

Toni Hebel: 

Yes. 

Bill Hendricks: 

We may hear some of those today, Toni. 

Toni Hebel: 

Yes. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Awesome. 

Bill Hendricks: 

But I want to thank you all for being with us. And as I say, this is a most serious and important topic. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

It truly is. And for me, it actually is a very personal topic because we all have struggled at one point or another to forgive something, even if we didn't know we needed to forgive it. 

Toni Hebel: 

Absolutely. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Forgive ourselves sometimes for things. And most importantly, as you all have spoken into, is how to do that as a leader and how important it is for leaders to understand that in order to be a Christian leader, you have to forgive because you can't minister from a place of unforgiveness. So, Bruce, dive right in. 

Bruce Hebel: 

You really can't. You really can't. God expects forgiven people to forgive others so much so he connects his unforgiveness with ours. And if we're not truly forgiving and living a lifestyle of forgiveness, then we are not actually able to share the gospel well. Because the gospel is simply that those who have been forgiven by God, God expects that they extend that forgiveness horizontally. So if we've received the vertical forgiveness of God, the clear expectation from God is that we take it to people who've wounded us. And unless we do that, we're actually living counter to who God… to the gospel itself. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

I love it a lot. Toni, can you just also chime in? 

Toni Hebel: 

Sure. Well, we experienced that firsthand pastoring the church with a lot of unforgiveness, but we didn't know it. And it was through a lot of pain, we've been through just horrific things in ministry, and it was through a lot of pain getting to the end of ourselves that God revealed this message to us and we applied it and it set us free. I was extremely depressed and heading in a very, very bad direction, and God stepped in and shared the importance of forgiveness, how to forgive. We walked through it and it just completely changed my life forever, never to go back there again. 

Bill Hendricks: 

So, Toni, let me jump in here. This is a suspicion on my part, but I am deducing from what you just said that you're sort of tacitly admitting by nature you're sort of natural self you, and maybe Bruce too, I don't know, you're not really that a forgiving person. Some people would go, "Well, this whole forgiveness thing…" I mean some people just have a personality that they let things go, but other people not so much. 

Toni Hebel: 

I wouldn't say that, but I would say I did not understand how to forgive. So when I forgave, I would just say those words, "I forgive Bob," or whoever, you know? 

Bill Hendricks: 

Right. 

Toni Hebel: 

And yet I was still what we would call in torment. I was suffering great depression, anxiety, panic attacks, fear. Those were the ways torment showed up in my life. But when God revealed to me and to us that he wanted us to forgive from our heart, where we were wounded to forgive the specific wounds, and it was a choice and not a feeling. Then when I would say, "I choose to forgive Bob from my heart for…" And list the ways he wounded me, getting as deep as possible. Even the words he spoke, the way he made me feel, all of those things. Then immediately the torment left. 

I know this sounds radical, but I was no longer depressed, instantaneously. I threw all my meds that I was on down the toilet and I was set free. And no longer did I have to go to church on a Sunday morning with the pretty church lady face on and play the game, and then at home during the week, stay in bed all week. So forgiveness, the gospel of the sacrifice of God through Jesus Christ is powerful and we don't tap into it. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

And with that in mind, can we get to a definition quickly? 

Bruce Hebel: 

Sure. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Because, I mean, we all have our ideas of what this looks like when we say- 

Bill Hendricks: 

Forgiveness. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

… forgiveness. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Yeah. And for 30 years, I'm pastoring a church thinking I understand forgiveness. And as we talked off camera, the enemy knows he can't teach us, can't convince a pastor or spiritual leader that forgiveness is a bad idea. So he so muddies it and dilutes it, that we salute it and don't do it. So, Bill, the ones you were saying, "Oh, I'm just a… I just let it go." Well, we're not letting it go. There's a wound somewhere that's festering and metastasizing into something very serious that eventually will get up with us. Because forgiveness isn't letting it go. Forgiveness is not just saying, "It's okay, doesn't matter." Forgiveness says what happened mattered. 

Toni Hebel: 

It was wrong. 

Bruce Hebel: 

It's not okay. 

Toni Hebel: 

Mm-hmm. 

Bill Hendricks: 

And to say it's not okay, you're not saying I'm a bad person, I have a character issue because I'm saying that's not okay. 

Bruce Hebel: 

No, and you're not saying- 

Milyce Pipkin: 

You're saying that's a literal wound. 

Bruce Hebel: 

It's a literal wound. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Right. 

Bruce Hebel: 

I mean, if a guy walks up to me and I'm Downtown Atlanta and somebody stabs me, I don't go, "Well, I can't admit I had a wound because I don't want to be a bad person." No, someone just stabbed me. So we get wounded. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Yeah, you can. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

But it doesn't matter. It's in the past. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Yeah, it's a big… 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Its no big deal. Yeah, right. 

Bruce Hebel: 

That's the Monty Python thing. It's a flesh wound. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Yes. 

Bruce Hebel: 

The arm is laying on the ground, right? Forgiveness is simply applying the blood of Jesus as payment in full for every wound I ever have or will suffer. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Say that again. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Forgiveness is applying the blood of Jesus as payment in full for every wound I ever have or will suffer. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Ouch. I think I forgave, but then maybe I didn't when I hear that definition. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Well, maybe. Yeah. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

That's deep. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Because so many models, even in the church, of forgiveness, it's just putting it off, giving… "Okay, I'll let them off the hook." I used to teach that, "I let them off the hook." But we're not dealing with the payment for the wound. Who's collecting the cost on this? And so if I just say, "I'll forgive it," then just by extension I'm absorbing the debt. And while I may feel better about it, there's still a resentment there because there's an unsettled debt. 

Toni Hebel: 

Who pays? 

Bruce Hebel: 

Who pays? 

Bill Hendricks: 

So there's a justice issue? 

Bruce Hebel: 

There's a big justice issue. So when we understand that Jesus died to pay for the sins of the world. 1 John 2:2 says, "He, Jesus, is the full satisfaction for our sins. But not for ours only, but also the sins of the whole world." That means people don't go to hell because they've not been forgiven, they go to hell because they've not repented to receive the benefit of the forgiveness. Because every sin ever committed by anybody anywhere on the planet, past, present, future was paid for by Jesus on the cross. It's finished. So the payment was settled on the cross. So when we don't forgive, we're saying the blood of Jesus isn't enough to satisfy me. And we're dishonoring the very sacrifice that paid for our sins by not applying it to their sins, the ones that wounded us. 

Toni Hebel: 

Jesus paid for their sins. 

Bruce Hebel: 

And God takes that really seriously. In fact, in Matthew 18, we won't break it down, we did this on a previous podcast and it's in our books and materials, but in Matthew 18, when Peter asked Jesus, "How many times do I forgive my brother when he sins against me?" He's thinking seven times is a big deal. But Jesus says 490 times, which is unlimited, right? 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Yeah, exactly. Yes. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Because you get to the 460s and you're still counting, you've probably not been forgiven. And then he tells this parable about a ruler who came to collect debts from servants who owed him money. And the first one owed him 10,000 talents. And he said, "Please forgive me." He didn't ask for forgiveness. He says, 'Give me time. I'll pay it back." But the ruler forgave him the debt. And what we don't understand is how insurmountable of a debt that was. 

A talent was worth 60 maneh, and a maneh was three months wages. So one talent is 15 years wages. And 10,000 talents is 150,000 years worth of wages, and nobody I know has 150,000 in year mortgage on their house, right? No one's living that long, a 7.5 billion at today's dollar. And then he wouldn't forgive a minor debt, a hundred days debt from a fellow servant. And then it says Jesus says that the Father… Let me back up and say the ruler summoned the guy and said, "You wicked slave. I forgave you that debt because you asked for mercy. Should you not have also had mercy on your fellow debt the same way I had mercy on you, right?" 

Toni Hebel: 

Your fellow slave, right? 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Fellow slave. 

Bruce Hebel: 

You fellow slave. Which is a legitimate question. Then the text says, "And the ruler handed him over to the torturers until he should repay what he owed." Well, what did he owe at that point? He didn't owe the money. Because if you forgive a debt, you legally cannot reclaim that debt. What did he owe? He owed mercy to the next guy, or what we call forgiving forward. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Okay. That's good. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Right? And then Jesus says, "My Heavenly Father will do the same to you if each of you doesn't forgive your brother from your heart the same way." 

Toni Hebel: 

That was a shocking thing for me because that is… Right then he left the parable. And when I read a parable, it's like, "Oh, we'll learn a good principle, blah, blah, apply it to my life." But that last verse in Matthew 18, he is not talking a pretend story anymore. He goes back to answering Peter's question. Yeah. 

Bruce Hebel: 

And the torturer in that day was a man who was assigned to the jail, who was skilled at exacting the greatest amount of pain for the longest amount of time without someone passing out and dying. That's horrific discipline. And so when Jesus says, "My Father's going to allow that to happen to you…" And notice in the story the ruler didn't torture him. He gave authority for it to happen. And that word torturer is translated 18 times in the New Testament. It's used 18 times. Of the other 17 times, maybe there's one exception, but every other time is used in connection with hell or demonic activity. So what Jesus is literally saying is the Father hands us over to tormentors, demonic forces to torment us as a discipline for not forgiving. And it's not because we've been wounded, it's because we haven't forgiven it. Because our unforgiveness dishonors the blood of Jesus. 

Toni Hebel: 

Yeah. So when God revealed that to us, as hard as that is to hear a lift came in my spirit. I was lifted because now I had to answer, "Oh, that's why I'm feeling this way. That's why I'm tormented. That's why you're tormented." We both recognized that. And so we forgave and immediately we were set free, the torment was gone. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Now let me say something to you who are listening. If you're curious about more of, "Where does this come from? I've never heard this before." The Hebel's have written a book that's outstanding called Forgiving Forward, and the subtitle has Experience the Freedom of the Gospel Through the Power of Forgiveness. This is actually a second edition. 

Bruce Hebel: 

It is. 

Bill Hendricks: 

So with that, I guess I want to hear about the first edition and then why you put out a second edition. Was there, "But wait, there's more," kind of thing? 

Toni Hebel: 

Yeah. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Yeah. Well, the first edition we published in 2011, and we didn't know what we were doing to be honest. We've never written before, was never on my bucket list. Bruce Wilkinson kind of pushed me off the cliff and said, "You need to write this book. Leave the local church and do this thing." So we wrote the book. We hired a writing coach. And we gave what we knew and it became the framework for the ministry as we developed it. 

Bill Hendricks: 

ReGenerating. 

Bruce Hebel: 

ReGenerating, well… ReGenerating Life Ministries is a parent company. Forgiving Forward is kind of- 

Bill Hendricks: 

Forgiving Forward. 

Toni Hebel: 

Is what we normally… yeah. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Is what we normally go by. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Yeah, okay. 

Bruce Hebel: 

And that Forgiving Forward ministry, we developed a seminar, we developed a video series. And as we begin to teach this, as we begin to apply this, as we begin to coach people… Because we're training people how to coach as well, we've coached thousands of couples and individuals over the years on how to forgive couples in crisis. 

Toni Hebel: 

Actually, we coach them to forgive. They actually- 

Bruce Hebel: 

Coach them to forgive. We actually coach them- 

Toni Hebel: 

We walk them through it. 

Bruce Hebel: 

In one conversation, it's a long conversation, three, four hours sometimes. Our longest I think was nine, wasn't it? 

Toni Hebel: 

Mm-hmm. 

Bruce Hebel: 

But at the end of the conversation, they walk away free. 95% of the people we coach get free in one conversation, and the only ones who don't are the ones who don't do what we say to do. And it's not us, it's the scripture. It's biblical principles we're teaching. So as we've applied these things and we've practiced it, as we've utilized it, we've learned a lot over the years. In fact, the definition you asked about was not in the first edition because we didn't have it at that point. I'm at a seminar one day and someone in a break said, "Okay, Bruce, bottom line, define forgiveness?" And I went, "Forgiveness is applying the blood of Jesus as payment in full for every wound I ever have or will suffer." And then I said, "Toni, write that down." 

Toni Hebel: 

That came out of nowhere. 

Bruce Hebel: 

It came out of the Holy Spirit, I think. And the other thing we did in the book, in the first edition, we had stories and we weave stories through the book. We don't just give you theological data, which is there. I've done my exegetical work, but… 

Bill Hendricks: 

How does it look in real life? 

Toni Hebel: 

Yeah, exactly. 

Bruce Hebel: 

But does this work? What does it look like? And so we gave stories. And so in the second edition, at the end of each chapter we added what we call a forgiving fast-forward. So in a lot of the chapters, we're taking one of the stories from the first edition and we're giving you how are they doing- 

Toni Hebel: 

Today. 

Bruce Hebel: 

… 12, 13 years later? 

Toni Hebel: 

Did it last? 

Bruce Hebel: 

Was this a youth camp experience that three weeks later no one remembered or did this last? And then some of the other things are just new things that didn't fit the flow of the… 

Toni Hebel: 

A lot more practical. 

Bruce Hebel: 

And a lot more practical. 

Toni Hebel: 

We add about a hundred pages. 

Bruce Hebel: 

In the practical sections, we just upgraded that a lot because we'd learned a lot more. We rearranged the protocols from our original ones. Because we just kind of have a better feel for how it flows. 

Toni Hebel: 

Yeah. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

I could ask you about the rippling effect of what you've seen in the work that you've put in and watch people grow from their forgiveness into freedom. A tougher question is probably what was maybe one of the worst case scenarios that you have experienced in how you all were able to make an impact? 

Toni Hebel: 

We have had so many, you would not believe this world what their… We've heard everything, but we have one- 

Bruce Hebel: 

But the most recent- 

Toni Hebel: 

Most recent horrible one. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Most recent horrible one… Every time we think we've hit the worst, God goes, "Oh, no, let show you something else." 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Okay. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Last March, we were in Dallas area. A good friend of mine leads a bunch of four different groups of men he disciples, and he invited me to one of the groups. And my friend's name is Guy. So when I say Guy, it's not just a generic term. So Guy brings me into this 10 or 12 guys, and we're answering questions. I'm sharing the story and a lot of good interaction. Everyone is engaged except one guy named Steve, who the longer the conversation goes, the more he leans back into himself. And at the end, Guy looks at him and said, "Steve, what's wrong with you, man? You're never this quiet. What's going on?" And he goes, "I'm struggling." 

And he looked at me, he says, "You're telling me I have to honor my father," which is interesting. I really had not said that. It was a tagline. 

Bill Hendricks: 

The Holy Spirit was telling him. 

Bruce Hebel: 

It was kind of a tagline. 

Toni Hebel: 

Yeah, exactly. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Holy Spirit was calling. 

Bruce Hebel: 

I did say that, but it wasn't a focus. I said, "I don't think I said that, but I think you want to pay attention to the one who told you that." He said, "You don't understand. I hate my father. My mother shot my father when I was five." Now, Steve's 65 years old. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Wow. So 60 years is… 

Bruce Hebel: 

"My mom shot my dad. I've only been to his grave twice. I cursed him out the first time and I urinated him on him the second." I go- 

Bill Hendricks: 

That's a bitterness. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Man, that's some anger. Yeah, bitterness. 

Bruce Hebel: 

There's an issue. There's an issue. I said, "So Steve, you and I need to meet." So later in the week, we set up a time and I met with Steve for about three and a half hours. And the reason Steve's mom shot dad is because Steve's dad had taken Steve and his two older sisters and handed them over to a child pornography ring where all the atrocities of that world were being filmed done to them and seven or eight other kids. There are eight or nine kids involved. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Sorry to hear that. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Horrific stories he told me. And so when Mom hears about it, she grabs Steve, takes him over to where Dad is and says, "Play in the front yard with your Tonka toy," and goes in and shoots and kills Dad. This is in Amarillo, Texas. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

So in essence, he lost his mom and his dad because mom had to go to prison. 

Bruce Hebel: 

No. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

No? 

Toni Hebel: 

Actually she didn't. 

Bruce Hebel: 

No, because- 

Milyce Pipkin: 

The story better. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Well, in a way. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

In a way. 

Bill Hendricks: 

It gets worse. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Because the sheriff shows up. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Okay. 

Bruce Hebel: 

And Mom says, "I know the story. I know all the players in the story. I know what's going on. If you arrest me, I will talk." And the sheriff said, "Have a nice day, ma'am." And she left, never spoke about it. And Steve is left, at five, to deal with all of these things. And he's gone through all the counseling. He eventually came to faith. He went through all the 12-step programs, multiple counseling. He blew through one marriage is now about to blow through his second. Trying to follow God, but still just tormented by all that went on. 

Toni Hebel: 

Which was also evident in sexual activity and porn and drugs and all of this. 

Bruce Hebel: 

All of the addiction. Drug and sex, all of it. I mean, he was a mess. And all the people who'd worked with him said, "You'll never get over this. We're just going to help you manage." 

Bill Hendricks: 

And humanly speaking, you can see why. 

Bruce Hebel: 

That's what everyone believes. At the end of our conversation, I coached Steve to forgive his dad for the specific things… Because you don't forgive people, you forgive wounds. He forgave the things that his dad had done. He forgave his mom for not only shooting Dad, but other things that she had done and being silent and never talking about it. Forgave the leader of the group, forgave himself for many things. I know people say you don't forgive yourself. Well, you do. We wound ourselves and we forgive wounds. 

So he forgave himself and many others. And when he was done, I said, "Steve, how's your heart?" He said, "Unshackled." 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Awesome. 

Bruce Hebel: 

I said, "Describe the difference between you walked in and now." And he said, "You ever seen the movie Dances with Wolves?" I said, "Yeah." He said, "You remember the scenes where the buffaloes are roaming or running free on the prairie?" I said, "Yeah." He said, "For the first time in my life, my heart feels like it's free, running free on the prairie." 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Beautiful. 

Bruce Hebel: 

I texted him two or three days later, I said, "So, Steve, how's life on the prairie?" And he said, "I'm doing awesome. My wife cannot believe the difference. We're doing great." Fast-forward from March to December, my friend, Guy, has all of his groups together for a lunch and he brings me in to interview me. Then we bring Steve up and interview Steve, and he said, "The way you know something is true gospel-" 

Toni Hebel: 

Steve said this, right? 

Bruce Hebel: 

Steve said this, "… is it lasts. I've tried everything in my life and nothing helped. I am free. This works." 

Milyce Pipkin: 

You And Toni gave him heart hope through Jesus. That's awesome. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Well, it's simply applying the blood of Jesus. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Yeah. 

Bill Hendricks: 

I was going to say, just to clarify, when Steve says, "I forgive, I'm applying the blood of Jesus Christ as payment in full for every wound, my dad or anybody else inflicted on me or that I will suffer." 

Bruce Hebel: 

Yeah. There's seven simple protocols and I coached him through those protocols. And the fourth protocol, which is actually the forgiveness protocol, ends when you… When you finish forgiving a person for what they did, all the wounds and the Holy Spirit opens up oftentimes will reveal things that they haven't thought about in years in our conversations. And when you forgive those and it's all done, you seal it by saying, "I declare this person is no longer in my debt. I transfer their debt to the cross where Jesus paid it all." And forgiveness isn't a process, it is a trans–action. You want to pick up on that? 

Toni Hebel: 

Yeah. So we do a lot of work with people groups as well. And we were in Israel working with the leaders of Arabs and Jews. And you explain that whole idea about it's not a process- 

Bruce Hebel: 

They're all churches. They're Christian leaders, 

Toni Hebel: 

Christian leaders. There's a hundred of them. When we began the three-day retreat at the Dead Sea, which is the only place they can come together… They were separated. When we were ending our three days, they were like this. And one Jewish pastor watch help another Arab leader who had actually worked for Yasser Arafat, he was his right-hand hit man, killed more Jews and he knew, get free, and instantaneously they were set free. There wasn't a process of freedom. It's just as soon as you forgive, you're set free. 

In that time in Israel, we ran into a lady, 76-year-old woman whose name is Marika, and she said, "I need to tell you my forgiveness story." I said, "Sure." She said, "Well, actually, 18 months prior, I was getting on a bus in Israel," that's how they get around, "and these two Arab men got on the bus and one jumped on me and began stabbing me. Stabbed me five times. The other one started shooting. And the windows were shot out, the door next to me, I was in the middle, was shot out, and I was bleeding everywhere. He went to somebody else. And I asked the Lord, 'Should I stay here and pretend like I'm dead or should I try and escape?'" And she decided what could it hurt? So she escaped. 

She got off the bus and immediately she called out to the Lord and she said, "Please help me. Help me. Send someone to help me." She's bleeding everywhere. And she said, her words were, "I clearly heard the Spirit say to my spirit, 'I will not help you until you forgive the man that just tried to kill you.'" She went, "Whoa." And she says, "Immediately I knew in my spirit that this was a choice. It wasn't going to be a process. I needed to forgive him. It was my choice and I needed to do it right now, even though I didn't feel like it." 

So she said, "Out loud I said, 'Lord, I choose to forgive this man that just tried to kill me.'" And she said, "As soon as I said those words, a car drove up," a Mercedes, right next to her with a Jewish man in it. "He jumped out, he took off his shirt, he wrapped my arm, which was bleeding the worst. He put me in his car, took me to the hospital, got me on a gurney. I turned my head to say thank you to him. I know this is crazy, but there was no one there." And she said, "I healed faster than anybody else. Many people died in that attack and now I'm here to proclaim the power of forgiveness." And it was just beautiful to meet her. 

Bill Hendricks: 

I'll bet. 

Toni Hebel: 

So it's not a process, it's an immediate transaction. 

Bruce Hebel: 

It is a transaction. We're applying the blood of Jesus as payment in full. We're receiving the payment that Jesus paid as enough for what they did to me. 

Toni Hebel: 

And it's a one-time deal. When I forgive whoever, or anybody we coach to forgive, the wounds of the people that have wounded them, they never have to talk about it again, bring it up again, mull about it. It's under the blood, it's done. The only things we continue to forgive are the new wounds that take place or things that maybe we hadn't forgiven that day that hadn't been dealt with yet. But just like Jesus said, "It is finished." That's what we say, "It is finished." One time is enough. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Now, as I see in the book, you make a distinction between the forgiveness and reconciliation. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Yeah. 

Toni Hebel: 

Mm-hmm. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Talk about that a little bit. Because a lot of people are like, "Well, I have forgive, but I can't…" 

Milyce Pipkin: 

I'm not being reconciled. 

Bill Hendricks: 

"There's no way I can be… 

Milyce Pipkin: 

… that person. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Well, forgiveness and reconciliation are not the same thing. 

Toni Hebel: 

They are not. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Reconciliation is two alienated parties coming back into harmony. All right? So in this case, you've got a wounded party and a wounding party. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Mm-hmm. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Well, wounding party needs to repent. The wounded party needs to forgive. Our job, if we've been wounded, is to forgive. And it doesn't say what they did was okay. It says, "Jesus paid for it." In the same way, if you get in an accident, you get out and someone shows you an insurance card, you never have to have… It's okay. It's okay. There's a greater entity that's covered this. So whatever they did, it wasn't okay, but Jesus paid for it. And we come to the table, what we call the table of reconciliation. 

It's got five seats at it. It's the Father's table. You have the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit already sitting there. They're inviting us to the table. And so we bring forgiveness. What they did was wrong, but Jesus paid for it. The one who's done the wounding, they bring repentance, which is not changing your behavior, it's changing your mind. Metanoia, to change your mind. So what I did was wrong. I used to think it was okay. Or I used to maybe not even think about it, but now I know it was wrong. What can I do to make it right? At which time the person already sitting at the table says, "Thank you very much, but Jesus already paid for it." 

Toni Hebel: 

So when we're talking to people about the subject of reconciliation, we will encourage them, once they have forgiven, to not go to the person who wounded them and say, "I forgave you." That's kind of counter for what we've been raised with. But the reason we say that is because if they have not repented, they will move further away from the table. Their pride, their ego will get involved and they'll say, "Forgive me for what?" And we'll get wounded again because they don't acknowledge it, don't recognize that what they've done. So we say, "Come to the table. You are free. Our freedom is not dependent upon the person repenting at all. We are free because we have forgiven. That's all we're responsible for." 

Bruce Hebel: 

We've aligned ourselves up with the gospel. 

Toni Hebel: 

Yes. So we sit at the table, free, and we just wait on the Holy Spirit to bring conviction to them to bring them to the table. We have story, after story, after story, my God's stories- 

Bill Hendricks: 

That's right. 

Toni Hebel: 

… of how people, without this person saying a word, have been convicted and come to them and reconciliation takes place, without them saying a word. One example was I met with a lady in Atlanta who her father, a 75-year-old retired pastor, prominent pastor in Atlanta, had preached about the love of Jesus on Sundays, but during the week did horrible things to her. She was raised with a very skewed mind of who God the Father was. She forgave her father for all of these things. She's 50. And I told her, I said, "Now don't go tell your dad you've forgiven him. You just trust the Holy Spirit to move in his heart-" 

Bruce Hebel: 

And honor him. 

Toni Hebel: 

"… and honor him. Your freedom is not dependent on his behavior." So, okay, she went home. It was a Monday. Why I remember that, I don't know, but I do. It was a Monday. On Thursday her father called her and said, "Mary…" And she gives us permission. By the way, when we share stories, we've received permission to share them. "Mary, please come to my house. I need you to see you," and he was crying. So she drove over there quickly thinking he was sick. She went into the living room, he's sitting in his recliner and he said, "I need to talk to you about something. I need to ask you to please forgive me," and he started listing all the things he had done to her as a child. 

And she starts to cry in relief and says, "Dad, why are you just now telling me this? It's been a long time, Dad." And he said, "I was convicted." "What do you mean you were convicted?" "On Monday, I was sitting in this recliner watching the news, and all of a sudden I was so riddled with guilt about what I had done. God revealed to me, brought to my remembrance how I treated you, what I did. And I knew I needed to make it right as soon as possible." And she said, "Dad, I'm curious what time on Monday?" He said, "I don't know. It was close to noon, 11:30, something like that." And she said, "Dad, I had just finished forgiving you at 11:30 on Monday." And that story has been repeated countless times. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Yeah. Yeah. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Well, it sounds to me like you guys are going to need to write a sequel to Forgiving Forward called Repenting for Release or something like that. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Yeah, yeah. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

That's a good word. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Yeah, that's a good idea. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Because you've got one side here, you've got to forgive. And I'm like, "Okay, what about over here?" 

Toni Hebel: 

You are absolutely right. You are absolutely right. 

Bruce Hebel: 

I think that's in the back of our mind. 

Toni Hebel: 

We've been asked that before. 

Bill Hendricks: 

So when you do that, we'll have you back on The Table. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Yeah, there's a marriage book coming out of this. Toni has a great book on expectations that it needs to be written. So yeah, we've got some… I guess we're finding out where authors. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

I love that you're reminding us that forgiveness is not predicated upon someone asking to be forgiven. 

Toni Hebel: 

Not at all. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

It's not predicated upon your expectation that they're going to forgive or turn, repent. And that's just important I think for us to realize. 

Bruce Hebel: 

In Ephesians 1, it says that before the foundation of the world, God decided to forgive us. And then 2000 years ago, before we were born, he enacted the payment to pay for our forgiveness. So we talk a lot about pre-forgiveness. In fact, the seventh protocol is make pre-forgiveness a lifestyle. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

And I don't want you guys to give it all away, but we got to say before the end of the podcast, you've got to tell us, the main thing is the definition and how we see that we have to forgive because of the blood of Jesus Christ and the fact that he died for us. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Uh-huh. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

But at the end of the day, you guys are kind of experts on what you do. 

Bruce Hebel: 

How? 

Milyce Pipkin: 

So we got to ask you, what is it that you're doing to walk people through this? 

Toni Hebel: 

Oh, the protocols. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Yeah. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Because as you're saying, it's not a process. So I know it's the protocols, but what can you tell us? 

Toni Hebel: 

Well, the protocols came… Literally God downloaded those to us. There's a whole story. And they're all based on Scripture, but we believe… And it's not like steps, like, "If you do it this way…" We're not into steps. 

Bruce Hebel: 

We call them protocols because a protocol is how things are to operate in an official capacity. If we were invited to the inauguration or a state dinner at the White House, someone from the Office of Protocol would tell you how you're supposed to act and what you're supposed to do. These are simply things that if these are in place, God in heaven says, "Yep, they have forgiven." And they're very simple and they're very, very clear. 

Toni Hebel: 

Yeah, God just gave us the practical. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Yeah. 

Toni Hebel: 

And so when we're meeting with a person, I know it sounds kind of crazy, we will ask them to keep their eyes closed. Because this is a prayer between them and God. And we can pray with our eyes open, but we need to get to our heart. And if our eyes are open, we're distracted and we're really staying in our head. Our goal is to leave the head. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Closing your eyes is kind of like saying, "Okay, Bill, you I need to have a private conversation, can we step into another room?" 

Bill Hendricks: 

Gotcha. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Right? It's you setting yourself in a private conversation- 

Bill Hendricks: 

With God. 

Bruce Hebel: 

… with God and one other person who's helping you. 

Toni Hebel: 

Right. which is powerful because if we confess our sins to one another, we are healed. And so- 

Bruce Hebel: 

Doing it with someone. 

Toni Hebel: 

… forgiving with someone listening is more powerful than not because intentional about what we say and we're held accountable. 

Bruce Hebel: 

And the other person can actually pull things out of you- 

Toni Hebel: 

Right, see things. 

Bruce Hebel: 

… deeper than you will yourself. 

Toni Hebel: 

So that's why we train coaches. So we start with number one is thank God for forgiving you. Spend some time in getting that attitude of gratitude that says, "Lord, I am so grateful for shedding your blood for your sacrifice, for covering me with your blood and offer me forgiveness." I coached somebody yesterday as they were praying that they just wept and said, "I am so sorry that I've received your forgiveness, and yet I've been so ungrateful. And so I just didn't give it the power that… the place in my life because I haven't been forgiving other people. I haven't really…" "I've taken it for granted," was her words. 

That was number one. Number two, once our hearts are in that posture of gratitude and recognizing our own sin, then we deal with a specific sin, which is unforgiveness. We confess that, we repent of that because unforgiveness is not just a bad idea, we believe it's the most harshly disciplined sin that we can commit. So we ask them to make that right before God, so they deal with that. 

Bruce Hebel: 

I repent of my sin of unforgiveness of dishonoring your blood by expecting more than that for what they did. And we often ask that question, if people are unwilling to forgive, I said, "Besides the blood of Jesus, exactly what would satisfy you? If the blood of Jesus isn't enough, exactly what would be?" 

Milyce Pipkin: 

That's good. 

Toni Hebel: 

Yeah. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

That's good. 

Bruce Hebel: 

And so we repent of our sin of unforgiveness. The protocol number three is ask God, "Who do I need to forgive? And for what?" And again, we're not forgiving people. We're forgiving wounds. Jesus said, "Father, forgive them. They know not what they do." Stephen said, "Don't hold these things against them," as they were… the last rock that was taking his life was about to hit him. So it's how are we wounded? God forgives sins. We forgive wounds that his blood has covered. And so how do we know where the root wounds are? 

Toni Hebel: 

And there are root wounds. There are things that have happened way back that really shape us for the rest of our lives. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Mm-hmm. I bet. 

Bruce Hebel: 

What's been interesting, that every single couple that we have coached to freedom- 

Toni Hebel: 

We've kept the stats on this. 

Bruce Hebel: 

… couples on the way of divorce, some people already divorced, I mean major issues. And they think it's the current issue. It's not the current issue. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Yeah. No. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

It's not a blowout. It was a slow leak. 

Toni Hebel: 

Exactly. 

Bruce Hebel: 

100% of the time, the wounds that's driving the torment or causing the torment, that's driving the conflict in the relationship predate the couple meeting, happened before they met. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Wow. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Yeah. Back from childhood. 

Toni Hebel: 

A hundred percent of the time. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

That's good. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Yeah. And so oftentimes when we're coaching couples, when it's all said and done, the spouse goes, "I never knew anything about that." And so the Holy Spirit will bring up things that they've buried and hadn't done. So you ask the Holy Spirit, he's really good at his job. And so you just ask him, "Who do I forgive? And for what?" 

Toni Hebel: 

Yeah. And the way I say it is, "Lord, would you please bring a name or a face to this person right now, to their mind or their heart, of who you want them to forgive?" And then I let silence speak. I just wait. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

That's good. 

Toni Hebel: 

And boy, it's so funny because we'll have already taken their history and more times than not, they'll go, "Oh, I haven't thought about that person in…" It is like nobody we even talked about… That even happened yesterday. So once we have a name, we go in faith. Okay, we're going to believe the Holy Spirit brought that name to you. So then we take into what we call the forgiveness protocol. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Let me just stop you right there because I want to remind you if you're tuning into The Table podcast, we're on the table right now. Bill, along with me, and we're talking with Toni and Bruce Hebel, and we're talking about the freedom to forgive. And they're actually walking us through as coaches. Some of those not steps necessarily- 

Bruce Hebel: 

Protocols. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

… but what you call is protocols. 

Toni Hebel: 

Yes. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

And we're on number? 

Toni Hebel: 

Four. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Four. 

Toni Hebel: 

Of five. We'll just do the five, I suppose. That's the main one. 

Bruce Hebel: 

No, we'll do all three. 

Toni Hebel: 

You do all them? Okay. All right. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Might as well. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

It's just a few minutes left. 

Toni Hebel: 

You can do six and seven. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Okay. 

Toni Hebel: 

So number four is we say these words and we use them from Matthew 18, "From my heart, Lord, from my heart I choose," that choice thing, "to forgive this person for these things." And we list the way they wounded us. It may start out with something from the head for being an alcoholic. Then it may start getting deeper for embarrassing me in front of my friends. I could never bring my friends home because I didn't know what my dad was going to do. This is not true of my father, but this is an example. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Right. 

Toni Hebel: 

And the- 

Bruce Hebel: 

And we always pick on dads. I don't know why. 

Toni Hebel: 

Yeah, we always pick on dads. 

Bruce Hebel: 

They're safer. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

The biggest targets. No, just kidding. 

Toni Hebel: 

And then we'll go even deeper, for making me feel like I was not valued, known. No matter what I did, I wasn't good enough. I could never measure up. Or even words, "I forgive my dad for saying…" 

Milyce Pipkin: 

You're worthless. 

Toni Hebel: 

"… you're worthless. You'll never measure up. I wish I was dead. I wish I wasn't your father." I mean, we've heard some really pretty bad things. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Yeah. 

Toni Hebel: 

And we go to the heart, stay in that heart till there's no more things coming to their mind. If there's nothing else coming, then we will end number four by saying, "I declare my dad is no longer in my debt. I transfer all of his sin to the cross where Jesus paid it all." And then there's this- 

Bruce Hebel: 

That's where we're signing the contract, that's where where we're due on the deed. 

Toni Hebel: 

And then we seal that forgiveness with number five, which is asking God to bless them. And so this is when the tears will pour. This is when their heart of compassion will come out. This is when they'll see, "Oh, I know why he did it, because he's tormented. I see what happened to him in his life. That's why he acted this way towards me." And so they will say, "God, would you please bless my dad by…" and everything…. We encourage them to bless actually in some of the ways in which they were wounded. If my dad rejected me, we'll say, "God, would you please bless my dad by giving him friends that are loyal, that won't reject him, that love him and we'll support him and we'll let them spend some time for giving our blessings in all the ways that God gives them." 

Bruce Hebel: 

Yeah, because if you can't bless someone, you've not forgiven. See, in my journey when God was downloading this to me and confronting me after my years of torment and struggle, a particular pastor I'd worked for had wounded me. And I'd moved away from the initial Imprecatory Psalms. Right? "God, get them." We do that. To, "Okay, God, don't hurt him, but don't help him." 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Right. Right. Oh, okay, that's good. 

Bruce Hebel: 

And God told me clearly that that's a… 

Bill Hendricks: 

Well, that's not what God does. 

Toni Hebel: 

Yeah, right. 

Bruce Hebel: 

That's a passive form of vengeance. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Yeah, exactly. 

Bruce Hebel: 

It's the kindness of God that leads us to repent. 

Bill Hendricks: 

God causes that rain to fall on just and the unjust. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Just and then unjust, yes. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Do good to those who despitefully use you, bless and curse not. 

Bill Hendricks: 

As your Father does in heaven. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Yeah. 

Bruce Hebel: 

So if you're truly forgiven, then you will want good for them. And so very quickly, protocol number six and seven is how to deal with a memory. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Okay. 

Bruce Hebel: 

When the memory comes back, you're not bringing it up. God's not bringing it up, the enemy's bringing it up. So you can't forget it. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Rebuke it. 

Toni Hebel: 

Yeah. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Well, here's what you do, you say, "I specifically remember forgiving that." 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Okay. 

Toni Hebel: 

Out loud. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Out loud. And I was with Toni when it happened. I was with Bruce when… I was with so-and-so when it happened, and God, thank you for the freedom. Because every time when the blessing happens, we ask, "How's your heart?" "It's light. It's free. I can breathe again." There's a supernatural transaction in your heart of freedom. 

Toni Hebel: 

Or specific things. Because we haven't even talked about what the torment looks like and how that changes. We'll put that in later. 

Bruce Hebel: 

So there's freedom that happens. We'll get to that. And so thank you God for the freedom that I got when I forgave. Thank you that you set me free. Thank you that my depression lifted, or whatever. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Right. 

Bruce Hebel: 

And God, would you bless that person again? They must need a blessing. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Since it came to my mind. 

Bruce Hebel: 

If every time the enemy brings a memory to you, you turn it into praise and blessing, he'll eventually leave you alone. It's counterproductive. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Yeah, right. 

Bruce Hebel: 

But if he reminds you of something you haven't forgiven, go back to number four. You're right, I forgot all about that. I forgive. And then number seven is just make pre-forgiveness a lifestyle. Just say everything has already been paid for. That's our definition. Applying the blood of Jesus as payment in full for every wound I ever have or will suffer. Whatever happens, it's already been paid. 

Toni Hebel: 

So immediately forgiven. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

I love that y'all came up with seven protocols and seven is the number of completion. 

Toni Hebel: 

We didn't, but it works out that way. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Yeah. And we found something because that's how many of that came to us. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Well, I guess I want to applaud you for, as you put it off camera, off recording, you had been working with the little C, a little church, and then when the Lord sort of helped you forgive. You realized church leaders everywhere, churches everywhere need this and you began to work for the big C. And it is simply my observation that in churches, this whole thing of forgiveness, it kind of gets sent back to the individual and it's privatized like, "Well, you need to go deal with that. You need to go forgive." 

Bruce Hebel: 

But we're not equipping to do it. 

Bill Hendricks: 

We're not equipping to do it. And I was just going to point out in the very earliest form of the church, first 300 years, first of all, if you want to become a believer, if you want to follow Jesus, you had to go find a sponsor within the church who'd said, "Okay, I'll sponsor this person in." Because there's a lot of persecution. They can't just let anybody in. 

Toni Hebel: 

Oh, wow. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Yeah. And so then you'd go through about three years, sometimes four years of what we would call catechesis, which means they want to see is the Holy Spirit active in your life. And they would put you through a variety of exercises, it wasn't really doctrinally centered because they didn't have a lot of doctrine formulated. It was behavioral. It was habitual. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Do they see Christ in you? 

Bill Hendricks: 

And they would go through disciplines. And one of the disciplines was forgiveness. 

Toni Hebel: 

Wow. 

Bill Hendricks: 

And they'd actually work you through who do you need to forgive and so forth. 

Toni Hebel: 

Interesting. 

Bill Hendricks: 

And I'm thinking, "Why don't we do that today?" I mean… 

Bruce Hebel: 

Well, we have books on spiritual discipline, Dallas Willard, all the… None of them have forgiveness as a discipline. 

Bill Hendricks: 

No. It's a key discipline. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Absolutely. I think after salvation, it's the first. If you're helping someone, your job is to connect them with the forgiveness of God. Once they put their faith in Christ and they receive the forgiveness and they move from death to life, the very next thing they need to be taught is how to share that outward. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Exactly. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Because if you're not doing this, you can't share the… And if you've got a tormentor assigned to you, you can't even abide and walk by the Spirit. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Yeah. 1 John, "How can you love God you can't see-" 

Toni Hebel: 

Absolutely. 

Bill Hendricks: 

"… but here's your brother or sister, who you can see, but you don't forgive him. Then how are you loving God?" 

Bruce Hebel: 

And the first act of love is forgiveness. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Exactly. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Yeah. I just want to give you a chance to come back to you, Toni. 

Toni Hebel: 

Yes. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

We've only got a few minutes left. 

Toni Hebel: 

Okay. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

You mentioned something and Bruce said, "We'll come back to this," so I want to go back to it. You were talking about tormenting. 

Toni Hebel: 

Yes. Torment- 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Okay. Quickly. 

Toni Hebel: 

… so the way we see torment in our life is just there's some key things we notice in people. We've already mentioned depression, anxiety, panic attacks, fear, great fear. And I'm not talking about fear of seeing a snake, I'm talking about the fear that grips you. But we also see it in all the addictions. If someone has a sexual, drug or alcohol addiction, even- 

Bruce Hebel: 

Or food addiction. 

Toni Hebel: 

… food addiction, control, addiction, we know there's torment in their life. And once they forgive, they're set free of their addiction. We see it all the time. It lasts. That's why we did the forgiving fast-forward in the book, the stories of that. We also see it in paranoia. We see it in the outbursts of anger, controlling anger. That's a sign of torment. And then surprisingly, we see it in some physical issues. We are not saying that all physical ailments are a result of unforgiveness, not at all. But if the torment is there to torment in the physical realm- 

Bruce Hebel: 

To discipline. 

Toni Hebel: 

… to discipline, rather, and we forgive, then they are removed by the Holy… God says, "They're out of here." The Father says that, and they're healed. So examples of that quickly is a couple of months ago, one of our board members and his wife went to Zambia to do some ministry, take Forgiving Forward there. And the wife was coaching a lady there who was completely blind. And when she was praying, she was forgiving, and when she finished forgiving and she opened her eyes, she could see. That was one example. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Wow. 

Bruce Hebel: 

And they didn't pray for the sight to come back. 

Toni Hebel: 

No, it just happened. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Wow. 

Toni Hebel: 

I was working with a lady who her heart was operating at 20%. She had a defibrillator and a pacemaker. She was only 50 years old. She was on the Georgia transplant list. And after she forgave horrific things, she said, "Something just happened in my heart." And I'm thinking, "Spiritual heart. Oh, you can breathe again," that kind of thing. "No, my physical heart." She called me the next way week and she said that, "I just met with my cardiologist. He ran all the tests. He ran him a second time, and my heart is now operating at 90%. He doesn't understand what happened. I told him what happened." 

And that was like, now, I'm going to say around 11 years ago. I still keep up with her and she's still doing great. She was taking off the transplant list. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Yeah, and I want to circle back and clarify for people this concept of torment is not God being mean. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Right. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Mm-hmm. 

Bruce Hebel: 

This is God being loving. 

Toni Hebel: 

Yes. 

Bruce Hebel: 

This is God honoring his Son and not tolerating those of us who've been redeemed by him, dishonoring him. And so discipline from God is never punishment. It's always to bring us into alignment with his thinking, to line us up with how he views the situation. Discipline only lasts until it accomplishes its goal, which is aligning ourselves up with God. So if we forgive, there's no more need for the discipline. And God, the Father, himself tells the tormentor to leave. So it's all that. One of the other things we did in the new edition is I put more of a deeper dive exposition as the appendix on the Matthew 18 question, but it is real. And the freedom is as transactional as salvation. 

Toni Hebel: 

Yeah. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Powerful. 

Bruce Hebel: 

And we call it gospel-centric forgiveness. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Absolutely. 

Bruce Hebel: 

It's the power of gospel-centric forgiveness. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Well, our time is up. I wanted to give you a last comment, quickly. One last comment. 

Toni Hebel: 

If you have any questions, want any more information, we are here to assist you, come alongside you. You can find us at ForgivingForward.com and we would love to support you, whatever that looks like. We do have a center in Atlanta where we have coach people as well. 

Bruce Hebel: 

And we'd love to train the churches or whatever. Our passion is to see the body of Christ worldwide, experience the freedom of the gospel through the power of forgiveness. And out of that, our mission is to coach every pastor and church leader on how to coach their people to forgive and coach others to forgive. That's what we're called to do. And we believe if we can get the church to learn to forgive, we can't even imagine the transformative power of the church and the culture that will take place. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

All right. That is all the time we have. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Powerful. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Give it, Bill? You got something to say? 

Bill Hendricks: 

No, I was just saying that's powerful. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

That is powerful. That's all the time we have. 

Bruce Hebel: 

Thanks for inviting us. 

Toni Hebel: 

Yes, thank you so much. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Thank you, Bruce and Toni Hebel for coming on. And again, if you want more information, they have two editions to Forgiving Forward, and they're probably going to be working on something else really, really soon. We can see that in your future. Thank you for joining Bill and I here on The Table, and we hope that you'll leave us a rating or a review just so that we can continue to have people find us. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Absolutely. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Bill? 

Bill Hendricks: 

Yes. We invite you to come back, if you've benefited from this podcast, to the next time we do the table where we discuss issues of God and culture to show the relevance of theology to everyday life. I'm Bill Hendricks. This is Milyce Pipkin. Thank you for joining us today.