Voices In My Head Podcast Episode 332: Jennifer M. Greenberg - Not Forsaken: A Story of Life After A
In this episode of the Voices in My Head podcast, host Rick Lee James interviews author, musician, and abuse survivor Jennifer M. Greenberg about her memoir Not Forsaken: A Story of Life After Abuse. Greenberg recounts her 21‑year experience of psychological, physical, and sexual abuse by her church‑going father, her suicide attempts, and the deep depression that followed. She describes how a childhood encounter with God’s promise – “I will never leave you nor forsake you” – sparked a lifelong faith that sustained her through the darkest moments. Greenberg explains that her healing was intertwined with music; she released an album, Symbiotic, alongside the book, using hymns and original songs as a conduit for hope. The conversation turns to practical guidance for churches and Christians: how to support survivors without trying to “fix” them, the importance of listening, praying, and referring to professional help, and the need to avoid sweeping abuse under the rug. Greenberg introduces the theological distinction between “abusers” (who lack genuine repentance) and “gracers” (who seek true change and accountability). She elaborates on two kinds of forgiveness – limited forgiveness (releasing anger to God while maintaining boundaries) and reconciliatory forgiveness (possible only when the offender shows authentic repentance). Depression and suicide are portrayed as allegorical characters in her book, illustrating how negative thoughts can masquerade as friendly companions. Throughout, Greenberg emphasizes that identity and worth are found in Christ, not in trauma, and points to Jesus as the ultimate abuse survivor whose suffering models divine compassion. The episode concludes with promotion of the book, its foreword by Russell Moore, and resources for listeners to connect with Greenberg’s work.
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Hi everybody, this is Rick Lee James. My guest today on Voices in My Head is Jennifer M. Greenberg. Jennifer has an amazing story of hope, and trust me, it is a story of hope, but it is also a story of her survival from psychological, physical, and sexual abuse, as well as suicide survival. So for listeners who may be sensitive or who have suffered this kind of trauma, or even if there are young listeners in the room, I just wanted to make you aware of today's topic before we began the show to help you discern the appropriate time time and place of listening. Thank you for joining us this week and enjoy my conversation with Jennifer. She has quite an amazing story of what God has done in her life. God bless and thanks for listening to Voices in My Head.
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Welcome to Voices in My Head, the official podcast of me, Rick Lee James. I'm a recording artist, a singer, a songwriter, an author, a worship leader, and an ordained minister in the Church of the Nazarene. The Voices in My Head podcast is where I discuss music, movies, books, pop culture, theology, and more with friends, colleagues, and sometimes just by myself. Now make sure to let me know what you think of today's episode by leaving me a review on iTunes or by tweeting at me @RickLeeJames on Twitter. And please join my mailing list at RickLeeJames.com where you can receive an email every time a new episode is released. By the way, in case you're interested in a daily dose of kindness and encouragement beyond this podcast, I also run the Twitter account @MrRogersSay where I post daily quotes from Fred Rogers, one of the voices in my head. Well, I guess that's it for the intro, so sit back, relax, and listen to the latest episode of Voices in My Head.
Welcome back to Voices in My Head. As always, I am your host, Rick Lee James. I'm Rick Lee James, and I'm so glad that you can be here with us for this conversation. "Isn't it tragic that in a world so beautiful and diverse, a defining feature we all have in common is pain?" says author Jennifer M. Greenberg. Jennifer knows pain all too well, having suffered psychological, physical, and sexual abuse at the hands of her churchgoing father. At the age of 15, as she contemplated suicide with a razor to her arm, she heard the voice of God say to her, "I will never leave you or forsake you." From that moment on, she knew she had a Father in Heaven who loved her. She knew she had a purpose in life on this earth. In her new book, Not Forsaken: A Story of Life After Abuse: How Faith Brought One Woman from Victim to Survivor, Greenberg shares how her faith brought her through the darkest of situations time and time again and how faith can enable survivors of all walks to navigate issues of guilt, forgiveness, love, and value. She also encourages church leaders to take the necessary measures to protect the vulnerable among them— amongst them. Jennifer Greenberg, welcome to Voices in My Head.
Thank you so much for having me, Rick.
I almost made it through that intro without saying the wrong word, and I got to the last word and said among instead of amongst. But that just kind of is typical for me and my mistakes. But I'm so glad to have you here with us today, and I'm so glad it worked out for us to have this conversation. Conversation together. Thank you for your new book. It is quite a story, and as, as I'm telling people, as I get to share a little bit about your story, is just talking to people face to face. It is a story of hope, but it's a story that is a difficult story as well, with a lot of different paths that you have been down. But before we get too deeply into the book today, I just want to talk about you a little bit. You are not only a wonderful writer, and I so appreciate what you have written in Not Forsaken, but there's a lot more to you than that. And one of those things is that you are also a gifted musician, and I was just listening to you this morning on one of your albums, and my goodness, what an amazing voice you have. So I was just curious, do you have any plans upcoming for any future albums or anything like that?
I do, actually. I'm going to be releasing an album around the same time as my book. It's called Symbiotic, and And it actually is inspired by a lot of classic literature, classic film. And there are several songs even about, for example, the song "Whittled" about a feeling of, you know, enduring pain, enduring hardship, and the evils of this world. But your hope is in God, and God carries you through it, and He is your victory. And He is profoundly faithful. And so I'm releasing that alongside my book, and that's been incredibly encouraging to me. I've always loved music. In fact, you know, when I was a kid, playing the piano, playing hymns, and singing songs like "Be Thou My Vision," "Amazing Grace," 'How Great Thou Art.' Those songs really were the anthem of my hope and carried me through so many dark times. So music played an integral part in how God enabled me to endure abuse.
Wow. Well, that, you know, I have heard that time and time again, the way that music has sort of been a help and a healing agent. And there is something special about the way that God works with music. As a musician myself and a songwriter, I know that there are times that I feel like I just can't express the emotion or the feeling or sometimes the joy or the pain in any other way than just with music. Sometimes just it speaks in ways that sometimes the printed word can't. But I was really enjoying some of your earlier projects. And it's actually, if people want to listen to that, they can go to your website at jennifergreenberg.net. So I'm going to let them know. But I was listening through Apple Music, and I know people can buy your music online, but it's great stuff. So before we got too far into the book, just as a fellow musician, I was really impressed with what I got to hear. So thank you for sharing that.
Oh, I appreciate it. Thank you.
Well, let's get into some of your story today, Jennifer. And again, for listeners who are tuning in and finding about Jennifer today. Hers is a story of hope, but it is at the same time a difficult story. And you are a Christian abuse survivor, you're a stay-at-home mom, and now you're an author. So tell us a little bit about yourself and why you have written this book, Not Forsaken.
Yeah, absolutely. Thank you. Well, I began writing Not Forsaken as a series of letters to my husband. You know, I survived, as you said, 21 years of abuse. But then, you know, I married this great guy who, you know, thank God, had never been abused and had never suffered severe depression or dealt with, you know, the kind of complicated relationships I was dealing with. And while he's incredibly sympathetic and supportive, I just felt that there were certain stories and certain emotions and challenges that I was dealing with that I didn't know how to verbally put into words. And so I wanted to explain myself on a deeper level to my husband. And what's funny is, in trying to explain myself to him, I actually came to understand myself. And in seeking to figure out who I was, I came to a deeper understanding of who Jesus is. So it was a very interesting process and very difficult, but also very rewarding. Hmm.
Well, and that really comes through in the pages. I love, by the way, the way that the book opens up with, the numbers at the top, which represents your age at the time and the telling of your story. And I don't know if I've ever seen a book that quite starts out that way. And it took me just a moment when I was looking at it, and I was like, I wonder what the number is there for? Then I realized, oh, this is the— these are the ages that she's telling about and what's happened. And I thought it was a really powerful and creative way actually to start telling your story. I've I haven't seen that before, and I think it really helps put into context to kind of share the broad picture of what happened to you without fully diving in all the way yet. And sure, it's very, uh, it's a very interesting way to begin. Um, and you, you said you suffered significant trauma, and it was at the hands of your church-going father. And one of the things that amazes me most in this book is you remain a Christian. I look at your story and I think maybe if it was me and if it was others who had been through this and the church was so much a part of the abuse in some ways, I think I would have said, "I'm done." Yet your story, you rely on a God who is deeper than all that, and you rely on your faith to pull you through. So how did that come about? Tell us a little bit of why you decided, "I still want to be a Christian in the midst of all this, even though my example of what Christianity was was not great." Sure, absolutely.
I would have to say, you know, it was an act of God. You know, God is faithful. I really love the story of Jonah because he doesn't want to do what God wants him to do. He runs away, he rebels. And God goes to hilarious and extraordinary lengths to bring him back. And I really feel that, you know, there were times during my recovery process, there was at least a year where I just didn't feel comfortable at church. You know, there was, of course, there was the church building where my dad had once worshiped, but then had been asked to leave. Just being in that environment with those people who knew so much about me was incredibly difficult, you know, and many of them tried very authentically to have mercy on me and to love me. And many of them were just angry for me, you know, they were furious that I'd been treated that way. And really, they were betrayed too, because here was a guy who they had trusted, who they had thought was their friend. And all this time, you know, he's living this dark life. So, you know, one thing I want to emphasize, you know, there's no such thing as an abuser with one victim. They may have a primary victim, but there are so many people who are lied to, who are conned, you know. And then of course there are other siblings and family members who may witness their abuse. And let's face it, when you've got a child who is witnessing their mother getting harmed or a sibling getting harmed, that's child abuse. Because they're witnessing something traumatic. They're witnessing something that's going to stick with them for the rest of their lives. So that all was very difficult. And I finally came to a place after wrestling with God for a long time, where I realized, you know what, God knows everything. He knows exactly how angry I am. He knows that I don't want to go to church. He knows that I don't enjoy reading the Bible anymore. And I'm just going to tell Him about it. And so I did. I confided that pain and that anger to God. And I was blessed with just this overwhelming peace that God understood. And he got it, and, and it was going to be okay.
You know, one thing that really stood out to me is, as I was reading in parts of your book, and especially again towards the beginning when you're, you're sharing about the different ages, uh, you seem like when you're a child and when you're growing up that you're having these conversations with God a lot, and it seems like the Spirit is speaking to you and replying to you in many times. And sometimes, you know, I think God speaks in different ways. Some of us, most of us wouldn't say we hear it audibly.
Sure, yeah.
And yet at the same time, just again this morning, I was reading in my devotions about when Jesus is kind of rebuking the disciples for making the children go away. And Jesus is saying, you know, let the children come. And there's this sense of don't you dare 'Never drive these children away from me.' And as I think about your story, and as I was reading through again this morning and looking through some of the things that you had written, it reminds me— I really do think there is a special way that God communicates to children, and maybe especially to children who don't have the loving father-type example that we do see in Jesus, you know. And I just kept getting this sense again and again that kind of ties in with the question I asked about why you remained a Christian. I think you really truly had a sense that the Lord was so present with you in those moments of darkness and in those moments of hurt in a way that no other human could be. Would you say that was accurate?
Absolutely. And you know, you think about what a complex being God is to create the universe with his words. He's so high above us, and yet He chooses to relate with us in such beautifully simple ways. He calls Himself a Father, a Shepherd, a Redeemer, a Friend, a Mighty Counselor, you know. So God, He's incredibly merciful and faithful, and He He characterizes himself in ways that we can understand, that a little child can understand. And that's one of the things I love about parables as well. He talks about complex things like heaven. You know, how do you understand what heaven is like? And, you know, and Jesus says, well, you know, heaven is like, you know, a mustard seed. And, you know, he makes these beautiful pictures that a toddler could get, you know, like the Good Samaritan is such a beautiful, simple story. A child can understand it, and yet it teaches us such a profound truth about his nature and his desire for how we are to respond to evil and what mercy looks like and what goodness looks like. So yeah, I truly feel that that God did, you know, in his mercy, and he's so incredibly humble to bend down from glory and involve himself in the life of children, and he really does.
Well, I want to talk a bit today about how to talk to other Christians about how they can assist survivors. And as we do this, another thing that stood out as I'm reading your book, it wasn't just your father. You know, there's a story that you share about being on your way to a church camp, and yeah, it was a long drive. It was around 10 hours, and you had stopped. It seems like, if I remember right, it was about halfway maybe, and you were staying at the home of a pastor, and The pastor of the home you were staying in seemed like he said and did and tried some really inappropriate things.
Yeah.
Which I'm reading it and I had to stop and talk to my wife and I said, this is just creeping me out, you know, I just can't believe this is going on. And yet we know with the Me Too movement that has happened, we know that there's a lot of things that have happened in society, but that also gave church gave birth to sort of this Church Too movement that's been going around, where people have been coming forward with their stories of surviving not only abuse and trauma in their homes, but even in their churches it's been happening. And, and it just— it, it's awful to think that in many cases people don't have a safe place in their church even, and yeah, they, they need some help from there. So, so I want to I want to talk to you about today. As a Christian and abuse survivor, what do you want other Christians to know about how they can assist survivors? And right along with that, what do you want other survivors to know about Christians and the church?
Well, one thing I would definitely say to Christians, to pastors, is, you know, you don't have to have all the right words. Or all the answers. You know, as someone who has survived over 2 decades of abuse, I can tell you nothing you could say to me is going to heal all the wounds or draw my abuser to repent, because trust me, I tried for over 20 years, nearly 30 years to to be Christ, to be a representative of Christ in his life and to draw him to repentance. And, you know, barring an act of God, it's just not going to happen. You know, the Spirit has to work in his heart. You know, so I think a lot of times people, they do two things. Either they get overwhelmed by the magnitude of the problem and they don't do anything. They sort of shut down. Or they start, or they're arrogant and they think, well, I can handle this. I'm just going to DIY fix this. We can handle it in-house. Everything's going to be fine. And so I think, I think what we need to realize is we can't be everything to everyone. You know, maybe you're a pastor and that's wonderful, but you're not a therapist. You are not a police officer. You are not a lawyer. You are not a counselor. You know, so knowing your calling, knowing what God has called you to do, what your skill set is, and being content in that. And, you know, just being able to say to someone, even, "Look, I do not know what to say. I do not know what all the right words are. I cannot imagine going through what you have been through." But I would love to listen and I would love to pray with you. And I'd love to take you to this pastor over here or take you to my friend who's survived abuse or, you know, help you find a counselor. So, you know, on the one hand, don't be intimidated thinking that you need to solve this problem because it's not a problem to be solved. And on the other hand, don't in-house it. I think a lot of times, you know, when we see these church scandals crop up, it's because the church administration didn't file that police report, didn't get the victim counseling. They kind of swept it under the rug, or they tried to deal with it in such a way that just didn't address the problem on a fundamental level. And that's really what I think gets gets some churches into trouble and why we're seeing a lot of these scandals blow up to the extent that they are.
Yeah, well, one thing I also appreciate about your book is it's not just your story. You really are trying to give some tools to help survivors and to help other people as they deal with survivors. And, and you talk about abusers and gracers. Would you mind telling us the differences between those two and how to distinguish which is which between an abuser and a gracer?
Absolutely. Well, you know, our theology listeners will probably recognize the term common grace, this idea that whether someone is a believer or not, God is working in their lives, restraining their sin, you know, and hopefully inspiring them to be a better, more righteous person. So the difference between abusers and gracers, you know, when you have someone who's an abuser, they may claim to be sorry. They may pretend to make amends or pretend to change. But their heart isn't in it. They feed their sin. They continue in their deviant ways. They may claim to be sorry, but you don't see the fruit of repentance in their lives. So you don't see them going to a counselor, reporting themselves to the police, holding themselves accountable, and actively trying to progress out of their sin. Rather, you're going to see them staying stagnant or returning to their sin over and over again, or you're going to see them getting worse and worse and worse. And that's when you see someone who's just feeding their sin, honing their sin, you know, becoming the kind of evil person that, you know, we are reading about on the news these days. It seems almost every day something horrible just explodes in someone, and you know that that evil has been been building up in their hearts for years, if not decades. And finally, it's just reached a point where it just blows up like a volcano. Whereas a gracer, whether they're saved or not, is someone who recognizes what they've done as wrong, who has sympathy and empathy for their victim. They will try to make amends for what they've done. They will actively try to change their behavior. You know, they may go to rehab, they may seek counseling, they may report themselves to the authorities and say, "Hey, I did this, this, and this to this person." So they're going to hold themselves accountable. And one thing I think is very important too is a repentant person is not going to expect or demand forgiveness because they're going to understand that what they've done is so horrible that they don't deserve to be forgiven. So they're going to give their victim space. You know, they're going to say, you know what, if me emailing you gives you stress, stresses you out when I call you on the phone, whatever, I'll leave you alone. I will step out of your life. I will give you space to heal. It's okay. I'm so sorry. That is a sign that they're truly repentant. An abuser, on the other hand, will often say, no, no, no, if you're really a Christian, you have to forgive me. You have to let me into your life. You have to let me near your kids, you know? And so there's this dichotomy. But it's all about heart motives. It takes so much wisdom, but you've got to discern those heart motives and you've got to be so careful.
Yeah, and so often Christians are easy prey to that because we try to be people of grace and forgiveness and mercy, and sometimes I think abusers see that and they take advantage of that too. And yeah, so, so I'm glad you write about those things for us in that way that we can help hopefully become discerning people together. Let me ask you this: how can survivors be encouraged by the gospel?
Oh, in so many ways. I think for me personally, you know, I had been a Christian for a long, long time, for as long as I can remember really. I don't remember a day when I did not believe in God. But when I had been married probably for about 10 years, it struck me that Jesus is an abuse survivor.
Hmm.
He, yeah, he was betrayed by his friend, someone he loved dearly. He was abandoned by many of his friends. His own family accused him of being crazy. He was falsely accused. He was called demon-possessed. He was called a drunkard, a false teacher. And, you know, eventually he was taken captive. He was beaten up and he was murdered. And so once I realized that, that Jesus is not only an abuse survivor, but a death survivor, I was able to realize that, you know, in addition to God loving me, He can relate with me in an extraordinarily personal way, and I can relate with Him. And to me, that just— I don't— I can't explain it. It was so fulfilling, and it brought me such peace to know that I was understood on that level.
Hmm. Wow. I don't know that I've ever heard it put in exactly those terms, but— and then as you say that too, again, he was suffering at the hands of people who were part of his faith and religious leaders. And like, wow, the, the context you just put it in there, that's, that's a powerful context for us to think about, and the hope that Jesus offers to those who are survivors and his response. How did Jesus respond to victims of their abuse?
Well, you know, we see Jesus continually having mercy on people, you know, whether it was abuse or blindness or illness, being lame, He heals people, He brings them back to life, He cleanses them from their sin, He brings them out of their misery, their pain, their suffering. So we have a merciful Savior. We have a Father who loves us and is willing to bend down to our level so that He can catch us up in His arms. And pick us up where we're at. You know, a beautiful parable I mentioned earlier is the Good Samaritan. You know, the Good Samaritan, in a lot of ways, he helped an abuse survivor. He helped this man who had been assaulted, been beaten up and robbed, and he was just left in the road, lying in the road, bleeding and broken. And the Good Samaritan comes along after these, you know, self-righteous people who maybe they're worried about their reputation, they're worried about, you know, their branding, how things look, you know, their time, their expense. They're thinking about themselves. The Good Samaritan comes along, he picks up this broken man and he takes him to safety. And so that's really how Jesus treats abuse victims and survivors. He meets us where we are, in the dirt, on the side of the road, bleeding and broken. He picks us up and he takes us to safety. Wow.
And before we had started recording today, actually, you made mention of something too that I thought was very helpful. Might be helpful to those who maybe have suffered abuse or trauma or maybe are currently experiencing that. And you said something to the extent of, you know, I tend to think of my story as surviving as— I think you said it was, um, you look at what happened to you as though, uh, it were like a car accident that happened to you. Yeah, you know, it's, it's something that happened to you, not something that you did.
Yeah.
And, uh, and I, I think that's hopefully a very helpful way for people maybe to start looking at their own, if they've encountered this type of abuse in their life, because it really is— we have to emphasize, I think, again and again to people, this is not something that you did.
Yeah.
And it's not something you brought upon yourself. This is something that happened to you. And we wouldn't make a person feel guilt if they got hit by a car, you know, struck by lightning, or yeah, it's just— yeah, or any of those type of things. And yet just probably whatever we do in our own minds, I'm sure we hold that into ourselves because it's— and so often that's a trick of those who are doing the abusing, I think, too. They maybe want to make them think that they've done something wrong or it's their fault. But it's so important, and we just want to emphasize that again today, that this is not something that's your fault. This is something done to you. And I'm so encouraged as I hear you talk about the God that you obviously know so well in Jesus and that has come to you in so many ways to meet you in, literally as the Psalm says, "Out of the depths I cried," you know.
Yes, yes.
And we have a God that just enters into those depths with us and to pull us out. And not only just, you know, so often we want the story just to be, "Well, then Jesus saved me and everything got great, right? Your story is one of, oh no, Jesus stayed down in the pit with me. Yeah, yeah, when I couldn't get out and he wouldn't leave until I could come with him, you know, type thing. Absolutely. And, um, I mean, it, it makes me teary just thinking about that kind of love and grace.
Oh yeah, me too. You know, it's just like, you know, you lead me through the valley of the shadow of death, you know, Jesus is with us in the shadow of death. That's evil. That's sickness. That's pain. That's suffering and fear. You know, it's not just abuse, but just all the many terrible things that happen to us in this fallen world, you know, that may bring us to our knees and cause us to despair. You know, it's funny, so often I tend to say I was clinging to Jesus, but really Jesus was grasping me.
Yes.
There were so many times when I know that my human heart would have failed. I would have given up. I would have forsaken God, but God did not forsake me. He was faithful and He is faithful. Hmm. Wow.
What a testimony. I so appreciate you sharing that. If we could, and I know we've already gone over the 30 minutes, are you still okay?
Oh, you're fine, you're fine.
Okay, great. I wonder if you could tell us about your experience with depression and suicide and moving on from those things. It seems like there is so much depression in our society right now and so many people who suffer from that, and I don't know if it's just I'm paying attention more or what, but it seems like I'm hearing a lot more about suicide lately, and I hear about it from very young children. It seems like I hear about things sometimes even as early as elementary school, kids who have tried to take their life. And I wonder if you could just share maybe some of your experience of dealing with that depression and overcoming and surviving suicide and how you move past both of those things.
Absolutely, yeah. Well, in my book, Not Forsaken, I have a chapter that's an allegory. And so depression is depicted as a character, and as is suicide. And so, you know, I walk along through this valley with them, and we have a conversation. And, you know, they start out— depression starts out seeming friendly and seeming kind and thoughtful and sympathetic. But she plays to the negative and she reinforces the fears and the insecurities. And so, and this is something that I have noted in my own life, you know, it's like I'll start with a minor insecurity You know, maybe my husband comes home tired after work and I just think, oh, you know, if I were a better wife, you know, he would be happier or, you know, something like that. And that little seed of insecurity grows and it builds and it sort of snowballs until, you know, maybe a couple days or a week later, I'm thinking about how much better his life would be if I weren't in it. And so, you know, one thing that I think a lot of people don't realize is that, you know, suicide, when you are in that place in your heart, it's not a scary thing. And that's why it's so dangerous. It's something that feels right and it feels true. And so we really have to be careful that we are not confusing the lies of Satan and the lies of sin and fear with the truth of God. And the truth is that you are created by the Creator of the entire universe. Not only that, you are created in His image, and you are so valuable and so loved by Him. That he was willing to become human and suffer through this fallen world and be nailed to a cross so that you could come live with him in heaven. That's how much he wants to live with you. And so, you know, we need to— when we're in those dark places, when we feel like nobody would ever want to live with us, Nobody would ever want to be our spouse, be our loved one. We need to remember that Christ died so that he could live with us.
Hmm.
Hmm. And so we need to derive our identity not out of our pain, not out of what's been done to us, not from our situation or even things we've done. You know, all of us have sinned. We've all fallen short of God's glory. So instead, we need to define ourselves and define our value in Jesus Christ. And that's really, you know, depression is a thing that many people struggle with over and over again. A lot of times it comes in waves. And there's two different kinds of depression too. There's the clinical depression, you know, that may be caused by hormones chemical imbalances in the brain, mental illness. But there's also depression where you've just had a depressing life. Something depressing has happened to you. And, you know, I used to tell my husband, you know, I feel too broken to be a good mom. I feel too damaged to be a good wife. And he'd say, Jennifer, you're not, you're not damaged. You're not broken. You're sad because terrible things have happened. You're sad because sad things have happened. Your sorrow, your mourning over evil is actually a healthy reaction to terrible things that have happened in your life. There's nothing wrong with you. This is the proper response. And so when I understood that, and but more than that, when I heard my husband tell me that, But that's how he felt about me, and that's how he viewed my grieving process. There was a huge shift in my life in how I viewed myself, and I became a more secure person.
Wow. It sounds like, by the way, and I meant to say this earlier, it sounds like your husband is quite a guy.
Oh, he's wonderful, yes.
Sounds like that the Lord really put you two together for quite a wonderful purpose. And I'm so glad to find that— my fear was in reading the book was, "Oh no, she's gotten into a relationship that's just like her dad," you know, or something. And it's actually the opposite of that, it seems like. It seems like he has been such a presence of grace in your life, and I'm so grateful to read about that and to hear stories about those good things that do happen. So often we just hear bad things about marriage.
I know. So often it's a cycle that that, you know, just goes on and on. And I cannot take credit for breaking the cycle. Honestly, God has been incredibly good to me. You know, I got married at the age of 21. And I will tell you, as most 21-year-olds, I did not have a whole lot of wisdom. And coming out of what I was coming out of, I had a very strange and warped view of what marriage was. What love was, what fatherhood was, and what healthy relationships were. I had no idea what a healthy relationship looked like. So, you know, again, God worked in my life and just worked everything for His glory. You know, without Jason, my husband, "Not Forsaken" would not have been written, at least not at this point in my life.
Wow. Well, thank God for Jason, and I hope he listens to this and hears that. And I'm encouraged by that part of your story. And, uh, you know, it's odd— this is going to seem like a probably an odd little sidebar, but I was just thinking about when you said, I can't take credit for breaking the cycle, and I was just thinking of an interview I heard years ago, um, with, with the singer Alice Cooper, and, um, who is a Christian. And I think he was on Fresh Air or something like that, and he, he has this really dramatic story of of, uh, he was an alcoholic and he was in the hospital and he almost died from alcohol poisoning. And, and he says part of his testimony is he walked out of the hospital and he never wanted another drink again. Yeah, it was like, it was like he was healed from it. And, and he was raised the, the child of a pastor, but he, you know, left that faith behind when he became a big rock and roll star. And the thing that, the thing that was interesting that what he said and what you just said reminded me of he said, he said, I knew it had to be God that did that in me because you don't just stop being an alcoholic, right? He said, and he said, and the thing that— and he kind of gets emotional when he tells it— and he says the thing that's so powerful is I didn't even ask to be free of it.
Amazing. Yeah.
And so he's— it's interesting to hear someone like him tell that story and, and know and understand that that is truly the power of divine grace. And when you said that again, like, I can't even take credit for breaking the cycle, that's That's— those are really awesome stories to tell, you know, of the way that, um, and you said it before, that God is holding on to us more than we are holding on to him. Yeah, and I think, I think those are wonderful stories. It's good to remind ourselves of these.
What a beautiful picture of God's faithfulness too, um, you know, to be, to be born into a Christian family, the son of a pastor no less, um, and to fall so deeply into sin and dysfunction and addiction. But then despite all that, to have God bring you out, and that just, you know, again points to, you know, we are not defined by our situation, by what's been done to us, or even by what we've done. We are defined by the love of Jesus Christ.
Yeah, it really, really becomes more appropriate when you think of that over and over, the, the prodigal son story of the father who is running down, uh, to meet the child, you know. Yes, the child is kind of standing there, but it's the father who is running full force, you know. Um, that's— it's, it's a good, it's a good image in that parable of truth, I think.
Absolutely.
Well, we're getting sort of to the end of our conversation. I want to thank you for, for staying a little longer than I had originally planned, but you have a great section in your book on forgiveness. It's chapter 12, and it's called The Truth About Forgiveness. And if you don't mind, I want to just read the opening paragraph Absolutely. You do a great job in the book about talking about what forgiveness is and what forgiveness isn't and the role it plays in your own healing journey. So I'm just going to quickly read this opening paragraph, chapter 12, for our listeners. You write, forgiveness is at the heart of Christianity. However, when it comes to forgiving an abuser, particularly one who is a current threat or a source of pain, Things become incredibly difficult and extremely complicated. We may be emotionally unable to forgive. We may simply not want to, and that's entirely understandable. But forgiveness, when properly understood, is a peace we can hope for, a relief we can anticipate, and a joy when it arrives. So I'd love for you to maybe talk a little bit about here what you talk about in the book when you're explaining what forgiveness is and then what forgiveness isn't. For us today.
Absolutely, yes. Well, there's, there's two different kinds of forgiveness, and I guess I should preface it by saying, you know, most people when they think about forgiving someone, they're thinking about forgiving someone for spilling coffee on their carpet or dinging their car with a grocery cart or their kid mouthing off to them or something like that, you know. But when we talk about abuse, we're often talking about heinous, extraordinarily personal, deep wounds that are very intentional, that are premeditated, and often, particularly in the case of child abuse, domestic violence, that are chronic, that are done over and over and over again. And that abuser may have lied and said they were sorry, but then returned back to their sin. So there's a lot of distrust that builds up over a long period of time, and it's very hard to comprehend, especially when, you know, when you're a Christian, when you're a good person yourself, it's hard to understand how someone could be that cruel, how someone could be that evil, and what would motivate that sort of sin. So, you know, before you are able to forgive, you have to kind of get to a place in your heart where you can look at that person objectively. Because if you're so twisted in knots and pain and you're disoriented and confused and really heartbroken, you know, you can say, "I forgive you," but that doesn't take away the acute agony that you're in, or the distrust that you feel. So, you know, it's important, I think, to be able to progress in your recovery and your healing process, you know, before you say, okay, yes, I forgive you, you know, forgive and forget. Because really, I find that's basically like applying a Band-Aid to a stab wound. It just doesn't work in these situations. And what ends up happening is you have the survivor, you know, or me, for example, I've said, I'll forgive you, or I have forgiven you. But then the next day, I'm upset to the point that I'm nauseous again. And I realized that I haven't forgiven and I don't feel forgiving. And so then I feel like I've lied. And I feel like I've betrayed my abuser because I didn't follow through on forgiving them. And so I, you know, I wrap myself up in this guilt that I shouldn't have to carry. So, but I tackle two different kinds of forgiveness in my book. There's limited forgiveness and there's reconciliatory forgiveness. Limited forgiveness is kind of where I'm at with my dad. You know, I've let go of my anger. I've entrusted my anger to God and said, you know what, God, you are angry with the wicked every day. "Lord, and this anger that I have in my heart is just poisoning me. It's ruining my life. It's affecting my marriage. It's affecting how I parent. I need you to take it away from me and free me from this pain." And so God did that for me. But at the same time, I'm not going to let someone who I know is a sexual predator near my kids. And I'm not going to let someone who triggers my anxiety into my life and let them damage my marriage or damage my relationship with God any further. So I've created those boundaries. And I've disallowed him from sinning against me. And unfortunately, because he's not repentant, and because his sin is so pervasive, that meant just completely cutting him out of my life. You know, because doing anything less puts me emotionally and possibly physically at risk. So, but the other kind of forgiveness, and you know, some survivors are blessed with this, it is a true blessing, is reconciliatory forgiveness. And that's when you have someone who's sinned against you, whether that be a sin of abuse or some other grievous wrong, but they're genuinely repentant. They are so sorry for what they've done. They've humbled themselves before you. They've attempted at least, you know, as much as they can to make amends. Obviously, in cases of abuse, what can you do? You know, there's nothing that you can do that's going to make amends for a wrong like that, but they've tried and they will hopefully keep trying. And, you know, they're humble too. They're not going to demand forgiveness from you. If you're still angry, they're going to be like, you know what? Your anger is justified. You should be angry at me because what I did was wrong and it deserves the wrath of God. That's a truly repentant attitude. And a person who's genuinely repentant, if they've committed a crime, they will turn themselves into the authorities. They will talk to a pastor. They will ask their church to hold them accountable so that they don't continue in their sin. They will, you know, go to rehab, go to counseling, whatever it takes. They will war against their sin. And so those are the signs of a repentant person. But a repentant person, even at that stage, they will recognize, you know what, if me being in your life stresses you out, if I cause you to fear, if I'm setting off your nightmares, if I'm triggering your depression, I will step out of your life because I love you enough to give you that space. So I think that's really key. I think a lot of people, you know, they talk a lot about forgiveness, but they forget or they skip repentance or they have just a shallow understanding of it. You know, it's so much more than saying, I'm sorry.
Yeah, well, thank you for sharing that, and I really appreciate the way that you're giving people space to do that as well, and you're giving people permission to do that. I think it's one of those things that is not always handled very well when we talk about forgiveness, especially in churches, because we want people to so quickly jump to, well, you're, you know, you're saved and you're forgiven, so now you just have to forgive this person and get over it, like, right now.
Right, yeah, switch off those emotions in your head, just turn off that switch. 'You'll be fine.' Exactly. Not the way it works.
And I think it's a little bit similar to me— you can tell me if you think I'm right or wrong in this— but I think it's a little bit similar to the way that we sometimes treat grief when a loved one has passed away. I think so often we're uncomfortable with a person sitting with their grief, and so we want them to get over it quickly. And we'll say these high-sounding platitudes of, 'Well, thank God they're with Jesus. Now we can rejoice,' you know. And we don't allow a person to take the time that they need sometimes because we're uncomfortable with it, I think. And so I appreciate the permission that you give, especially in that chapter, to those who are struggling to forgive, and the way that you kind of lay out the different ways of forgiving people and the ways that we need to make space and help people have that space as well.
Yeah, weep with those who weep.
Yeah, for sure. And I think that's all a very healthy thing, and maybe it's a good thing for us to do, even in a person struggling to be a person of forgiveness, God is still working in the midst of that struggle, I think. And just as you said about a person who is repentant, and it doesn't mean that there aren't consequences to it and that things don't happen, but I think it's a sign of grace working in their life that they want to repent. And I think it's true as well for those that are really trying to forgive. That is also a sign of God's grace that's that we would even want to forgive, you know?
Exactly. It's a miracle. Forgiveness is a miracle, just as repentance is a miracle. And you know, one thing that I found incredibly comforting was the story of Joseph. You know, when he finally is able to forgive his brothers for beating him up and selling him to human traffickers. I mean, can you imagine?
Yeah.
Amazing. When he's finally able to forgive them, 40 years have passed. It's not something that happened a couple days later. It's something that he processed through over the period, a period of decades. You know, God enabled his recovery. God drew him out of domestic violence, out of the pit, out of false accusations, out of prison, out of slavery. And enabled him to forgive those who had wronged him. And God gives us that space. You know, he loves us. He is powerful enough to forgive any sin. You know, he doesn't only forgive people who are perfect. He forgives people who are broken and who are in pain. And who are, as David said, you know, his bed is soaked with his tears. Those are the people who, you know, our Great Physician has come to heal. And so we don't need to feel inadequate because we're hemorrhaging grief, or we're overwhelmed by heartbreak. We don't need to feel like we need to recover to a certain extent before God will accept us. We can, like that poor man who the Good Samaritan rescued, we can be lying in the mud on the side of the road, bleeding and broken, and God will come along and he will love us and he will take care of us.
Yeah. Well, Jennifer, there is so much that we could even still keep talking about, but for the sake of time and because I want people to read read the book as well. We're going to start drawing our conversation to a close, but even the foreword by Russell Moore, the president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, who I have a lot of respect for, that should tell people if they're wondering, if they need a recommendation, should I read this book? Well, Russell Moore says you should read it. So, and, but his foreword is excellent to the book as well. And I just, I can't wait me personally, um, to, to share this with, with my own pastor, um, because there's just so much good in here that is— we're always at my church asking, how can we help better? You know, we're looking for good counselors to send people to, and I think this book is going to be an incredible resource for people. Um, when this, when this episode releases, actually, your book will have officially released and been out for one day. So this is sort of going to be the the, uh, the celebration podcast in some ways of a book like this releasing.
Awesome.
Um, and I want to let everybody know that's listening, you can go to jennifergreenberg.net and you can find out not only about this wonderful book Not Forsaken that she has written, but you can also find her music. And there's some great videos on your website as well I want people to be aware of. Um, it is— and by the way, on our podcast website at voicesinmyheadpodcast.com, we are also going to to have a link to your book in the show notes. So if somebody happens to be perusing our page, you can just click on it and it'll take it straight to your Amazon page where they can get a copy for themselves. Is there anything else that we should tell people about your book before we end our conversation together, or where they can find it or find out more about you?
Thank you so much. Yes, um, well, as you mentioned, you can find Not Forsaken on Amazon, and, you know, please connect with me on Twitter. Let me know if you— you can contact me through my website. Let me know if you have any questions about what we have talked about today, or, you know, if you read the book, if you have any questions or stories of your own, I'm always happy to listen. And I just, you know, I pray that this book would, would help survivors and victims to, to realize that they are loved, to realize that they are not forsaken, and also you know, the spouses, loved ones, pastors of survivors, to just give them the tools that they need to sympathize and understand and hopefully get some clarity on how they can help their loved one, a member of their flock, better. That is my prayer for this book. And I want to thank everyone who reads it because honestly, in my own recovery process, Knowing that God has taken what I have been through, if He can use my story to help even one person, I am profoundly honored. And you know, it is back to what Joseph said in Genesis 50:20, "You intended evil against me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives." And, and that is my prayer for Not Forsaken, that, that it would help many people.
Oh yeah, well, we amen that for sure, and, and we hope that it will truly be something. This is going to be a timely book, and I think a much-needed book for many people.
Thank you, Rick.
Congratulations. Yes, congratulations on the release of Not Forsaken. I'm proud of you and the way that you're telling your story and the way that you're providing tools for the church. Again, JenniferGreenberg.net. Everybody go and check out this great new book, Not Forsaken. And with that, we are finished with our conversation for this week. Jennifer Greenberg, thank you for being one of the Voices in My Head this week.
Thank you, Rick.
Thank you for joining me here this week on Voices in My Head. I hope you'll visit me on my website at RickLeeJames.com where you can find out more about me, get my music on vinyl and CD, follow my blog, and even schedule me for a concert or a speaking engagement. Better yet, even a book signing in your neighborhood. You can find all that and more at rickleejames.com. Also, it would mean a great deal to me if you could write a review of this podcast on iTunes. The more positive reviews that we receive, the more visible this podcast will be online. And now for the benediction: May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope. God bless you, and thank you for listening to Voices in My Head. This is Rick Lee James, and the music you are hearing is from my new album, Thunder. The title track, Thunder, is a never-before-released song by the late Rich Mullins. There are also 12 other tracks made up of original music hymns, and readings to guide the listener on a journey. You can buy Thunder today on clear vinyl and CD, or stream it on Spotify, Apple Music, and almost every other music streaming service. Thunder, hear it today at rickleejames.com.
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