Episode 29-Forgiveness 70×7: Finding Freedom Through Grace with June Hunt

One of the most powerful, and most misunderstood steps toward healing from trauma is forgiveness. June Hunt, founder of the biblical counseling ministry Hope for the Heart, joins Aliza to share her own story of childhood trauma and unpack what forgiveness truly means; not weakness, but the courageous choice to remove the offender from your emotional hook. If you've ever struggled to forgive someone who never said they were sorry, this conversation will give you both the clarity and the courage to move forward.

Resources: 

●     Hope for the Heart

●     Forgiveness: Releasing You Is Freeing Me by June Hunt.

●     Keys for Living Library 

●     AMP Counseling

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Good evening. We begin tonight with an issue that continues to affect millions long after the original events have passed. Trauma. Mental health experts say trauma from earlier life experiences often resurfaces years later, influencing emotional responses, physical health, and relationships. While the incidents may be in the past, the body and brain can remain in a heightened state of survival.

SPEAKER_04 0:33

I wish I could just forget about everything that happened to me so long ago. But these memories haunt me.

SPEAKER_02 0:43

I know it's over, but it doesn't feel over. I need help, but I'm afraid to open up about my past.

SPEAKER_06 1:45

She is the author, she's been a singer, she's a speaker and founder of Hope for the Heart. It is a worldwide biblical counseling ministry. Her life work has yielded landmark contributions in the field of Christian counseling. Hope for the Heart, which she founded in 1986, offers biblical hope and practical help through biblical counsel, coaching, and context for contemporary concerns in more than 60 countries? Six languages and sixty countries. Amazing. Amazing. And early family pain, though, is what was the catalyst that shaped June's compassionate heart. Later, as a church youth director, and then becoming a college and career director, she became aware of the need for sound biblical counsel. June, I am so happy to have you here today, and I see that Hope for the Heart had real stories in it from real people.

SPEAKER_05 2:46

Well, I do now a live calling counseling program called Hope in the Night. And um, so I never know what for sure, because even the presenting problem may not be the real problem which you understand. Exactly. And so Hope in the Night, uh, people call about what is well sometimes the presenting problem is not the real problem. And so you have to peel the layer of the onion, you know, the layers, and um figure out what's the catalyst for the trouble they're having.

SPEAKER_06 3:18

And that's gotta be extremely rewarding. I know as a counselor or therapist, sometimes it's extremely rewarding. It's always exhausting, but that's gotta be a real labor of love that you're doing right now. So it's it's a privilege.

SPEAKER_05 3:32

It is a huge privilege.

SPEAKER_06 3:34

It is. So today, the topic that we sort of settled on, and there you know so many things about so many things, but we'll just hone in on the one area, if that's okay with you. Uh forgiveness. Oh dear. Not easy to forgive this one.

SPEAKER_05 3:53

Well, no, it it's uh some people think it's impossible to forgive somebody. I'm I'm one of those who that was my hardest of everything. Uh after I became a Christian, uh first I wasn't a Christian, and and uh I was not exposed to the Bible, wasn't exposed to authentic Christianity, and then I see students. Uh all of a sudden I'm in a church that I didn't want to be in, but all of a sudden I'm in this church for the first time, and everybody has a Bible, and I didn't have a Bible. And so it was stunning because for the first time I saw authentic, well, I didn't know what they had. Whatever they had, I wanted to.

SPEAKER_06 4:40

You wanted what they had, you felt it.

SPEAKER_05 4:42

Yep, and I I just tried, but I wasn't I didn't talk either. I was shut down.

SPEAKER_06 4:47

You're very shut down at that point. Um, do you want to talk a little bit about your story of origin?

SPEAKER_05 4:55

Well, my father had three families going on concurrently at the same time. And we were the third family, so I grew up with a fictitious last name. I was June Wright, spelled W-R-I-G-H-T, even though what was going on wasn't right. And um my mother uh had four children from my father, but uh, and eventually I figured out what was going on because we were a family off on the side, and but I knew how to fill out forms like father's name, and so but everything I wrote down was not right, it wasn't true. But but uh I was trying to protect my mom and um she was sweet, she had no vices like alcohol or drugs or all these things, but her father died when she was either two or three. Oh and I thought, because I thought how how could she have gotten in this situation? Right. And it dawned on me, my dad, 28 years older, was a father figure figure to her. So, but he was cruel. And uh when I was twelve, we moved into his home, and uh eleven months later my parents married, but I didn't talk uh because I couldn't explain my existence to anybody. I mean it just um it uh so I I didn't know I wasn't vulnerable, I didn't have a friend.

SPEAKER_06 6:23

You were very alone.

SPEAKER_05 6:25

I felt very alone, yes. And so depressed, maybe? I know that we're yeah. I I just to know that I was shut down, that I couldn't reveal anything about me, and not and I wasn't I mean I didn't want to. I didn't want people to be aware of what what was happening. But it was bizarre. Just and my dad was cruel at times. And um I thought, how can he hurt mother? I mean, how can he say the things he says when and uh so one day I at age 14 I confronted him and I said, How can you treat mother the way you do? And wh wh how how can you have all these other women? Mother's totally, they're she's totally loyal to you. And he said, I'm not a Christian, I don't have to go by Christian ethics. And so at least he didn't pretend to be something he was not. He had not been in church for 40 years, except for weddings and funerals. And um all of a sudden, now a year later I'm in this church and I see whatever they had, I wanted us all students. Absolutely and the youth leaders were extraordinary. And um so I I did become an authentic Christian um after six months. For a while I was thinking, what if it doesn't work? Because I saw these people would walk down an aisle, but then I didn't know what happened to them. An altar call? It was an altar call. I'd never seen an altar call. So uh, because I was in a church, but no Bible in that church.

SPEAKER_03 8:08

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 8:09

And uh it was a Christian church called Christian, right? You know, but uh I didn't even have a Bible. They said, Would you bring a Bible for the Sunday school class? And I thought, well, I've been to Sunday school, and they said, But bring a Bible. Well, I thought, I don't have a Bible. And so I but I knew there was one on a shelf, so I brought it and I took it off the shelf?

SPEAKER_06 8:30

I couldn't I but I you didn't know what like what it all meant, like all the numbers. And then they they would say, turn in your Bible to sh and you're like, what's that?

SPEAKER_05 8:39

I don't even know the neither, yeah.

SPEAKER_06 8:41

Oh, you go to Romans 8 28. I think the colon is the eight is the ver like I had to figure that out.

SPEAKER_05 8:46

Right.

SPEAKER_06 8:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 8:47

And and a lot of people don't know, but that's really challenging. Yeah. And so my first Sunday, I rar rarely tell this, but they were doing high school Bible, and you could get credit for Old Testament for one year, credit for New Testament. Uh, and I thought, but that and not not that that was anything significant to me, but they had a test. And a test. So I'm my first Sunday, and there were I was looking at all these questions, and I look at the teacher, and it was a large class, and she looks at me and she so sees kind of a bit of a panic, and she she said, Don't worry, you know, if you just know one, you could write it down. So I finally I saw four lines, and it said, What are the four gospels? And I thought, I think I may have heard this somewhere. And I went, da-da-da-da-da-da-da, da-da-da-da-da-da-da. And I just kept going, da da. And finally, uh I wrote, well, it was Matthew, Martin, Luther, King. That's what I wrote.

SPEAKER_06 9:51

Oh, is that what you wrote?

SPEAKER_05 9:52

Yes, and I thought I was right. So um I but the my point is I know what it's like to be a blank page, and therefore, to see true authentic Christians, and the kids would help me, the students, they would because I couldn't turn in the Bible anywhere, and they would see when they'd say, Turn in your Bible, and And they helped you, they saw you maybe struggling a little with it. Yeah, totally struggling, and and they would just turn, but nobody made fun of me. And I thought they are being so kind. And then finally, after six months, I asked the teacher, How do I know if I'm a Christian? I think I am. Well, that's I thought I was because I wasn't Jewish, that's all. Oh, okay. And I didn't even know what it meant to be a Christian. And so she said, Well, June, if you're not a Christian, would you be willing to do whatever God would want you to do to become a Christian? I thought, well, what would that be? And finally I thought, okay, if it doesn't work, it doesn't work. But if it does, if it would have worked and I wouldn't pray to receive Jesus as Lord and Son, then I wouldn't have what they have. Whatever those students kept saying made all the difference. They said, June, Christianity is not a religion, it's a relationship with Christ. Now I didn't know what that meant. But what is so wonderful, it was students that drew me to Christ. And yes, there were youth leaders, but I thought, okay, I will humble my heart and receive Jesus as Lord and Savior. They were explaining to me, Lord means master, ruler, owner, giving him control of your life. And I thought, okay, I I'll try and I'll see. And indeed, you did more than that.

SPEAKER_06 11:45

And what's so interesting is now those very moments I I see a connection where you felt lost and people helped you.

SPEAKER_05 11:55

Yes.

SPEAKER_06 11:55

And now you're helping the people that are lost.

SPEAKER_05 12:00

You know, it's interesting you say that. I used to think, God, why didn't you expose me to authentic Christianity? Why why why did I have to wait, you know, so long? And but now I can verbalize what many people really do experience.

SPEAKER_06 12:18

They don't know. You have an empathy for them. Totally. I love that word empathy. That's why you have that's why I think you have done as as well. I mean, y well, my goodness, you've done it all, but no. You've connected with these people because you were there. You were them.

SPEAKER_05 12:36

I definitely was one of them, and yet there was I changed in so many areas except one.

SPEAKER_06 12:43

What was that?

SPEAKER_05 12:45

I couldn't understand forgiveness. How I I did not my dad was cruel. Yes. And he hurt my mom. Yes. And I tried to be her protector, and I had two younger sisters, so I was trying to protect them too. An older brother didn't worry about him, but my goodness, how could I, you know, and I didn't I thought, well, how can you just let somebody off the hook? I mean you just let somebody off the hook who's not repentant, who doesn't ever admit wrong. Who never apologized. Never, never. I never once heard it. Yeah. And so I didn't know what to do with the scriptures because like Colossians 3 13 says, bear with each other and forgive whatever grievance you have against one another, forgive as the Lord forgave you. But I I thought, I can't. I mean, you're just letting him off the hook. He doesn't have to apologize. There's no repentance, no changed attitude. So I j all I could do is just take those scriptures. I didn't say they were wrong. I I wouldn't say that, no, but I just had to put them off on the side.

SPEAKER_06 13:51

Just kind of press pause on that.

SPEAKER_05 13:53

Yeah, and um God knew I was sincere. I was learning, they say hand over fist, you know, whatever. I I was learning volumes, and I saw what God says is true, except I couldn't understand that.

SPEAKER_06 14:10

Forgiveness. And that's what we were scheduled to talk about today. I could ask you so many questions. I could talk to you for a very long time, but we'll just ask you a couple of these because I think people that are listening, many of them have been through trauma. Well, my whole audience mostly. Yeah. Why do you think people have a difficult time forgiving?

SPEAKER_05 14:33

My number one area was how can you let somebody off the hook do when there's no change?

SPEAKER_06 14:43

Right.

SPEAKER_05 14:44

Now that didn't make sense to me. But there are I remember the first time I talked on forgiveness, I said, what do you think forgiveness means? First response, it means being a doormat.

SPEAKER_06 14:58

Really?

SPEAKER_05 14:59

And I went, oh. And uh then the second person said, it means being a weak martyr.

SPEAKER_06 15:07

Also, I wouldn't have expected that.

SPEAKER_05 15:10

No, I I didn't expect at all. If if it meant being a doormat, that would have meant Jesus would have been the a big doormat. Greatest doormat of all. And he forgave those who crucified him from the cross. Right. Father, forgive them. Being a weak martyr, uh, no, it's being strong enough to be Christ-like. So I began to see these objections. It's not fair. Well, that's true. Forgiveness is not fair. Right. Uh in fact, uh, it wasn't fair for Jesus to die on the cross, but he did so so that we could be forgiven. And there are other reasons, but uh but some people say, well, it's waiting for time to heal all wounds. But you as a therapist know time does not heal all wounds. No. So uh the the biggest one that was for me was it's letting the guilty off the hook, but instead, this is what I learned. It's removing the guilty from your hook to God's hook. In other words, uh he says, It's mine to avenge, I will repay.

SPEAKER_06 16:26

That's right.

SPEAKER_05 16:27

So they're not off the hook, they're just off of our emotional hook.

SPEAKER_06 16:31

Right. So you can do other things and be free and open to live a better life. Yes. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 16:38

And so that helped tremendously. Absolutely and um not easy. No, but at least it gave I'm math-oriented, I'm logical, uh just real rational in my thinking. So things needed to make sense to me. And so for him to say it's mine to avenge, he'll deal with that person in his time, in his way. And it really doesn't help for me just to literally be pointing the finger the whole time. And yet that that is what I I really did. I I actually went to my mother, I said, Mother, because dad had just torn her down, cut cut her down, and I and he left the room and I said, Mother, how? How can you be so kind to dad? And she said, Oh honey, he doesn't know the Lord. If he only knew the Lord, he wouldn't be that way. Meaning for him to have allow Jesus to have control of his life. And but she's saying, but that that's what he needs. And uh that that was uh actually life-changing to me because all of a sudden it changed my whole paradigm, the way I thought. Like you reframed it? Mm-hmm. Because I thought, okay, she's not focusing on his fault, she's focusing on his need. His need was to have a changed life through Christ. Right. And I went, oh. And then I remember seeing scripture that made no sense. Love your enemies. I thought, well, that's impossible. Pray for those who persecute you. Yeah. Love your enemies. Well, I didn't know about agape love. Agape love isn't based on emotion, it's based on devotion. It's not emotion. You're devoted enough to do what is in the best interest of the other person. So I remember thinking, huh, okay, love your doing the best for what what could I do? That and dad was always misplacing his he was the president of a company and he had this fat um vinyl red address book with everybody's numbers, and he would call them late at night or whatever. And but he would say at dinner, where's my address book? Where's my address book? And and I thought, I'm gonna find his address book so that if he asks, I will go get it. So I was trying to figure out what I can do. Something kind you can do. I was working on it. Okay. And so I find it, it is in his bedroom, so sure enough, in during dinner, where's my address book? And I said, Dad, I know where it is, I'll go get it. Just very softly. I slid out of my chair, picked it up from his bedroom, brought it in, I just laid it to his side, and he looked at me very strangely, like, well, what's gotten into her? Well, she's doing this nice thing for me. And um, so it's like I started looking not at his fault, but at his need.

SPEAKER_06 19:48

Yes.

SPEAKER_05 19:48

And what could be a benefit. And then I later went to him and I said, I was a youth director now at that time. And I had told the youth and the leaders the most difficult thing for a parent is an ungrateful child.

SPEAKER_06 20:09

It is.

SPEAKER_05 20:10

The most difficult thing is an ungrateful child for a parent. And I thought, where have I because a man asked me, June, what percentage wrong do you think your father was? And what percentage wrong do you think you were? I said, Well, I think he was 98% wrong, and I would be 2%. And he said, Well, aren't you responsible for your 2%? I said, Yes. Yes. Now I didn't know what my 2% was. I hadn't figured that out, but I just knew surely I had, you know. But the point is, then I went to my dad, I said, I have realized I've been an ungrateful daughter. And I've come to ask forgiveness. I've never thanked you for a roof over my head, for food on the table, and books for school. Would you be willing to forgive me?

SPEAKER_06 21:08

What did he say?

SPEAKER_05 21:09

Long pause, and he's looking at me, and finally he says something totally uncharacteristic. The pleasure was all mine, and he went right back to his newspaper, no discussion, and I think. Wow. Uh, but that wasn't his language. The pleasure was all mine. He grew up in a home in Illinois where he uh I later learned after he died that his father would beat his mother and the kids would scatter. Sometimes make it to an uncle's house. If not, he would sleep on a church pew.

SPEAKER_06 21:47

And I makes sense, doesn't it? I uh for the first time. Makes sense. When you see that's why sometimes when I have people come in who've had trauma, I want to do a family history. I do a timeline. And when I start with their earliest memory and you go forward in the timeline, it gives you a wealth of information. And it doesn't excuse by any means the behavior. It gives you a oh context. Now I see why. Not excusing it, never saying it was the right thing, but it makes sense and it helps you to almost have some kind of empathy in a way for that person.

SPEAKER_05 22:24

And that's what it did for me. Yes. Even after he died, for the first time I had some understanding of what he went through.

SPEAKER_06 22:35

Like what was it like for two-year-old him or five-year-old him? Yes. You know, could you imagine? I'm getting towards the end, and I have so much I want to ask you. I'm going to ask you this other question that I think a lot of people are wanting to know. The ones that say, Well, I thought I for I forgave them, but they're still struggling. Like they still have to see that relative at the dinner, or they still have to work alongside the coworker that has lied about them or done something egregious. What would you say to them?

SPEAKER_05 23:09

Well, sometimes they're told, Well, you didn't really forgive. No, you can forgive. But based on the Bible, at times we need to forgive again and again. Yeah. And again, because uh Peter said, How many times should I forgive? And he had a big number. Seven times? Now in Jewish culture, uh, but it's like three times. But the fourth, it's too much. But the bottom line is say he said, so he was being uh big-hearted seven times. Right. And he said, no, uh, Peter, it's seventy times seven. Meaning you don't keep track of the numbers. You keep going. You keep doing it. Whenever there's a need, you forgive again and again. And what that means is you take that person off of your emotional hook and put that person onto God's hook because he says, it's mine to avenge, I will repay. And that so it's not that they get away with it.

SPEAKER_06 24:19

Absolutely not, no, no, no. And they are able to say, okay, I now know that it'll be handled. And isn't it kind of refreshing and kind of, oh, I don't have to handle it.

SPEAKER_05 24:31

Yes. Let him handle it. My responsibility is I am to choose to literally release my resentment. Forgiveness is literally you forgive the debt, you dismiss the debt, two Ds, and you two R's. You release your resentment.

SPEAKER_06 24:59

And if you get stuck somewhere in the middle, you start over and keep going.

SPEAKER_05 25:02

That's right. You do it again, you do it again and again.

SPEAKER_06 25:05

And you're no longer in bondage.

SPEAKER_05 25:07

That's right.

SPEAKER_06 25:08

The bitterness. And that's the thing, if the person is still committing the offense, I think that's where people get in a little difficulty. Um, and your father was still not the nicest, and you still went and got that red address book.

SPEAKER_05 25:25

Yes, I would do whatever, because what mother said was true. He doesn't know the Lord. If he only knew the Lord, he wouldn't be that way. If he had really ever committed his life to Christ, he wouldn't be that way. By the way, nine months before he died, at age 83, no, eighty-six, uh, he prayed for the first time to receive Jesus as Lord and Savior. Really? I had come in from something, he uh from Florida, and he he always liked for me to sing to him. Because you were a singer, yeah. It says here. And so I he wanted me to sing, oh Danny Boy. The pipes, the pipes are calling. So I sing Danny Boy, and I thought, well, let me try this a second time. I tried when I was 25. Now I'm you know twenty eight, no, twenty-nine, and so I present the plan of salvation to him. And um at the end I said, Would you be willing to humble your heart and receive Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior, giving him control of your life? And he said, Yes.

SPEAKER_06 26:44

And you probably fell over at that point.

SPEAKER_05 26:47

I actually the truth is I didn't believe. I thought that he would so I went to mother, I told her what had happened, and I said, Mom, but I just don't know if it's true. And she said, Honey, Billy Graham has tried. All these people have tried. If he did this, it's the first time. And wow, she said, uh, on Wednesday there was a couple, there's a man at our home, and he tried to talk to your father about Jesus, and your father just shut him off and said, if anybody's gonna talk with me about spiritual things, it'll be my daughter June. And I thought, what? I mean, I had no idea. So somehow I think God really used my mother primarily to nurture the soil of his heart. Because she easily could have chosen not to forget. For sure, for sure.

SPEAKER_06 27:41

She was continually and you learned from that then as well.

SPEAKER_05 27:45

Totally, yes.

SPEAKER_06 27:46

Well, I would love to talk to you. I wish we could do this for hours, but unfortunately we can't. You've been a real joy. Thank you for agreeing to talk to me.

SPEAKER_05 27:56

Oh, it was an honor.

SPEAKER_06 27:58

Little old Ohio girl. Love it, love it, love it. Northeast Ohio, Diana. Um, and thank you very, very much. And your book here that I have is Forgiveness, Releasing You Is Freeing Me by June Hunt. Keys for Living series, the Thoughts and Emotions series. This is something I am going to read.

SPEAKER_05 28:19

Wonderful.

SPEAKER_06 28:20

For sure. Thank you. So thank you very much. And if you all have heard some noises here, it's because we are on the floor in a media area of the National Religious Broadcasters Convention. There's a lot of initials. I've been saying it all day, and I want to call it all kinds of I add initials, okay? And that's not what you're supposed to do. So National Religious Broadcasters Convention. So you're hearing all the buzz around here. But it's been very exciting, and thank you very, very much. I really do appreciate it from my heart. Thank you. And I like you. I'm honored. Oh, well, thank you. Hopefully, we can stay in contact. We'll do that. Okay. Thank you for joining us, and we will see you again the next time on the Amp Cast with Aliza ProCop. Bye-bye.

SPEAKER_03 29:09

You've been listening to the Amp Cast with Aliza Marie ProCop. To find out more, go to Ampcounseling.com. You can discover more information about all our services that we offer. Be sure to follow our social media platforms using the icons at the bottom of the page. Don't forget to check out our show notes for today's episode, where we will have links and contact info for today's guests. Well, that's all the time we have for this episode. Thanks for joining us, and we will see you next time for another edition of the Amp Cast with Elisa Marie Pro Cop Dealing and Healing from Trauma.