Let’s say someone hurt you. Not in a “they forgot your birthday” kind of way, but in a “they gaslit you, lied about it and are now pretending like nothing ever happened” kind of way. And now, they’re texting. Or sliding into your DMs. Or showing up at mutual events with a sheepish smile and zero acknowledgment of what they did. Cue the Christian guilt spiral: Am I supposed to be the bigger person? Is this what forgiveness looks like? Am I being unloving if I keep my distance?
Here’s the thing no one tells you when they slap a “just forgive them” sticker on your trauma: Forgiveness is not the same as reconciliation.
Dr. Tim Keller, the late pastor and author of Forgive, put it this way in an interview with RELEVANT: “Forgiveness is not the opposite of doing justice. Forgiveness is not only not a contradiction of pursuing justice; it’s actually a precondition for pursuing justice. Because if you don’t forgive before you start to pursue justice, you’ll actually be pursuing vengeance.”
In other words, forgiveness helps you let go of bitterness so you can move forward without trying to settle the score. But that doesn’t mean you have to keep someone in your life who refuses to own their wrongs.
Forgiveness is something you can do alone. Reconciliation is a team sport.
Even Jesus makes the distinction clear. In Luke 17:3, he says, “If your brother or sister sins against you, rebuke them; and if they repent, forgive them.” Notice the order. Rebuke, then repentance, then forgiveness. That’s not vindictive — that’s healthy. Without repentance, reconciliation isn’t restoration. It’s just pretending.
Keller told a story about a woman who forgave her verbally abusive father but set a firm boundary: if he started yelling, she’d hang up the phone.
“I forgive you,” she told him, “but I won’t let you keep doing this.”
That’s not bitterness. That’s wisdom.
“You have to earn the trust,” Keller said. “You have to do something if we’re going to be reconciled.”
So what do you do when someone wants reconciliation without accountability? You keep your peace. You forgive them internally — so they don’t control you emotionally — but you don’t have to let them back in until they’re ready to name the harm and do the work. As Proverbs 4:23 reminds us, “Above all else, guard your heart.”
This is especially relevant in church settings, where forgiveness has too often been weaponized to silence victims. Keller noted this tragic pattern:
“What a lot of people have done in the church is they’ve used forgiveness to silence victims,” he said. “And if you felt like that, then you leave the church and feel like, ‘I just can never trust the church again.’”
But real forgiveness isn’t about pretending nothing happened. In fact, Keller said, the first step in forgiveness is naming the evil.
“You can’t forgive something unless you admit that it was an evil,” he said. “The difference between forgiveness and excusing is a very big difference.”
Ignoring harm in the name of “moving on” doesn’t make you holy. It just makes you hurt longer.
Paul writes in Romans 12:18, “If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.” That little qualifier — as far as it depends on you — is everything. You can forgive. You can be open to reconciliation. But you are not required to restore a relationship with someone who refuses to change. Peace does not require proximity.
So if someone hurt you, never owned it and now expects a warm welcome back into your life — you don’t have to say yes. You can forgive. You can wish them well. But reconciliation without repentance is just a doormat with a halo.
Forgiveness is obedience. Trust is wisdom. And reconciliation? That’s only possible if both people are doing the work.
Let peace be the fruit of truth — not a substitute for it.
