The Best Write Off
Having just closed out 2025, I’m sure a lot of people were looking for last-minute tax write-offs. There’s a double blessing in getting tax relief while giving to our favorite charity—or perhaps our church. However, there is another kind of write-off that potentially has even greater benefits. I’m talking about writing off the hurtful things people have done to us or said about us.
Coming into the Christmas season, I was made painfully aware of numerous family dramas as well as other relationship situations involving unforgiveness. In 1 Corinthians 13 it says that love keeps no record of wrongs. Forgiveness is the central theme of Christianity. Jesus went so far as to say that if we do not forgive people who have sinned against us, we will not be forgiven by God. This makes me wonder if people truly understand the serious consequences of unforgiveness.
The best thing to do is to write off the offense—whatever it is. Please understand, I’m not making light of the many ways people hurt us. I’ve been in a position of leadership for the last 45 years, and I understand the necessity of forgiving people. At times, I’ve felt like a human piñata. I’ve had lots of practice exercising my forgiveness muscles. Some of the things people have done to me and said about me were absolutely horrible. My family suffered, my kids suffered, my wife suffered, and I ended up in therapy at one point in my life. People can be brutal.
To forgive someone who caused us pain and suffering violates our sense of justice. We might think, as I have, “Why should I forgive them? What they did was evil.” That may be true, but in God’s kingdom the only way evil can be defeated is with an act of love.
One of the greatest stories of forgiveness is recorded in Genesis chapters 39–45. Without going through the whole story, Joseph’s 11 brothers did him dirty. Their actions caused Joseph 13 years of pain and suffering. Through an act of God’s providence, Joseph was promoted to prime minister of Egypt. As prime minister, Joseph had the opportunity to exact revenge on his brothers.
Joseph wrestled with forgiveness. He wanted to forgive his brothers, but he clearly struggled. Finally, after a series of dramatic events that took a couple of years, he decided it was time to forgive them. Genesis 45:1–2 records it this way: “So there was no one with Joseph when he made himself known to his brothers. And he wept so loudly that the Egyptians heard him, and Pharaoh’s household heard about it.”
What Joseph’s brothers and the Egyptians heard was a man forgiving. No one ever said it was easy—but it is necessary. When we harbor bitterness and unforgiveness in our hearts, it takes a toll on us and on everyone around us. It begins to shrivel our soul. Not forgiving has a snowball effect. Bitterness grows exponentially, and pretty soon we don’t even recognize what we’ve become.
We can choose to write a person off, or we can choose to write off their offense against us. Is there someone you’ve written off? Someone you haven’t forgiven and have no intention of forgiving? As we begin the new year, why not write off their sin against you? Breaking the cycle of unforgiveness has the potential to impact an entire family system.
Get the unforgiveness monkey off your back and start the new year with a new heart. If you choose to forgive, God will help you—and more importantly, God will bless you.
Happy New Year,
Steve