Are there times when we shouldn’t forgive? When hurts or wrongdoing are chronic and deep, you may find yourself in the position of wondering whether you should forgive at all.

Doing Fresh Start divorce recovery seminars around the country, I run into this question all the time. People are dealing with hurts that go well beyond their human ability to forgive. “Why should I forgive him?” I’ll hear. “He’ll just think that what he did was okay. Maybe if I don’t forgive him, it’ll teach him a lesson.”

Certainly God wants us to forgive and be reconciled, even when the wounds are deep. But there are some legitimate parameters regarding how we do this.

A woman stalked up to me angrily after I had spoken about forgiveness at a seminar for separated and divorced people. “You Christians are all alike,” she ranted. “You judge me and tell me what I should do, but you don’t have to live in my shoes!”

“Back up,” I begged. “What do you think you heard me say?”

“You told me that I needed to forgive my husband and be reconciled. But he was abusive to me for years. I took the abuse far too long because my pastor told me I should submit. Then when I saw him begin to abuse my children as well, I gathered the courage to leave him for good. Now you tell me I have to forgive him as if it never happened.”

I thanked this woman for coming to me immediately and not walking away with a misconception; I needed to clarify some things. When wrongdoing is chronic, reconciliation is difficult and perhaps inadvisable.

We can forgive within our spirits, but the full restoration of a relationship requires the commitment of both parties. Forgiveness means that we don’t harbor ill will toward the person who wronged us, but it does not mean that the wrong was right.

Here’s a trivial but helpful example. I have a friend who is always late. Before I knew this about him, I offered to carpool with him to church on Sunday mornings. The first time he was to pick me up, he arrived about a half hour late, making us a half hour late to church. Well, I’m one of those people who really wants to be on time, or even early, so I let my friend know how I felt. He apologized and offered to make it up to me by driving next week, promising to be early.

As you might guess, he was a half hour late again but apologized profusely, promising that he’d never let it happen again. He even offered to come an hour early the next week and treat me to breakfast at a diner on the way to church. Not only did we miss breakfast the next week, but we were late to church again.

Do I need to forgive my friend for being late? Yes. I need to accept his sincere apology. I should not let his chronic tardiness destroy our friendship. He feels terrible about this, and I should release him from his debt to me. Yes, he made me late to church a few times, but that cannot be undone. I choose not to hold a grudge against him, which would only wreck a relationship and poison my spirit.

But will I let him pick me up for church next week? No, thank you. I’ll drive myself to church. So it is in marriage, when there is chronic abuse, lying, or affairs. Wronged partners need to get to a point of forgiving their spouses, but they should also take steps to get out of the position where they can be hurt deeply again.

As a Christian, I believe wholeheartedly in the sacredness of the marriage commitment. But I also believe that there are times when an abused partner must separate himself or herself for protection and perspective. It’s a simple issue of safety.

If a wife is being physically abused by her husband, she should move out —and then work toward reconciliation through counseling. I recommend that an abused spouse not return until there is strong evidence of behavioral changes in the abusive spouse.

If your spouse repeatedly has affairs, it is not your Christian duty to ignore the problem, to “forgive and forget.” Your errant spouse is violating the marriage commitment, and you need to stand up for those promises you both made. If your partner is truly repentant, you need to work through the forgiveness process together, demanding an end to the infidelity.

How can you tell if your spouse is truly repentant? You need more than an apology (although it starts there). Your spouse should take strong steps away from the misbehavior and toward the marriage —cutting off ties with the other person, staying out of tempting situations, agreeing to counseling, committing time and energy to you. If your spouse is not wiling to offer these fruits of repentance, you should question his or her sincerity and take steps to protect yourself from future infidelities.

If your partner continues to break your marriage vows, you may need to attend to your own safety by putting some distance in the relationship —if not moving out, maybe moving to a different bedroom (especially with the possibility of sexually transmitted diseases). You’re still committed to the marriage, but your spouse is flouting that commitment. You’re saying, in essence, “Meet me here at the altar of our sacred marriage vows. But if you have no interest in that, I need to look out for my own well-being.”

In cases of chronic lying, you may not have grounds to leave the person, but you want to make sure you protect yourself from hurt. You simply cannot trust your spouse’s word, so you’ll need to rely on others for reality checks. Don’t feel guilty for double-checking and verifying the stories of your lying partner.

If he or she says, “Would I lie to you?” your appropriate response is, “Yes, you have done so on many occasions, and I can’t afford to trust your word anymore.” It is hard to maintain a relationship without trust, so you will almost certainly need counseling to restore a healthy relationship.

There are many chronic behaviors that are less damaging, but still annoying. Your spouse may be late or disorganized or forgetful or rude. Good communication is crucial in dealing with such issues. You must let your spouse know how much the offensive behavior hurts you. While you do not expect perfection, you do expect effort, and you hope for improvement.

One problem with a lot of chronic behavior in marriage is that both partners get used to it. The offending spouse gets tired of asking for forgiveness and the offended spouse gets tired of raising the issue. So the behavior continues, and grudges grow. Steady communication keeps the issue on the surface, where it can be dealt with.

Another problem is that the apology-and-forgiveness process can be watered down. When the problem is chronic, the words “I’m sorry” and “I forgive you” are repeated so often that they can be misunderstood.

“I’m sorry” can begin to mean “I’m sorry that you’re upset about this (but hey, that’s just the way I am).”

It should mean “I was wrong; I’ll do everything possible not to do it again.”

“I forgive you” can be understood as “It’s all right; no problem; no damage done.”

It should mean “Yes, you hurt me, but I will not let that action poison our relationship.”

Whether the offense is as major as an extramarital affair or as minor as leaving the cap off the toothpaste, the full process of forgiveness requires repentance rather than excuse.