Breaking Generational Cycles: Brant Hansen

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Breaking Generational Cycles

Guest:Brant Hansen

From the series:Fatherhood and Forgiveness (Day 2 of 2)

Air date:December 10, 2024

Brant: Living a healthy life is going to be dependent on—no matter what you’ve gone through with your parents—ultimately, you have to forgive even your enemies. And I’m so tragic that they turned out to be your enemy maybe; but that’s the work in front of us, and it frees us.

Ann: Welcome to FamilyLife Today, where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I’m Ann Wilson.

Dave:And I’m Dave Wilson. And you can find us at FamilyLifeToday.com. This is FamilyLife Today.

Dave: Alright, so we’ve talked about this here before; but everybody brings luggage into their marriage—

Ann: —from their past.

Dave: We’ve got Brant Hansen here today. Brant, I want to know what luggage you brought in. But here’s my thought: “Wouldn’t it be cool if, at a real wedding, the groom and bride walked up; and they had all these bags. They just sat them beside each other as they stood in front of the pastor.” Don’t you think that’d be funny?

Ann: No.

Dave: He’s got these big bags, and she’s got little bags; and you’re like, “What is that?” It’s like: “Ah, that’s what you’re bringing in”; and nobody knows that. But once you get married, after a couple of weeks, you’re like, “What is that?!” We bring it.

Brant: But there’s a hint that there’s luggage, right? Because traditionally, you have maybe

100 people or 200 people gathered to watch you take a vow, to witness you take a vow. That’s an indicator, early on: “This is not easy.” If you think about it: “Why would you need witnesses?—

Dave: —you need to make a promise.

Brant: —‘I want you to remember you took a vow.’” You don’t have to do that for other stuff that’s going to be easy, so that should be an indicator.

Ann: Ah, I never thought of that before: “This is a big deal.”

Brant: “Must be”; yeah.

Ann: Yeah, you’re going to make this promise and vow before all of these people.

Brant: “We saw you do it.” You don’t do that when it comes to going to an amusement park:—

Ann: —buying a house.

Brant: “I’m going to take a vow to go to the amusement park.” That may be a lot easier—you don’t have to do that—but a vow: “It must be challenging.”

Dave: But the funny thing is—it’s not funny at all—once you get married, and you start to see some of the stuff we bring in, that’s where it gets hard. It’s like, “I didn’t know, and neither did you, that marriage would be awesome; but it’s also really, really difficult.”

Ann: Exactly.

Dave: And that’s why we’re here. We’re here to help you/to help all of us do marriage the way God wants us to do it. And let me tell you: when we do it the way God wants, it can be incredible. But I got to tell you—I just want to pause for a moment and remind you—that everything we do, here at FamilyLife, is only possible because of people, just like you, and your generosity. You’re praying for us; but especially, as you give to us financially, that keeps this ministry going and allowing us to bring hope, and truth, and realness to families like yours that are in need.

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Dave: Okay, Brant, we talked yesterday. One of the bags I brought—and it wasn’t a carry on; it was being moved by four trucks.

Ann: —a trunk.

Dave: And it’s overweight. And the plane’s like: “We won’t get off the ground with this bag”; that’s how big it was. I brought a father wound into our marriage, not even knowing what it was. I had never heard the term, “father wound,” till we were probably married ten years.

Ann: But I also think of what Jesus has done in and through both of us. And isn’t He sweet—

Dave: Oh, it’s amazing.

Ann: —that He opens our trunk, and our bag, and He says, “I can work with that. I can do something with that—all that pain—and I can even help you.” And here’s where we’re going to go today: Forgive. Whew!

Dave: Yeah; part of what God can do with that requires our participation. So yesterday—and if you missed yesterday—go back and listen, because this conversation won’t make sense if you don’t understand the background. But we’ve talked about some of the hurts and wounds we carry from our dads; and our kids have them, too. But going on the journey to forgive. So Brant, talk about that journey for you.

Brant: Well, you realize something—if you go through stuff, growing up, or you have difficult dysfunction in your family of origin—”I may be saddled with this for the rest of my life unless I forgive. This may define me.”

Ann: Wait, wait, wait. But people are like, “No, I don’t even think about it anymore. I don’t even think about that person because of what they’ve done.”

Brant: I doubt that is the healthiest way—”I don’t even acknowledge that I just went through all of that,”—even then, I think we’re kidding ourselves. There’s something very difficult sounding about it for a lot of people, like, “You do not realize,”—I’m listening to this—”You don’t know the trauma that I went through.” And it’s like: “No, we don’t; we don’t. I only know mine; you know yours.” There’s various levels and things people have gone through.

However, biblically, we know this: we have to forgive even our enemies. And the sad thing is that someone—who should have been your best defender, or most nurturing person, or a combination—wound up being an enemy. But still, the reason you do it isn’t because they deserve it. That’s the problem, too; it’s like: “Well, my dad doesn’t deserve it,” or “My mom…” Do you realize it’s not about whether they deserve it or not; it’s about the fact that you didn’t deserve it. If you’re somebody, who follows Jesus, and you believe in His forgiveness for you and what He’s done on the cross, that is what we’re supposed to extend to other people—even to enemies: people who persecute us, people who insult us, people who have abused us—and it’s an opportunity, honestly, to be free.

Ann: That’s what I was going to ask: “Why?” I mean, this is a big deal; Jesus talked about it quite a bit.

Brant: Yes.

Ann: And why did He?

Brant: Yes, because this is the way to freedom. This is our chance to, as an act of worship to God, saying, “Thank You for what You’ve done for me. Now, I’m going to do this for this person who failed as a parent.”

It may be, in your case—could be any number of things—but without that, you’re honestly still being affected by them. I really mean it’s the way to freedom. Because if you think about it—people will ask me, when I talk about this approach in Unoffendable, about letting go of anger—that’s really what forgiveness is. It’s letting go of your right to anger against this person in spite of what they’ve done. But people will say, “Okay, does that mean I have to stay in a relationship with this abusive person or this horrible situation?” No, it doesn’t. No, that’s not what forgiveness is; you can still have boundaries.

That said, if you don’t forgive this person, you are staying in relationship with them for the rest of your life. So this is the way out. This is a way to health and freedom. Jesus knows how we’re made. He knows us best, and He’s telling us: “This is the way to live.” It’s not an option if you’re somebody who’s a Jesus-follower. And it’s actually a brilliant way to deal with parental wounds so that it doesn’t infect the rest of your life.

Ann: Yeah; did you guys—I’m looking at both of you—”Did you guys have symptoms of unforgiveness before you actually went through the process of forgiving your dads?”

Brant: I’ll let you go first, Dave. It’s your show; I’d like to stall.

Dave: Well, I was thinking Ann could tell you the symptoms.

Ann: I’m thinking of listeners thinking, “Do I have any unforgiveness?”

Dave: Yeah; and again, I didn’t realize it was connected to the wound. But yeah, I had anger. Ann said to me one day, early in our marriage, “I’m just never going to bring up stuff in our marriage anymore, because all you do is blow up.” I’m not kidding; I said, “What are you talking about?!” And she goes, “Just like that—Exhibit A—you just blew up again, because I said I’m not going to bring it up.”

Ann: Or it could be simple things—like we were wallpapering one time—this is probably years ago.

Dave: Well, everybody gets angry when they wallpaper.

Ann: But that’s what I’m saying. This is—out of a 0 to 10 [scale]—10 being really hot rage. I mean, it was like the thing fell off—and I get it; I’ve done it before—it’s so frustrating. But you would be at a 10 when, “Hey, it’s just a 5 kind of thing.”

Dave: —which is, as I studied anger—and again, I’m in my, probably, early 30s then—I didn’t even know there’s types of anger. [Anger] is a second emotion; it’s usually not tied to what’s going on. I’m like, “Oh, displaced is anger in this situation from another/displaced from another [situation]. And then, chronic is displaced; but it’s at a high level that’s connected to something. Maybe it didn’t happen this morning or last week; but ten years ago.

It was like a revelation: “I’ve got chronic anger, and it’s connected to my dad. I’m not blaming my dad; I got to deal with this.” But it’s connected to that. So yeah, there were symptoms that I realized, as a young father, with babies in the house, “I got to get a handle on this or it’s going—

Ann: —“or it’s going to handle me.”

Dave: We talked about that yesterday; it’s like: “I got to go on a journey now quick, or I’m going to repeat the sins of my father. Whether I want to or not, it’s going to happen. I got to stop it.” And so that’s why I say: “God can do it; but He says, ‘You got to go with Me on this journey. You got to be willing to participate, or we’re never going to get there.’”

Brant: Well, anger will poison your relationships. It comes out towards other people in ways that you don’t necessarily see and makes you prone to fall into foolishness and stuff that’ll kill you. We know—talk to any addictions’ counselor—when you’re at your worst: hurt, angry, lonely, tired—that’s when your will really suffers. So to be in perpetual deep anger, it’s going to crop up in other ways, too. It also—we know this, physiologically—spending your life, without forgiving people—we know this—it will destroy your insides. It causes your cortisol level to stay high: that causes weight gain; that causes your heart to have problems; that causes you to have skin problems, even like your adrenaline or cortisol. But we know this now, cortisol actually increases your appetite, too; so we eat more than we should.

Imagine what an angry culture, that doesn’t practice forgiveness, might have problems with physical stuff, like crazy; manifesting it in pretty obvious ways. Unfortunately, we’re not taught this. What we’re taught—unfortunately, in a lot of churches—and I know: look, I grew up this way, too. I was taught that you can have righteous anger, and you should keep righteous anger. So what could be more righteous than: “Look what I went through. This person’s obviously wrong! I mean, I should hold onto that, right? I mean, that was really horrible”?

People who are listening went through worse stuff than I did, as a kid. But that’s not a thing in Scripture. There is no separate category for humans of righteous anger. Only God’s anger is righteous in the Bible. We can get angry, like you said, it’s like a dashboard light that tells us something’s wrong: “Something’s wrong. That should not have happened.” And you’re right; it shouldn’t.

But it also tells us we got to get to work on the forgiveness thing. So we’re told to get rid of anger before the sun goes down, because it will have this deleterious effect on our physiognomy. We’re told so, consistently, to get rid of it. “Anger resides in the lap of fools,” it says. Every Psalm—every Proverb, I should say—about anger is negative. It’s not in the fruit of the Spirit; it’s in all the other lists. So this is something that you can’t continue to live with.

Allowing a parent—if it’s a parent wound and allowing unforgiveness to persist—that is poisoning your life for the rest of your life. You’re still giving them power over you. And that’s what I realized, I think as a young adult: “I can continue to be angry about this; this can define me. This can define me and drive me the rest of my life.” And it might even drive me to accomplish great things somehow—like important impressive things—I know it does for some people.

Dave: —”I’ll show you”; yeah.

Brant: You know that from football; that anger can like: “Wow, that linebacker hits harder than he probably should.”

Dave: “He thinks I’m his dad.”

Brant: There’s a lot of that going on. You talk to football players; they’ll tell you that, right? There’s a lot of that unreconciled anger thing going on.

Ann: What do you mean by “giving them power over you”?

Brant: Well, because now they’re still in your head constantly; or they are poised, and that anger is leaking out into other relationships; or it is costing me physically, even emotionally: “I’m not growing up because I’m stuck with this.”

Ann: It’s almost like they’re still in the room.

Brant: They’re still in the room.

Dave: That’s what I was going to say. I was going to say: “When I was in that angry—and it was a state of life for me—it’s like my dad was living in our house!”

Brant: That’s exactly right.

Dave: I brought him into our house, said, “Live right here.”

Brant: And now, it’s torpedoing your marriage. And now, she has to live with your dad’s—

Ann: That’s interesting.

Brant: —characteristics, hovering over.

The same thing could happen in our marriage—for everybody’s marriage—but through forgiving, now, I’m charting a different path. I’m not angry with them; I’m free to think clearly. It’s not dragging me down. It actually helps me grow up, as a believer. It’s healthy.

Dave: How’d you get there? What’d your journey look like?

Brant: I think that was part of it was going, “Wait a second. Even as a young adult: ‘I don’t want this to define the rest of my life; it can’t.’ It’s actually an act of having these boundaries to say, ‘You know what? You got the first however many years; but from now on, that’s not going to be the way it is. I have my own life.’”

I know you can relate to this. That was a conscious thought for me, was, “God bless you. I hope the rest of your life is awesome.” You set up your own boundaries about how to interact and communicate or whatever. “But the rest of my life is not going to be like that. You don’t get that control. You don’t get to have that space.”

Dave: I mean, what a great way—I’ve never heard anybody say it quite like that—”You got the first 15; I get the next 60”—or whatever.

Ann: Yeah, that’s good.

Brant: “Yeah, you did.”

Dave: And some people will be like, “Well, he got the first 20.” Okay;—

Brant: Some people will say,—

Dave: —”you get the next—

Brant: “Wait; she got the first 50 years of my life. I’ve been defined by her controlling,”—it could be a controlling mom that’s got personality issues, or a dad—but you, literally, can say, “Okay, the next 50 is on/I got this. So we’re going to do it this way now.” Maybe, if they still have access to you 24/7, you say, “No, it’s not going to work like that. From now on, this is how…”

Dave: Set the boundaries.

Brant: Yes; and again, that’s not unforgiveness. You still love them; you want the best for them. You pray for them; pray for them. And if that’s like: “I can’t do that”; I know that sounds really hard: “Try it.”

Ann: I remember somebody saying that. It’s like, when Jesus said, “Bless those who curse you.” I’m sitting there, thinking, I heard it was a pastor. He said, can you bless and wish them well and bless them? And I remember I was so angry at this person; I was like, “I don’t want to bless them. I want/I want harm to come to them; you know what I mean? It’s what we talked about: “They deserve..”—and you could go through the whole thing/bad things to happen as a result of what they’ve done to me. I remember that was this little defining moment: “Could I bless them and wish them well?” Whew! That hard!

Brant: It’s hard. But tell you what: it gets easier over time.

Dave: What do you mean?

Brant: Just like—well, I keep coming back to sports with you—

Dave: You don’t need to do that.

Ann: I wonder why!

Brant: How many 7-step drops did you practice as a quarterback?

Ann: I’m very impressed that you know that term.

Dave: I was a scrambler; I didn’t go 7.

Brant:Okay, okay; alright, alright.

Dave: But yeah, you’re right. I mean—

Brant: —over, and over,—

Dave: —over and over.

Brant: —so that you don’t have to think about it anymore; it’s become second nature.

The way of Jesus is this way. I encourage people—if you’re like: “I just can’t because what I went through, I can’t pray for this parent,”—or whatever. “Okay, let’s start”—and I’m not joking; it sounds like a joke—”let’s start with traffic. Let’s start with blessing people in traffic.” I’m serious!

Dave: Oh, you just went too far, Brant.

Brant: I know; I know. This is a sore spot for you.

Dave: I can’t do that; ask my wife. I am the worst.

Brant: I know; I know. But—

Ann: I like it.

Brant: Yes, so that’s a fairly low-leverage possibility. Somebody cuts you off; or somebody’s too slow; or somebody—literally: “What is that person going through?” Can you say, “Lord, please bless that person’s family.” Or if they’re driving angrily—this person’s obviously toxic, or in a horrible hurry; something’s wrong—”Please bless that guy.” I’m telling you: it sounds so hard at first; it becomes easier.

Ann: It’s practice.

Dave: It’s like practicing the presence [of Christ].

Brant: You practice it. And the reason you practice it is because—just like with free throws; eventually, you practice 10,000 free throws—now, you’re in the game; you just do it without thinking. It becomes a way of life; it gets easier. The way of Jesus is easier than not following the way of Jesus; I’m convinced of it. What He is telling us about forgiveness—it’s a better way of life—a forgiving way of life.

Ann: “My burden is light,”—

Brant: Yes; right! And He meant it. “Easier” He said [paraphrase], “It’s easier to follow Jesus than not follow Jesus.” That’s the little secret. It’s still hard, sometimes; but it’s easier. Think about a life, where you’re forgiving people, versus a life of unforgiveness. You tell me: “What’s an easier life?” You can be upset at everybody all the time if you want, constantly. Just turn on the news—the news of your choice—and you can be angry 24/7. Not only that, but your parents, your neighbors; or a way of life that’s forgiving. And see if that doesn’t—that, also, just breathes life into the people around you; because, now, you’re not as upset all the time. You’re able to think more clearly; it’s healthier. Jesus is telling this because He knows what He’s talking about.

Ann: So we start out, maybe with traffic,—

Brant: Honestly, yeah.

Ann: —blessing people. That could be a first step; and then, what?

Dave: That’s my assignment for today.

Ann: I said to Dave the other day—

Dave: I can’t imagine doing that.

Brant: I know; it sounds so weird—but even people working alongside the road, or somebody who’s just standing there randomly—they didn’t do anything to you; but you could honestly say, “Lord, please bless that lady today.” I’m telling you: it will change you.

Ann: Dave and I were coming into the studio—

Dave: When? Today?

Ann: —yesterday. And there was somebody driving so slow, like ten miles an hour. He’s like, “What is happening?” I’m like, “Maybe she just got out of surgery. She could have this—

Dave: That’s what she said. Brad, she’s like you.

Ann: —“could have a cast on her leg. We don’t know what’s/she could have had tragic news.”

Dave: You said that: “Maybe, her leg is broken; she can’t push the accelerator.”

Brant: Okay.

Dave: I’m going to whip around her and get here on time. But—

Brant:Well, this sounds unrealistic—and none of us are perfect—but you do change over time.

Ann: You do.

Brant: You do. And this is the way to become more like Jesus; it’s by practicing the stuff that He actually told us to do.

Dave: Well, the thing you said earlier—that I was shocked by, still to this day—I still marvel at this: “When you truly forgive someone, who doesn’t deserve it—just like we were forgiven, and we didn’t deserve it—on the other side of that choice is what you said earlier; ‘Freedom; there’s a freedom.’”

I used to say to the men at our church: “I don’t think I was free to become the man, the husband, the dad God wanted me to be—that God created me to be; that God could shape me to be—I don’t think I was free to be that guy until I went through this process of cutting the chain to my dad, to say, “I’m going to love him. I’m going to forgive him.” And like you said—didn’t mean we’re going to have this perfect little relationship—but I’m going to set him free, not realizing I was the prisoner; and I’m the one who experienced the freedom. Now, I’m able to live a totally different life because I made that hard, hard choice. But God gives us—it’s like you said—it’s the ticket to a new life.

Brant: It is. And it doesn’t mean—again, your boundary may mean they don’t have access to you at all anymore—it may have to come to that. But you can still forgive them and do that. It’s about not harboring anger towards them; and it’s good for you to forgive, and practice this thing. It’s going to be good for you so that you can wind up—think of all the people who’ve been blessed by what you guys do—and when I say “blessed,” it sounds like a Christian-y thing to say; but there’s not a really good other word for it. It’s like, when you’re blessing someone, you’re adding value to their lives—you’re not subtracting it; that’s a curse—you’ve added value to people’s lives. You’re able to do that because of this freedom; because you’re not consumed by your dad—by living like him, or living opposite him, or whatever—it’s just like you’ve moved, because of forgiveness, you’re able to move into who you could be.

Ann: Yeah, that’s good. Okay, so what’s another step? If somebody feels like: “I want to; I’m going to start practicing this. Now what?”

Brant: Well, okay. I think it’s really important, in the morning, to decide you’re going to forgive people, in advance, because of what God has done for you. Remember, it’s not dependent on them apologizing; most people won’t apologize. Most people don’t deserve forgiveness, but that’s the whole point. So if you decide, ahead of time: “I’m not going to be shocked; somebody’s going to cut me off again.” There’s going to be the slow lady, with the broken leg, again, Dave.

Dave: So now, she has a broken leg; an amputee.

Brant: So we don’t know; but we do know that that’s going to exist today for us. So I’m going to forgive people, in advance; I’m not going to be shocked by human nature every day—constantly churning against humans—people are going to do that stuff.

Ann: Just watch the news, or get on a newsfeed, or social media.

Dave: Why are we surprised? We do it, too! We hurt others.

Brant: Two brothers were born to Adam and Eve—look how that worked out—humans have a problem. We should know that; if we’re Jesus-people, we know this; I think that’s a big part of it.

And asking God for the grace. We, literally, run on grace; it’s like jet fuel. Ask Him for the grace to burn today to forgive people—from Him, through you, towards others—again, this is about us changing. No, it’s not easy at first; but it gets better. It becomes a way of life, and people are going to notice that you’re at peace.

Dave: Do you feel like—if we hold onto bitterness, and resentment, and unforgiveness—we’re just not going to forgive; or we can’t: we just feel like, “I can’t.” Do you feel like it stunts our spiritual walk with God?

One of the reasons I ask you that is we have a son, who will be praying with someone, and say, “Hey,”—and he’s told me this—“so what do you feel like God’s saying to you?” And they say, “I can’t hear God; I never can hear God.” And every time, he says—I look at him, and say, “Do you have unforgiveness in your life?”—and they’re like, “What?” “There’s somebody in your life you haven’t forgiven; you know you need to?” He says, “One hundred percent of the time, they say, ‘Yes.’” He goes, “I think there’s a connection between being able to sense, even as you’re reading the Word of God, it coming alive to you.” He goes, “I think there’s a connection between unforgiveness and—

Ann: You think it puts a little kink in the connection?

Dave:Yeah; it’s like—

Brant:Absolutely, it does.

Dave: —you’re not going to hear the voice of God. You’re not going to be able to take the next step, spiritually, if you hold onto this. It’s like you got to let go.

Brant: Yeah, and those are just the words of Jesus. He’s the most brilliant man who ever lived, in addition to being God in the flesh, walking among us. But when He tells us to do this, we can say—you can listen to me on the radio, or you guys, and say—“Well, you just don’t understand my background.” Okay, but Jesus does; and this is what He told you to do, and it’s for our good. So I highly encourage that: living a healthy life is going to be dependent on, no matter what you’ve gone through with your parents, ultimately, you have to forgive even your enemies. And it’s so tragic that they turned out to be your enemy, maybe. But that’s the work in front of us, and it frees us.

Ann: Brant, I’m thinking about where we started yesterday, as you shared the journey with your dad. Did you ever tell him that you forgave him?

Brant: Oh, yeah.

Ann: How’d that go? Take us back to that time.

Brant: I think that’s a struggle for him; it keeps coming up. But I have told him, repeatedly, that: “Those days are over,”—like—“Finish strong.” He has to live with his own regrets, too. And so my position is: “When we talk, that’s not on the table anymore; we’re done with that. Let’s talk…” I’d rather talk about—

Ann: You don’t keep bringing it up.

Brant: No, we talk about the Cardinals or something; anything else. I told him that—

Ann: “We’re done talking about that.”

Brant: Yeah; that is not—“We are going to finish strong,”—is what’s going to happen. Everybody’s relationship can be different; you have to set up different boundaries and whatnot. But in that case, that’s what we’ve done.

But even in the case, where your parent has passed on, that forgiveness still needs to happen; and that’s between you and God. Again, it’s not even about the person, in a way, it’s so that you’re free. You do it, out of thankfulness, as an act of worship to God; because of what He’s done for you.

Dave: And I’ll close with this, Brant: “Way to go.”

Brant: Oh, thanks.

Dave: Seriously, hearing your story—I don’t, obviously, know your dad, but hearing your story and your brother—that’s a manly choice. Talk about being a man—it’s not about big biceps—it’s about big forgiveness in a lot of ways. And so the way you love Carolyn and your kids is totally different because you went on a journey. Way to go.

Brant: Thanks, man.

Brant: Hey, my name is Brant Hansen. I’m an author, and a radio guy, and a big fan of this ministry. I’m a fan of what Dave and Ann do on FamilyLife, the way they honestly talk about things and the way they point to the kingdom of God. There’s not much in our culture like this; it’s such a refreshing thing. I wanted to let you know, if you want to donate to support it, it would be wonderful; all this month, your donation gets doubled. And that’s a huge thing to support this ministry. If you can’t, totally understand; but if you are in a place where you could do that, thanks for locking arms with FamilyLife this month and making this incredibly important ministry happen; you will be making a difference.

Ann: We love Brant Hansen.

Brant: Yes, we do.

Ann: But I love, too, that—not only will your gift be doubled, up to $2.5 million—but we have a holiday bundle that we want to send to you.

Dave: Who doesn’t like a holiday bundle?

Ann: I love—and you’re going to love these books—one is Our Faithful God Devotional, which is this beautiful 52 Weeks of Leaning on His Unchanging Character by Katie Davis Majors; and also the other one. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen any of the books that Ruth Chou Simons have done, but they’re beautifully artistically done. This is a children’s book, which is called Home Is Right Where You Are; it’s inspired by Psalm 23. It is a gorgeous book that we want to give you.

Dave: You can go to FamilyLifeToday.com and make a donation there, and we’ll send you these books. Or if you want to give us a call, just call us at 800-358-6329. Again, the number is 800-F as in Family, L as in Life, and then the word, TODAY.

Ann: So coming up tomorrow, Dave and I are going to be talking about gift-giving stress.

Dave: —the story of my Christmas, right there; don’t miss that one.

Ann: And we’ll see you back next time for another edition of FamilyLife Today.

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