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Have you ever struggled with how to talk about the people who have hurt you? Maybe you’ve heard words like abuser, narcissist, toxic, or even wicked used to describe someone who caused harm in a story. And while those words might hold truth, something about assigning them so definitively makes you pause. It feels like a sentencing, like a line drawn in permanent ink between “us” and “them.”
I’ve wrestled with this too. Because the truth is, I’ve been on both sides of harm.
I have been hurt by people I love. And I have also hurt people I love.
I don’t always harm intentionally. Sometimes it comes out of my own unhealed wounds. But there have been moments—moments I don’t like to admit—where I have been sharp with my words, impatient with my kids, or emotionally distant when someone needed me present. And while I wouldn’t want my whole identity summed up by those moments, they were real. They mattered. They impacted people.
How do we hold space for both the harm we have caused and the harm done to us?
How do we name what is true about those who have harmed us without casting them out of the story of redemption?
Dan Allender describes three categories of people: regular sinners, wicked people, and evil people. Some people unintentionally cause harm. Some knowingly cause harm and refuse to repent. And yes, there are some who actively seek to destroy. Not everyone fits in the same category, and recognizing this can help us navigate our healing without oversimplifying the complexities of human nature.
For example, my father had tendencies that caused me real harm. But he also had qualities that shaped me for good. By naming the harm he caused, I’m not condemning him—I’m bringing clarity to my story.
His unhealed wounds landed on me, and until I named them, I was unknowingly repeating the same patterns in my own life.
And here’s something even deeper: By naming the harm that has happened to me, I can more readily access the harm that I have caused. Without naming my own experiences and the impact they’ve had on me, I can’t actually look at my own life clearly. The process of naming harm isn’t just about grieving and saying, Look, they hurt me. It’s about being able to turn that lens inward—to see where I have also caused harm, and in doing so, access repentance and restoration in my own relationships.
Naming harm is not about casting judgment. It’s about seeing clearly the path back to God and away from the traps of the enemy. Truth is what leads us into a deeper recognition of our need for God’s mercy, grace, and salvation.
We cannot live fully free and alive if we are bound to lies that keep us in false safety, afraid to believe truth. It is only when we expose darkness for what it is that we recognize just how desperate we are for the love of God—not in theory, but in real humility, intimacy, and authority.
God is not afraid of the truth. He does not ask us to pretend harm didn't happen or to soften reality to make others more comfortable.
He invites us to see things as they truly are—not so we remain bound in pain, but so we can experience the fullness of His healing, redemption, and freedom.
Because the truth is, the more clearly we name the harm, the more we can break free from its grip.
So if you’ve struggled with this tension, you’re not alone. It’s okay to hold both truths: the weight of what was done to you and the reality that people are more than their worst moments. It’s okay to grieve, to set boundaries, to acknowledge what hurts without sentencing someone to a label they can never be free from.
Because in the end, we are all in desperate need of the same thing: the healing, redeeming, and restoring love of God.
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