In 2011, Belgian-born Australian songwriter Gotye released a single that would change his life forever. The song was first released in Australia and New Zealand, but eventually became a global hit. Soaring up national charts, Gotye’s song nestled atop the Billboard Hot 100 list before winning two Grammys. Today, the song has been purchased over 13 million times making it one of the best-selling digital singles of all time.

The popularity of this song is intriguing, yet all the more when you listen to the lyrics.

“But you didn’t have to cut me off

Make out like it never happened and that we were nothing

And I don’t even need your love

But you treat me like a stranger and that feels so rough

No, you didn’t have to stoop so low

Have your friends collect your records and then change your number

I guess that I don’t need that though

Now you’re just somebody that I used to know”

“Somebody That I Used to Know” is a song you likely have heard, even if you don’t realize it. It’s a catchy tune that has filled the radio airwaves ever since it’s genesis in 2011. Clearly, people like it, and while I acknowledge that you can like a song for the tune, I have a hard time believing that’s the only reason people hit the play arrow.

The clear, poignant words “now you’re just somebody that I used to know” perfectly describe the words that rest on the tip of our heart’s tongue when we’ve been wronged by another. I realize this is a break-up song, but the tempting sentiment remains the same across all broken relationships.

The temptation is to “ghost” that person. Tell yourself that they mean nothing to you – that they are merely someone you used to know.

The irony is that while you’re doing that, you can’t stop thinking about that person and their action. It is here where bitterness with all its decay begins to call your heart home.

It’s a losing game, but one at which we’re all superstars.

Everyone has been “screwed over” as the song puts it – or at least feels they’ve been at one time or another. Sometimes our grievances against others are justified and sometimes they aren’t. Either way, our urge in those moments isn’t exactly forgiveness.

Forgiveness is hard. Continually passing up an opportunity to seek retribution for an offense seems unjust. Cancelling that debt is loss.

I’m convinced that genuine, heartfelt forgiveness is impossible for us to hand out until we have received it ourselves. Chances are that most people reading this have never been in prison or, more specifically, on death row. I’d like you to try and imagine you are for a moment.

Sitting in your cell, torn apart by your crime, you cross off the days until execution. As the date nears, a guard knocks at your door. He tells you that you’re free to go. As a cocktail of emotions flow through you, you question simply, “why?” The guard tells you that your charges remain, but another has offered to step in and take the punishment your actions deserved.

This is an incomplete picture of what Jesus Christ has done for us, but I hope that it serves to place that reality in practical terms. You may know Him as the leader of the Christian religion, or perhaps as a really “good” historical figure, but it’s His death on the cross and His resurrection from the dead three days later that allow us to forgive. For it is here where sinful man is offered their most desperate need – God’s forgiveness. Jesus is, in the most literal way, the substitute taking our place on death row.

Every one of us has rebelled against God. We don’t think there’s a problem with that separation until we experience a genuine taste of Godlessness. Yet it’s God’s righteous judgement that we were saved from when Jesus took his dying breath and cried out “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” It’s in that moment that we along with the death row inmate can say with tears, “why?”

Jesus dying on the cross is the greatest “I love you” ever spoken. His resurrection from the dead proved that justice was served and that what we had owed was paid in full.

When we see that we’ve been forgiven something infinitely greater than any wrongdoing we’ll receive on this earth, it makes real forgiveness possible. If our catastrophic sins are no longer held against us by God, how could there be any justification in holding something so comparatively insignificant against a fellow sinner?

I recognize and affirm that genuine forgiveness can occur without a reconciliation or an emotional desire. The relationship may end. But let it not be because you sought your own depraved method of justice. Let it be for the good of the other. Let it be with a heart free of bitterness, in light of the forgiveness you have received.

If you have not already considered that you need God’s forgiveness, please read Romans 3:22 & 23 below.  The greatest need of your offender is also your greatest need.

The temptation to say of someone “now you’re just somebody that I used to know” will always be appealing to our selfish hearts. Yet it is receiving God’s forgiveness and forgiving others that will set our hearts free.

Scripture References:

Romans 3:22-23 – “This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, ²³ for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, ²⁴ and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.”

Colossians 3:13 – “Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.”

Matthew 18:21-35 – Parable of the unmerciful servant

Matthew 6:12 – As Jesus instructed us to pray : “And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.”

Matthew 6: 14-15 – “For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. ¹⁵ But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.”

John 15:13 – “Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”