It's Your Time to Heal: God's Steps with Pastor Derwin Gray

It's Your Time to Heal: God's Steps with Pastor Derwin Gray

What drives someone to seek a life of real healing, not just success and trophies? This conversation with Pastor Dr Derwin Gray offers a very personal look at that question, mixing gridiron grit with deep faith and brain science.

You'll hear Derwin share how he once thought success would fix everything: “What I thought was going to heal me was success… when you use vengeance as fuel for success, eventually that vengeance is going to burn you out.” From a childhood marked by trauma and stuttering to an NFL career and then church leadership, he talks candidly about how an identity rooted as a “beloved child of God” changed his mind, his relationships, and his health.

Derwin sits down with Dr Daniel Amen and Tana Amen to talk through his new book *It’s Time to Heal*, built around the acronym HEAL: being honest about what happened, expecting healing to be hard, accepting that trauma explains origins but not destiny, and learning to live from love rather than chasing it. He links these ideas with neuroplasticity, showing how repeated thoughts and choices can reshape the brain toward wholeness.

Forgiveness is a major theme, especially in Derwin’s story of finding and forgiving his father, and Tana’s parallel experience with her own dad. They stress that “forgiveness doesn’t always mean access”, and that reconciliation and forgiveness are different. Letting go of anger is framed as an act of spiritual obedience and serious self-care, with unforgiveness tied to physical problems like high blood pressure and mental issues such as depression and anxiety.

If you’re carrying old hurts, struggling with family wounds, or wondering how faith and brain health fit together, this episode offers a practical, heart-level framework for starting to heal. What step from HEAL could be your first move toward a kinder story about yourself today?