Spiritual Healing

Not that long ago a friend of mine and I were talking.  She had just been through a difficult experience and she was feeling a lot of hurt.  What confused her the most was that she couldn't figure out why she was in so much pain because nothing was actually done to her or with the purpose of hurting her, but yet she felt the pain.  As she was explaining this to me I felt like there was something under the surface that even she couldn't see.  "I wonder if God's trying to tell you that there's a wound that needs to be healed, one that's had a bandaid over it so long you forgot it was there.  Maybe he wants to explore that with you and help you to heal it for good", I told her.  She thought about it and admitted that there might be as tears came to her eyes.  A few days later we reconnected and I asked her how she was doing.  Instead of tears a bright smile came to her face, and she proceeded to tell me all about what God had shown her and what He had done.  He had helped her to discover the wound, one that had been there for close to 15 years, and how many times the enemy had attacked her, aggravating the wound and causing her to try to shut it out, how he had brought her there and offered her true healing by the power of the Spirit and she accepted it.  The joy that came from her was obviously from one source, Jesus.

After we're born we go through many experiences, experiences that can either build us up or harm us.  They can come from our families and friends, or from things we've done.  Those experiences that harm us leave emotional wounds and false messages, and cause us to deal with our pain in the wrong ways.  We can become controlling to assure we won't experience that again, we can put a bandaid on to dull the pain, we can turn to what we know we can do well or hide ourselves from the world.  But the messages that continue to radiate from them show that they're still there and they're not healing.  These messages can sound like "I'm not good enough", "I'm too much", "I'm not lovable", "I'm not strong enough", "I'm not worthy", etc. etc.

If you're not quite sure what I'm saying let me give you an example.  Throughout my relationship with my fiancee I've struggled with physical purity.  While intimate acts are a main form of showing and sharing love in a marriage, the acts can leave wounds when outside of that covenant.  The affects of my sin came in the form of anxiety and struggling to see and accept God's love for me.  I felt dirty and kept getting angry at myself when I didn't obey God's commands regarding physical purity.  The message became "I'm not good enough, I'm not strong enough.  I'm not worthy of God's love".  Why was this area in particular so harming?  1 Corinthians 6:18 explains it by saying, "Flee from sexual immorality.  All other sins a person commits are outside the body, but however sins sexually, sins agains their own body. (NIV)"  This sin didn't just affect God, it affected me.  And worse still, I was dragging my fiancee down with me and causing him to sin.  My reaction to these messages was to put a bandaid on it by trying to control situations and saying that I could get ahold of it.  I could be strong enough, I could put my foot down, I could implement rewards to help us be good.  God broke down all of my efforts to control the situation and showed me that I didn't need another bandaid, I needed spiritual cleansing and healing. So I prayed, fully and honestly, and asked Jesus for a second chance.  I asked for the cleansing of my body and spirit, a return of my purity (of sorts), and for Christ to help me work through the wound that had been developing and festering.  And just as Jesus healed many during his 3 years, he healed me and said, "Daughter, your faith has healed you.  Go in peace and be freed from your suffering (Mark 5:34 NIV)".  The healing of the wound has begun, but my purity is renewed, and with God's help I hope to maintain it till my wedding night, and I look forward to seeing how God will change me and my fiancee as we strive to obey His commands with strength and patience from the Spirit.

I challenge you today to ask Jesus to help you identify the lies that have developed from the wounds inflicted on you.  Then ask him to walk with you as you remove the bandaids from your emotional wounds and work to heal them with his help.  He will not leave you alone and He won't make you do it alone.  I can promise you, you will feel so much better and closer to God with the wound gone than you do will with just a bandaid solution.

The Serving Bride

Moments after the ball dropped signaling the start of 2014 I got engaged to the man that God gave to me and asked me to love him and be a helper to him for the rest of our days!  As many newly engaged women do, a day or two after the question is asked and people are made aware, they turn to wedding magazines and the wedding section on Pintrest to seek ideas for their big day (I will not judge the pinners as I may or may not have 311 pins currently on my wedding board).  I joined the masses of women and started looking at wedding magazines and, to my surprise, found myself irked and annoyed.  Many of the articles I read talked about how it's your big day, it's your chance to feel like a princess, have the wedding of your dreams, it's ok to be a little selfish because it's your day, etc. etc.  It quickly became clear why some women can't wait to get married, and while I can understand the desire to have a day where the focus can be on you after you spend so much time focusing on others, I believe it's a trap.

I quickly realized that God was showing me that this wedding won't be my day, or my fiancee's day, but God's day!  Mark 12:25, 27 says, "When the dead rise, they will neither marry nor be given in marriage; they will be like the angels in heaven... He is not the God of the dead, but of the living. (NIV)"  This is about God, not about marriage as it will not even be present in heaven except for our marriage to Christ.  The church that my fiancee and I are getting married at describes a wedding as a worship service, an opportunity to share and celebrate God and what he's done for us.  I really like this idea.  As I continued to consider all this, I shared with my fiancee that I want our wedding to be about celebrating God and sharing love with those we care about, not about us, to which he agreed with me without hesitation (I do love him!).

Fast forward a few months.  My mother and I were walking around the mall together and talking as we normally do when she asked if we could bring my grandmother with us when we go wedding dress shopping.  I was so glad that she shared this idea and I said I would love to bring her.  You see, my grandmother was diagnosed with ALS (Lou Gerig's Disease) in December and we realized our time with her was limited.  God showed me that my dress shopping experience should be an opportunity to build a memory with her, enjoy her (and my sister and mother's) company, and make my grandmother feel special, and that this was exponentially more important than finding THE DRESS.  Even this past weekend I had a gathering with my bridesmaids to give them all an opportunity to get to know one another and have some fun.  My sister and wonderful Maid of Honor put together an amazing spread of desserts, and she and two of my friends planned some games for us to play.  The evening was filled with laughter and vulnerability as all of the girls opened up about themselves, even sharing some of what God was working on in them.  It was everything I could want, people building relationships with each other and an opportunity for me to get closer with my five beautiful bridesmaids (oh how I'm looking forward to all the festivities with them).  It was a celebration of them and what they mean to me, NOT a celebration of my status as a bride.  Despite being told not to worry about lifting a finger for set up (even after all my asking to help), I helped clean up the event and thanked each girl for coming, with a special thank you to my sister for the wonderful night she'd planned.

What does all this sharing about myself and my wedding planning have to do with God and weddings?  These experiences have shown me the kind of bride I want to be.  I don't want to be a bride that gets the day of her dreams or the one that simply tells everyone about God.  I want to be a serving bride, one who serves those participating in the wedding rather than having everyone serve her, one who puts more emphasis on building memories and loving those around her than desiring attention.  In other words, I want to be a Galatians 5:13 bride: "You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free.  But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love.(NIV)"  Wouldn't it be amazing to see wedding articles more focused on loving your guests and making them feel special rather than showing them your amazing planning and decoration skills?  Wouldn't it be great to read about how to make God a priority and understanding the true meaning of a wedding rather than getting your fairy tale?  Wouldn't it be great not to find shows like Bridezillas on TV (even though they can be our guilty pleasure)?  As servants of God given freedom from sin thanks to the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, isn't it only fitting that we serve others on a daily basis and even more so when celebrating the beginning of a marriage, which God has given to us as a holy gift, and for the bride and groom to be THE examples of serving, giving, and loving like Christ?  This is the kind of bride I'm choosing to be with God's help, and I hope my groom will choose the same.  Whether you're married, engaged, or still waiting for God to bring you the right person, I encourage you to consider using your position to serve humbly and appreciate your family and friends, to share God's love and celebrate what He's done for you.  If you have any suggestions on how to be a humbly serving bride, I'd love to hear them (those magazines aren't too helpful)!  God bless you :)

Contentment Where God Has You

I can worry about anything and everything, a self-professed worrier.  I learned it from my dad and then amped it up to the next level.  I'll worry about how much money I have, how to get to the next stage in life, how much happier I'd be if I this changed, what happens if I lose my job, what if my fiancee and I aren't meant to be, blah blah blah.  In fact, it became such a struggle that it turned into full blown anxiety, and God led me to counseling for a time.  Even after God put my anxiety to rest, I still had a lesson to learn.

One day as I was driving into work I recognized that I felt tense around my chest and realized I had been thinking about future finances with my fiancee again.  I took a moment, breathed, and started to pray.  It was in praying that I God showed that I wasn't appreciating where He had me now, that I was trying to rush through to the next chapter in my story.  I was forgetting that only God knows what my future looks like and how everything works out, it is not mine to plan.  

In Philippians 4:11-13, Paul writes, "I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances.  I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty.  I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want.  I can do all this through him who gives me strength (NIV)".  We like to live through dreams of the future, but the funny thing is that it can stress us out when we try to control situations so that our dreams become reality.  When we give our life to Christ, we forfeit the life we planned for ourselves, we give up control.  If we let go and start appreciating where God has placed us for now, and trust Him wherever he may take us, we begin feeling peace.  Thank God for where He has you now, and trust that He will give you strength to complete whatever task He currently has in front of you, and soon (like Paul) you will find yourself content and at peace no matter what the circumstance.  It's easier said than done (something I'm continuing to learn), but the first step is to release your grip on whatever you think you have planned, and give your future to Christ.  I know you won't regret it.

True Love

My fiancee and I have been together for 16 months now, and Christ has taught me so much about love in those months, especially how to love others.  After the lovely, "I can't believe how happy I am, this is awesome" honeymoon phase of the relationship, my pessimistic attitude started to emerge.  I started seeing my man's faults, and started desiring for him to change.  "You need to pursue me", "You need to pursue God", "I feel like you're not there for me", "I want you to be the best person you can be (aka, I want you to be the person I want you to me)"... doesn't sound very merciful or Godly does it?

By God's mercy, we've made it through each of those struggles.  But He didn't want to just get us through, He had something to teach me, something I kept trying to dodge.  He showed me a vision using Matthew 14:25-31, and He's used this before to speak to me.  The verse says, "Shortly before dawn Jesus went out to them, walking on the lake.  When the disciples saw him walking on the lake, they were terrified.  'It's a ghost,' they said, and cried out in fear.  But Jesus immediately said to them: 'Take courage!  It is I.  Don't be afraid.'  'Lord, if it's you,' Peter replied, 'tell me to come to you on the water.'  'Come,' he said.  Then Peter got down out of the boat, walked on the water and came toward Jesus.  But when he saw the wind, he was afraid and, beginning to sink, cried out, 'Lord, save me!'  Immediately Jesus reached out his hand and caught him.  'You of little faith,' he said, 'why did you doubt?' (NIV)"  This time, when worrying about my fiancee's faith, Jesus asked me to put myself in Peter's position, and instead of looking at the wind and the waves I'm watching someone else's walk to Christ, and just like Peter I'm starting to sink.  I need to focus on my journey toward Christ and they need to focus on theirs.  Focusing on someone else's walk will cause me to sink.

Through this vision He showed me that if I love my man (or brother, or best friend, or mother, or someone else) AND Jesus that I needed to value God's will for my fiancee more than my own, that the kind of man God wants him to be should outweigh the kind of man I want him to be!  And I should desire for my fiancee to want to same in me (and this is an area that he's so much better at than I am).  It's completely transformed the way that I love him now.  Don't get me wrong, there will still be times when my man drives me absolutely insane, or when he struggles with things that I think should be so easy to understand, but realizing that he has his own separate journey with Christ and that God has a plan for him helps me to show mercy and have patience.  Even better, it strengthens my faith in God! My prayers always seem to feature me telling God "Your will over mine".

Why is this important?  Jesus asks us to give up everything to follow Him.  That's not just possessions.  That's worries, control, and desires.  If you're trying to control a situation, or are worried about someone you care about then you're not giving up everything for Christ.  Trust God to work in the person you care about, and save yourself from anxiety, anger, frustration, and possible expensive therapy (any kind of therapy, either medical or retail, can still be pricey).

So how can this apply if you're not in a relationship?  You have other relationships to consider as well: siblings, parents, friends, etc.  If you find yourself worrying about their walk, and thinking that they could have everything together if they would just do A, B, and C, then ask God to remind you that He didn't just create you and endow you with a specific walk and purpose, He's done the same for the people you care about.  Ask God to help you let go and trust God to work His will in your life.  And recognize that his plan for them is so much better than anything you could plan for them.  That's true love, asking God to work in His way for the people you care about.  And don't forget to let His will win out over your personal will too.