Wednesday, November 12, 2014

Healing In The Pain



If I can be honest with ya'll I've been going through one of the most excruciatingly painful times of my life. It has been a very difficult season in my life and my families as well. When momma ain't happy ain't no body happy, has been a true and tried motto in this house. I've asked that God's grace would cover much of the crazy mood swings I've been having and I know that his grace HAS covered so much of my shortcomings this past year. 

I am going through a healing time with God. He has called me to the wilderness with him and we are sitting in a very dark, very painful and uncomfortable place Him and I. Before I started reading my bible a lot more consistetnly I didn't know that there was much of my life that needed to be changed. I think I was living in a safe reality that I had so carefuly created for myself. I was safe. I pretended to myself that I  was "content" with my place in life and I wasn't going to take many risks. As long as my little world spinned my way, I was fine. I did so much to try to control my life and that of my husband and kids, in order to not feel out of control.  But to be honest it was getting to be too exhausting and I could tell something was wrong, I just coudln't tell you what the heck the matter WAS. I was trying to fix things as they poped up instead of going to the root of my issues. 

I knew before I started reading my bibile that I had many flaws. I knew that. But I didn't know that God wanted to help me shed some of the things that were hindering me from knowing him better and from living a life full of adventure, joy and peace. FREEDOM was something I thought I had, until now. I KNOW God is setting me free as we speak. It wasn't until I was honest with myself and with God about the state of my heart that the healing began.  I didn't trust God. I wasn't free and I didn't show many signs of the fruit of His spirit. I knew I was being a hypocrite calling myself a Christian when the life I lead pointed the opposite direction. 

As I am healing, God keeps helping me understand each step when I am ready. Right now I am in the stage of acceptance. I am praying for God to help me have acceptance be the backbone of my healing. When I first learned that I had been sexualy abused I didn't want to belive the little girl inside me telling me there was something wrong. God exposed all the truth so it would set me free. It has been the most painful thing I've ever felt as a thrity year old woman to admit to herlsef that she has been badly hurt. But in accepting it, I have been able to experience peace.  I have been able to understand myself a little deeper and to KNOW that it was NOT my fault. It was not ME. THAT didn't come from me not matter how my body reacted. There has been an extreme change in my heart. I no longer feel angry all the time. God has allowed me to process my emotions in His loving arms. I struggle with anxiety and I have had more panic attacks than I'd like to admit. But through every one, the minute I allowed it to just be, the minute I surrendered ALL of my emotions to God; it was as if black tar was flowing from my heart outward into the His light and being changed into good energy instead of being stuck inside of me and coming out at non-welcomed times and places. I knew that if I didn't decide to heal with God on this, that it would eventually kill me. If it didn't kill me physically it would have mentally and emotionally. 

That is why I am trusting God to help me heal. But with healing, comes pain. I have been so badly hurt in my life that I am terrified of pain. The more I heal, the more accepting of pain I become. I welcome it because  I would rather be in pain and know peace and my savior than be pretending nothing is wrong and feeling hopeless, bitter and angry. There is healing in the pain. There is an end to the madness. My pain becomes energy to help someone else with their pain and my hope is that their pain will help someone else with their pain, and so on and so forth. I have learned that all of the things that happened to me have the opportunity to work for the good of me and other people. Genesis 50:20 Joseph said to his brothers. "You intended to hurt me but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives." I know that this is hard stuff to hear and to talk about. But the devil loves secrecy for that very reason. It isolates us and makes us feel like we're the only damaged one. That is a lie from the pit of hell! 

God has such a loving and compassionate heart he knows what we all have been through and he wants to heal us from all of our pain. In this life my pain may never go away completely. I know that I will remember the feeling I had when I started to heal, so I can empathise with another sister or brother of mine that has gone through the same thing. So that I can hold them tightly and tell them of how God has redeemed me and  that he will do the same for them. I actually don't want to forget. The people that have helped me the most in this trying time have been people that have also suffered pain and know how to give an encouraging hug and point me to Jesus. We will never have the ability to heal anyone in our lives, we have to realase them into the hands of Jesus;  but what we can do is what the bible instructs us to do which is "Mourn with those who mourn; rejoice with those who rejoice." Romans 12:15

I might be in pain right now but I am recovering. The one thing I won't do is give up. I heard Christine Caine say this today and I could not agree more. " The devil on his BEST day didn't take me out on MY WORST day." God has already won the fight. We need only to grasp his hand tighly and let Him help us embrace the pain of recovery. Because the devil will tell you that because you're in pain you are still not healed. NO FRIENDS! It's because we are healing that we feel pain. Praise God. 

By allowing God to help me heal the quality and amazingness of my life has doubled! I can now hold my head up high with the dignity that God provides me. I do believe that in heaven I will not experience any of this pain. And you won't either. 

 Stay blessed and stay saucy 
-Libier Reynolds 


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