Showing posts with label Healing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Healing. Show all posts
Thursday, July 19, 2012
Thursday, March 25, 2010
What is Restoration House?
I started this blog during my recovery. My recovery from a broken heart and a shattered spirit. At the end of my recovery a home for broken women was birthed. A friend of mine emailed me yesterday and suggested that I blog about the home and tell some of the stories of the girls that have come through here. Not sure why I hadn't already been doing that. Time probably, but it is time well served to share the miracles that take place here. Have all the girls experienced the transformation that I have, the freedom from pain and past hurts? Sadly no. But those that willingly surrendered control of their lives to God certainly have and that is what these blogs are going to be about. I hope one or some touch your heart and start you on a path to complete restoration!
Restoration House started as a desire to help women get off drugs and alcohol. This desire has turned into a mission to minister the love of Christ to these women. After seeing and experiencing the transforming reality of what surrendering your life to Christ can do, it has become my life's passion to open homes in small communities for young female adults with a deep desire to overcome addictions and alcoholism. This home will also be a safe place for young pregnant mothers with nowhere to turn. We offer an alternative to abortion and an alternative to a life of drugs and alcohol. At Restoration House we don't focus on the addictions and failures these young women bring with them; instead we focus on Jesus Christ-Our Healer and Deliverer.
Restoration House started as a desire to help women get off drugs and alcohol. This desire has turned into a mission to minister the love of Christ to these women. After seeing and experiencing the transforming reality of what surrendering your life to Christ can do, it has become my life's passion to open homes in small communities for young female adults with a deep desire to overcome addictions and alcoholism. This home will also be a safe place for young pregnant mothers with nowhere to turn. We offer an alternative to abortion and an alternative to a life of drugs and alcohol. At Restoration House we don't focus on the addictions and failures these young women bring with them; instead we focus on Jesus Christ-Our Healer and Deliverer.
Saturday, March 28, 2009
My Testimony
Revelations 12:11 We overcome Satan because of the blood of the Lamb and because of the word of our testimony....
I am sorry to say that my life is not very unique. I say Sorry because it is a shame how many women suffered at the hands of a family member or so called family friend.
When I was a little girl I thought what had happened to me was so vile, and so shameful that I must be the only one in the whole world that must be going through it. Little did I know that I probably was sitting next someone in school just like me.
My step father began to molest me when I was 5. The guilt and the shame I felt, was the manipulation tool that he was able to use to keep me quiet. I finally told my mother at the age of 9, thinking my nightmare was over. Wrong. My mother stayed. Telling however did empower something inside of me and I no longer allowed him to do those things to me. I became very brazen and tough mouthed. He began to knock me around and the peculiar thing about that is that it almost made me feel better. Which I later learned was part of the need to self inflicting outer pain to numb the inner pain and to help subdue the guilt.
He also began to hit my mother which was something he hadn’t done before. I felt so guilty about that I would come out of my room and purposely antagonize him, he would leave her where she fell and turn on me. My mother would then get up and hurry to her room, locking her door behind her. He would hit me a few times then go away.
Probably the most painful thing I experienced was watching my mother at the kitchen table with her address book in hand calling everyone she knew from our church and elsewhere to see if I could come and stay with them. You see it was either me or him and she chose him. I was the “problem”. I didn’t realize how much that truly hurt my heart until I had my own daughter.
My real father was a cheater and an abuser. The only man that I trusted and that had been good to me was my grandfather and he died when I was 9, which threw me into a major breakdown that required I be medicated.
I began to drink when I was 15 and I drank nearly every day as a teenager and tried a few drugs but drinking was by far my favorite choice o f drug. I also loved working. As I grew older I had more of a problem with being a workaholic then a drinking “aholic.”
At the age of 16 I took a bunch of pills and ended up in the physic ward at citizens. Angry and bitter I really laid it on thick, and had my mother removed on more than one occasion from my room.
As I got older my drinking was more sporadic as opposed to daily or even just on the weekends. I could go years without drinking and then decide one day I wanted to party and would turn my life upside down, that was usually when my life was going pretty good. I became really good at self sabotaging myself.
My first love was with an addict/alcoholic. Found out I was pregnant at 17 after leaving him, I mean got on a plane and left him. I couldn’t leave him any other way. After some really disappointing let downs from him, his family and my mother of course (that shouldn’t have been a surprise for me then but it was.) I decided to have an abortion. I painfully regretted that decision, until I finally gave it to God when I was 30.
When life was chaotic I was strong and took charge of the situation but when life was good I was a wreck and mostly clinically depressed. My battle with depression began after I had my daughter. I was 20 years old. I would spend the next 20 years fluctuating from severally depressed to moderately depressed, but nevertheless depressed. Not a day went by without the sense of dread and sadness looming over me.
I married at 19 to a pretty nice guy, wasn’t much of a drinker and definitely no drugs. His issues came from a dominating father figure so he was very passive aggressive and I of course was aggressive / aggressive. Something I never realized until recently was that he was probably my bumper pad. Our marriage wasn’t bad but at every turn it was strained and pulled. Through the years he dealt with my partying binges, working constantly, moving from house to house. I couldn’t be still. When life got still I got moving. I was always mad about something. I put him down constantly. I probably even blamed him for my bad hair days. Now don’t get me wrong he wasn’t perfect. He had his issues.
I ran the house, the bills, the business, the raising and disciplining of our children. I was a major control freak, and walked and talked work. Nobody could do anything right.
I gave my heart to Christ when I was 30. I was healed instantly from depression and began my journey of forgiveness. My mother was the first one.
We hit church pretty hard at first but then life happened and I was the one they talk about in Matthew 13. I wasn’t rooted in the word and as soon as thorns appeared the word was choked right out and life as I knew it before began only worse this time. My depression came back with a vengeance. Satan was determined to kill me this time.
Our daughters started to get involved with drugs and alcohol when I was at the pinnacle of my business career and on the verge of franchising my company. My husband checked out. He had quit his job and spent most of his days playing on the internet bogged down in his own obsessions. And I could care less.
I was tired. I decided it was time to party. And on my 36th birthday I did just that. A month later left my husband and the girls.
4months after leaving him I met a guy. Cute, funny and he seemed really strong, a leader. He was totally opposite from my soon to be ex-husband. Boy that was the understatement of the century to say the least but I was also very wrong about his character. He was strong but not in a nice way and he could be really mean. He was the mirrored image of me in male form only worse. And if that were not enough he was a raging alcoholic and a closet drug addict.
Before I met him I hated women who stayed in abusive relationships. Remember my mother had stayed. I looked down on them and thought them to be weak. A year and ½ into this relationship, I finally understood the obsession. I had lost so much weight I barely crested 95 lbs. My 250,000 year business barely grossed 20,000. I had stopped talking to all of my friends and rarely spent any time away from this man. We fought fiercely. Remember I was the verbally abusive one in my marriage so this guy had met his match. We beat each other up verbally and even physically at times. I was more aggressive in that area then him but he was the master of manipulation. Even at my worst I was always an honest person, so he used that against me while he lied, schemed and deceived in almost every area of his life. His drug use finally came to light and then so did my youngest daughters. So I was learning and dealing with the both of them almost at the same time. My oldest daughter married an addict and thus my life had sowed its rewards. I and my daughters were in hell and I didn’t know how to get us out.
But God……
In Ephesians 2:Verses 1-3 Paul writes how God found us. Messed up and beat up, then in verse 4 he writes “ But God so rich is he in his mercy! Because of and to satisfy the great, wonderful and intense love with which he loves us, that even when were dead by our shortcomings and trespasses, he made us alive together in union with Christ.
When I cried out to him 3 years ago and spent a week fasting, he began to move in my life in such a mighty way. He moved heaven and earth to get me back to Victoria (a place I had vowed I would never return to. I grew up there and would literally get ill when I came to visit) He was bringing me to this very church and even though I was still living in sin he began to convict me and move me towards him. As I began to slowly obey and to start the process of surrendering my will to him, he began to fix everything in my life that was broken.
This is just a small list of what Jesus has done for me in the last two years:
15 years ago my real father gave his heart to Jesus and spent the last 15 years getting to know me and his other children. I was able to be at my father’s bed side when he died in April 08, which was a blessing to be able to care for him the week before he died. God healed a lot of wounds during this time. Just a few months before that God and I took a journey back through my childhood while taking a writing class. God used this class and my writing to bring back to life the little girl that had been stolen from me. He completely restored me. e He After burying my father God gently told me it was time to forgive my step-father and for the first time I was able to sincerely and truly forgive him.
My youngest daughter who I can now say is a recovered addict survived a drug overdose, spent some time in jail and in a rehab and is now living on her own and has a wonderful job. She is watching me, her sister, and her father who has also given his heart to Jesus and each day she is drawing closer to God. My oldest daughter is no longer with her husband and is a sophomore in college on her way to pre-medical school to study medicine. She loves God and is committed to a life of service to him. Neither of my girls graduated from high school and look at them now. I have a wonderful Grandson who loves God. My ex-husband and I are very good friends today by allowing God to show us each of our parts in the destruction of our marriage. and the ex-boyfriend? He is still struggling But God…there is that statement again. God has a done a beautiful thing. I have forgiven him for all he did to me and asked him to forgive me for all that I did to hurt him. God has allowed me to see his brokenness in a way that has allowed me to show him Jesus. He hasn’t used drugs in a little over a year now, although he still struggles with his drinking. I continue to pray for him and I know that God is going to restore him just like he has restored me.
I am now actively involved in helping other women find freedom in Jesus, through 3 venues. One is by opening my own home to women who are ready to transform their lives, Two is here at Celebrate Recovery and 3 through being one of the counselors at our church.
I know personally the transforming power of Our Lord Jesus Christ. It is my passionate desire to see the broken hearted healed and the addicted freed. I know it is possible. I am a living, breathing example and have seen Jesus break bonds of those I love and know personally.
Don’t give up on God…He will never give up on you.
I am sorry to say that my life is not very unique. I say Sorry because it is a shame how many women suffered at the hands of a family member or so called family friend.
When I was a little girl I thought what had happened to me was so vile, and so shameful that I must be the only one in the whole world that must be going through it. Little did I know that I probably was sitting next someone in school just like me.
My step father began to molest me when I was 5. The guilt and the shame I felt, was the manipulation tool that he was able to use to keep me quiet. I finally told my mother at the age of 9, thinking my nightmare was over. Wrong. My mother stayed. Telling however did empower something inside of me and I no longer allowed him to do those things to me. I became very brazen and tough mouthed. He began to knock me around and the peculiar thing about that is that it almost made me feel better. Which I later learned was part of the need to self inflicting outer pain to numb the inner pain and to help subdue the guilt.
He also began to hit my mother which was something he hadn’t done before. I felt so guilty about that I would come out of my room and purposely antagonize him, he would leave her where she fell and turn on me. My mother would then get up and hurry to her room, locking her door behind her. He would hit me a few times then go away.
Probably the most painful thing I experienced was watching my mother at the kitchen table with her address book in hand calling everyone she knew from our church and elsewhere to see if I could come and stay with them. You see it was either me or him and she chose him. I was the “problem”. I didn’t realize how much that truly hurt my heart until I had my own daughter.
My real father was a cheater and an abuser. The only man that I trusted and that had been good to me was my grandfather and he died when I was 9, which threw me into a major breakdown that required I be medicated.
I began to drink when I was 15 and I drank nearly every day as a teenager and tried a few drugs but drinking was by far my favorite choice o f drug. I also loved working. As I grew older I had more of a problem with being a workaholic then a drinking “aholic.”
At the age of 16 I took a bunch of pills and ended up in the physic ward at citizens. Angry and bitter I really laid it on thick, and had my mother removed on more than one occasion from my room.
As I got older my drinking was more sporadic as opposed to daily or even just on the weekends. I could go years without drinking and then decide one day I wanted to party and would turn my life upside down, that was usually when my life was going pretty good. I became really good at self sabotaging myself.
My first love was with an addict/alcoholic. Found out I was pregnant at 17 after leaving him, I mean got on a plane and left him. I couldn’t leave him any other way. After some really disappointing let downs from him, his family and my mother of course (that shouldn’t have been a surprise for me then but it was.) I decided to have an abortion. I painfully regretted that decision, until I finally gave it to God when I was 30.
When life was chaotic I was strong and took charge of the situation but when life was good I was a wreck and mostly clinically depressed. My battle with depression began after I had my daughter. I was 20 years old. I would spend the next 20 years fluctuating from severally depressed to moderately depressed, but nevertheless depressed. Not a day went by without the sense of dread and sadness looming over me.
I married at 19 to a pretty nice guy, wasn’t much of a drinker and definitely no drugs. His issues came from a dominating father figure so he was very passive aggressive and I of course was aggressive / aggressive. Something I never realized until recently was that he was probably my bumper pad. Our marriage wasn’t bad but at every turn it was strained and pulled. Through the years he dealt with my partying binges, working constantly, moving from house to house. I couldn’t be still. When life got still I got moving. I was always mad about something. I put him down constantly. I probably even blamed him for my bad hair days. Now don’t get me wrong he wasn’t perfect. He had his issues.
I ran the house, the bills, the business, the raising and disciplining of our children. I was a major control freak, and walked and talked work. Nobody could do anything right.
I gave my heart to Christ when I was 30. I was healed instantly from depression and began my journey of forgiveness. My mother was the first one.
We hit church pretty hard at first but then life happened and I was the one they talk about in Matthew 13. I wasn’t rooted in the word and as soon as thorns appeared the word was choked right out and life as I knew it before began only worse this time. My depression came back with a vengeance. Satan was determined to kill me this time.
Our daughters started to get involved with drugs and alcohol when I was at the pinnacle of my business career and on the verge of franchising my company. My husband checked out. He had quit his job and spent most of his days playing on the internet bogged down in his own obsessions. And I could care less.
I was tired. I decided it was time to party. And on my 36th birthday I did just that. A month later left my husband and the girls.
4months after leaving him I met a guy. Cute, funny and he seemed really strong, a leader. He was totally opposite from my soon to be ex-husband. Boy that was the understatement of the century to say the least but I was also very wrong about his character. He was strong but not in a nice way and he could be really mean. He was the mirrored image of me in male form only worse. And if that were not enough he was a raging alcoholic and a closet drug addict.
Before I met him I hated women who stayed in abusive relationships. Remember my mother had stayed. I looked down on them and thought them to be weak. A year and ½ into this relationship, I finally understood the obsession. I had lost so much weight I barely crested 95 lbs. My 250,000 year business barely grossed 20,000. I had stopped talking to all of my friends and rarely spent any time away from this man. We fought fiercely. Remember I was the verbally abusive one in my marriage so this guy had met his match. We beat each other up verbally and even physically at times. I was more aggressive in that area then him but he was the master of manipulation. Even at my worst I was always an honest person, so he used that against me while he lied, schemed and deceived in almost every area of his life. His drug use finally came to light and then so did my youngest daughters. So I was learning and dealing with the both of them almost at the same time. My oldest daughter married an addict and thus my life had sowed its rewards. I and my daughters were in hell and I didn’t know how to get us out.
But God……
In Ephesians 2:Verses 1-3 Paul writes how God found us. Messed up and beat up, then in verse 4 he writes “ But God so rich is he in his mercy! Because of and to satisfy the great, wonderful and intense love with which he loves us, that even when were dead by our shortcomings and trespasses, he made us alive together in union with Christ.
When I cried out to him 3 years ago and spent a week fasting, he began to move in my life in such a mighty way. He moved heaven and earth to get me back to Victoria (a place I had vowed I would never return to. I grew up there and would literally get ill when I came to visit) He was bringing me to this very church and even though I was still living in sin he began to convict me and move me towards him. As I began to slowly obey and to start the process of surrendering my will to him, he began to fix everything in my life that was broken.
This is just a small list of what Jesus has done for me in the last two years:
15 years ago my real father gave his heart to Jesus and spent the last 15 years getting to know me and his other children. I was able to be at my father’s bed side when he died in April 08, which was a blessing to be able to care for him the week before he died. God healed a lot of wounds during this time. Just a few months before that God and I took a journey back through my childhood while taking a writing class. God used this class and my writing to bring back to life the little girl that had been stolen from me. He completely restored me. e He After burying my father God gently told me it was time to forgive my step-father and for the first time I was able to sincerely and truly forgive him.
My youngest daughter who I can now say is a recovered addict survived a drug overdose, spent some time in jail and in a rehab and is now living on her own and has a wonderful job. She is watching me, her sister, and her father who has also given his heart to Jesus and each day she is drawing closer to God. My oldest daughter is no longer with her husband and is a sophomore in college on her way to pre-medical school to study medicine. She loves God and is committed to a life of service to him. Neither of my girls graduated from high school and look at them now. I have a wonderful Grandson who loves God. My ex-husband and I are very good friends today by allowing God to show us each of our parts in the destruction of our marriage. and the ex-boyfriend? He is still struggling But God…there is that statement again. God has a done a beautiful thing. I have forgiven him for all he did to me and asked him to forgive me for all that I did to hurt him. God has allowed me to see his brokenness in a way that has allowed me to show him Jesus. He hasn’t used drugs in a little over a year now, although he still struggles with his drinking. I continue to pray for him and I know that God is going to restore him just like he has restored me.
I am now actively involved in helping other women find freedom in Jesus, through 3 venues. One is by opening my own home to women who are ready to transform their lives, Two is here at Celebrate Recovery and 3 through being one of the counselors at our church.
I know personally the transforming power of Our Lord Jesus Christ. It is my passionate desire to see the broken hearted healed and the addicted freed. I know it is possible. I am a living, breathing example and have seen Jesus break bonds of those I love and know personally.
Don’t give up on God…He will never give up on you.
Thursday, March 19, 2009
A Dream In All Of Us
There is a hope and there is a dream in every one of us. You can’t deny that fact. I don’t care how many bad things you have done, you have a dream inside of you. When you were a child you didn’t dream of drinking yourself stupid or shooting drugs up your arm, spending your nights in jail, molesting a child or killing someone, but that may be your life right now. You may have started out in a bad situation and therefore dreaming of anything more than a peaceful night’s sleep without being molested by a grown-up maybe even your dad, or being run down or knocked around was about as wild as your dreams got. But I promise you fear to dream doesn’t mean that there are not dreams inside of you. God put dreams, desires and hopes in all of us. It is Gods intimate desire to see those dreams come alive inside of you. God has a plan to cultivate those dreams and watch them become reality in your life. How does he plan on doing this? It really will become the simplest thing you have done yet. Surrender your life to him. It may sound hard, and I have to admit the first step is hard but even as hard as it may be; it isn’t harder than enduring the life you may be living right now. All the pain you cause yourself, all the pain you cause others and all the pain that has been inflicted by others onto you, can be forgiven and can be healed. Complete restoration, mind, body, and spirit that IS why Jesus went to the cross. That is why Jesus suffered the torture that led to his death, so you could not only live an eternal life in heaven but so you can live a free life on earth. A life Free from addictions, free from resentment, bitterness, pain, hatred, sick obsessions and negative thought patterns. Is that hard for you to believe?
It seemed impossible for me to even imagine forgiving my step-father for molesting me, for knocking me around and calling me every degrading name in the book. For completely stealing my childhood and unfortunately since I couldn’t let go of my past, stealing the next 30 years of my life. I blamed him for every bad choice I made, for every moment of depression and for every failed relationship.
When I finally let go and asked Jesus into my heart and surrendered my life to God, I asked him to take control and lead me into the plans that he had for me. He forgave me of my sins and began to heal my pain. As I learned and began to study his word and spend time in prayer, he opened up my heart to receive his love, and began to show me how beautiful and lovely I am to him. He poured the very love that Jesus took with him to the cross into me. Which was a four-fold benefit, One to show me how valued I am as a person and as a child of God and Two; to allow me to forgive those that hurt me, including my stepfather, Three; to seek out those I had hurt so I could ask for their forgiveness and Four to pour the love he poured into me out to others that are still hurting. Show them Jesus he told me. Is that hard? Sometimes, in my own capacity to love and in my own strength, but I constantly ask God for his love and his strength and he is faithful to give it to me. He is Real, He is mighty and he is ready, willing and able to comfort you, strengthen you, equip you, and enable you, to achieve your dreams, all for his glory.
He is fulfilling dreams inside of me that had always been there but seemed impossible for me to achieve and I am witnessing him raise up dreams in other’s that have spent their entire life addicted to drugs but are now free because they made a decision to do what I did. Surrender their life over to the one who died so they could live.
Do something different. Ask Jesus to come into your heart, ask him to forgive you, and then thank him because it is done! Then go look for a church. If you struggle with addictions or past hurts of any kind go to http://www.celebraterecovery.com/ and look for a celebrate recovery group in your area.
It seemed impossible for me to even imagine forgiving my step-father for molesting me, for knocking me around and calling me every degrading name in the book. For completely stealing my childhood and unfortunately since I couldn’t let go of my past, stealing the next 30 years of my life. I blamed him for every bad choice I made, for every moment of depression and for every failed relationship.
When I finally let go and asked Jesus into my heart and surrendered my life to God, I asked him to take control and lead me into the plans that he had for me. He forgave me of my sins and began to heal my pain. As I learned and began to study his word and spend time in prayer, he opened up my heart to receive his love, and began to show me how beautiful and lovely I am to him. He poured the very love that Jesus took with him to the cross into me. Which was a four-fold benefit, One to show me how valued I am as a person and as a child of God and Two; to allow me to forgive those that hurt me, including my stepfather, Three; to seek out those I had hurt so I could ask for their forgiveness and Four to pour the love he poured into me out to others that are still hurting. Show them Jesus he told me. Is that hard? Sometimes, in my own capacity to love and in my own strength, but I constantly ask God for his love and his strength and he is faithful to give it to me. He is Real, He is mighty and he is ready, willing and able to comfort you, strengthen you, equip you, and enable you, to achieve your dreams, all for his glory.
He is fulfilling dreams inside of me that had always been there but seemed impossible for me to achieve and I am witnessing him raise up dreams in other’s that have spent their entire life addicted to drugs but are now free because they made a decision to do what I did. Surrender their life over to the one who died so they could live.
Do something different. Ask Jesus to come into your heart, ask him to forgive you, and then thank him because it is done! Then go look for a church. If you struggle with addictions or past hurts of any kind go to http://www.celebraterecovery.com/ and look for a celebrate recovery group in your area.
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
In The Dark
In the dark, the quiet of the night when we are still, is when God does his work. When he heals and when he restores so it will manifest in the light of day to shine bright through us, to his hurting people.
In your darkest moment, when you cannot see him and you cannot hear him rest assured he is there. That’s when his great love is poured over you.
In your darkest moment, when you cannot see him and you cannot hear him rest assured he is there. That’s when his great love is poured over you.
Sunday, August 31, 2008
My Red Sea
For 23 years I battled with both moderate depression which was persistently present at all times to bouts of severe depression that could last several months. I took medication off and on for 15 years and sought therapy on 4 separate occasions, the last time being, when I first moved back to my hometown 3 years ago.
The Lord brought me out of my Egypt 13 years ago, he also miraculously parted the waters for me, but I couldn’t cross over my Red Sea. As I began to cross the vast expanse I took my eyes off of Jesus, looking back at the world I wasn’t ready to leave behind. The Sea closed in around me. Drowning in my anger, my bitterness consumed me-self pity abounded. My hurts and my pains were like the sea itself-vast and deep, no land in sight. I couldn’t see anything else.
Words simply cannot convey the intensity of the dark emotions that accompany this debilitating affliction. I wanted to die, I asked God on many occasions to take me home, I begged him, I pleaded with him, even negotiated with him. I was TIRED, unbelievably, tired.
My thoughts were a myriad of memories and dialogs that disrupted my entire life; disturbing my sleep and interfering in my relationships. Four years ago when I got my life insurance policies I had carefully reviewed the suicide clause. The devil had convinced me that my children would be better off without me as long as I left them financially secure. The fight in me didn’t want to die, but the depression was winning, I was losing this battle.
Circumstances brought me back home a place I vowed I would never return. As I wandered from room to room in my house, thinking life couldn’t get any worse, now that I had ended up back in my hometown of hell. The phrase “Seek ye first The Kingdom of God” began to come at me from the radio, the television and Sunday services. Honestly I began to get slightly annoyed because I was hearing it everywhere; I promise you, I think I actually saw the writing of those words on the wall, literally. I began my quest to find out what it meant exactly, and in my search, I was led to DBI (Destiny Bible Institute) a 2 year intensive 3 hours a week bible course offered by my church. God began to show me among other things 2 very important steps for recovery; how to worship him and how to praise him through the storms.
Listening to instruction from my pastor I began to read my bible, to thank God often, and I even set aside time everyday to pray. Healing began, slowly at first, I knew I was changing, but I was still afraid to believe it.
I was led to the Epistles, which I now call my “get out of depression” scriptures. I began to renew my mind. Remember the myriad of memories and dialogues that controlled my life? Well I began to take control of them by speaking the word of God to them. I wrote scripture on index cards and kept them with me. Repeating them often at my demons, my depression, my wrong thoughts, I began to confess healing over my depression and I stopped asking God to take my life instead, thanking him for my life.
The combination of heartfelt worship even at my lowest points, on my knees crying, giving thanks and praising God even when I felt like dying, prayer when I didn’t feel like praying, reading his word the bible and most importantly speaking his word out loud are what delivered me from my Red Sea.
My first year here, I was lost and broken, my second year broken but faking it, this, my third year I am walking in victory. The Red Sea parted and God carried me safely to the other side.
Three days ago God told me I was no longer broken! I am not quite sure how to do "not broke" but I am definitely ready to give it a try.
---------------------------------------------------------
Creflo Dollar Wrote:
"You can become a diligent custodian over your words by focusing your mind on those things that are just, pure, lovely and of good report (Philippians 4:8). As you fill yourself with the Word by continually reading, meditating on and speaking scriptures that relate to your specific situation, you design a wonderful blueprint for your life!"
The Lord brought me out of my Egypt 13 years ago, he also miraculously parted the waters for me, but I couldn’t cross over my Red Sea. As I began to cross the vast expanse I took my eyes off of Jesus, looking back at the world I wasn’t ready to leave behind. The Sea closed in around me. Drowning in my anger, my bitterness consumed me-self pity abounded. My hurts and my pains were like the sea itself-vast and deep, no land in sight. I couldn’t see anything else.
Words simply cannot convey the intensity of the dark emotions that accompany this debilitating affliction. I wanted to die, I asked God on many occasions to take me home, I begged him, I pleaded with him, even negotiated with him. I was TIRED, unbelievably, tired.
My thoughts were a myriad of memories and dialogs that disrupted my entire life; disturbing my sleep and interfering in my relationships. Four years ago when I got my life insurance policies I had carefully reviewed the suicide clause. The devil had convinced me that my children would be better off without me as long as I left them financially secure. The fight in me didn’t want to die, but the depression was winning, I was losing this battle.
Circumstances brought me back home a place I vowed I would never return. As I wandered from room to room in my house, thinking life couldn’t get any worse, now that I had ended up back in my hometown of hell. The phrase “Seek ye first The Kingdom of God” began to come at me from the radio, the television and Sunday services. Honestly I began to get slightly annoyed because I was hearing it everywhere; I promise you, I think I actually saw the writing of those words on the wall, literally. I began my quest to find out what it meant exactly, and in my search, I was led to DBI (Destiny Bible Institute) a 2 year intensive 3 hours a week bible course offered by my church. God began to show me among other things 2 very important steps for recovery; how to worship him and how to praise him through the storms.
Listening to instruction from my pastor I began to read my bible, to thank God often, and I even set aside time everyday to pray. Healing began, slowly at first, I knew I was changing, but I was still afraid to believe it.
I was led to the Epistles, which I now call my “get out of depression” scriptures. I began to renew my mind. Remember the myriad of memories and dialogues that controlled my life? Well I began to take control of them by speaking the word of God to them. I wrote scripture on index cards and kept them with me. Repeating them often at my demons, my depression, my wrong thoughts, I began to confess healing over my depression and I stopped asking God to take my life instead, thanking him for my life.
The combination of heartfelt worship even at my lowest points, on my knees crying, giving thanks and praising God even when I felt like dying, prayer when I didn’t feel like praying, reading his word the bible and most importantly speaking his word out loud are what delivered me from my Red Sea.
My first year here, I was lost and broken, my second year broken but faking it, this, my third year I am walking in victory. The Red Sea parted and God carried me safely to the other side.
Three days ago God told me I was no longer broken! I am not quite sure how to do "not broke" but I am definitely ready to give it a try.
---------------------------------------------------------
Creflo Dollar Wrote:
"You can become a diligent custodian over your words by focusing your mind on those things that are just, pure, lovely and of good report (Philippians 4:8). As you fill yourself with the Word by continually reading, meditating on and speaking scriptures that relate to your specific situation, you design a wonderful blueprint for your life!"
Monday, August 25, 2008
The Little Girl Inside-Forgiven
This short piece was written for my creative class.
The story is true.
Names have been changed to protect the guilty.
What if I could hit the rewind button and with the power of my pen rewrite my life? Not all of it, only from the moment it profoundly changed, the moment I was murdered.
I remember that little girl, riding high on that John Deer Tractor with her Shirley Temple hair carefully pulled back into pig tails and those big brown eyes glistening as she proudly takes her place on her grandpa’s lap.
What a charmed life I lived as that little girl.
I was five when she died, taking everything pure and innocent with her, instantly and forever changing me. I was left with an insatiable thirst for her. Her spirit of freedom had run boundlessly through those corn fields as she rode with her grandpa. Soon he would become the only man in her life that she would ever trust again.
Hector had become my new stepfather; he was the one who had killed her. I knew Hector's secret, but I had buried it with her. Grandpa hoped that having the surgery would make him well again so he could take me away from Hector. Looking into my eyes, grandpa no longer recognized the girl that was looking back at him, cradling my face he makes me a promise that he’d be back for me.
I refused to visit him in the hospital. I was in denial and in my child’s mind I believed if I didn’t see him in the hospital than he wasn’t really sick. Expectantly awaiting grandpa’s return; I knew he’d be coming for me soon.
A sickening grin came over Hector's face as he took noticeable pleasure in telling me that grandpa had died.
“Liar,” I cried out. “He wouldn’t leave me; he promised.”
Calling him a liar again, my legs gave way underneath me. My mind could not conceive it. In a state of disbelief, utterly inconsolable, I’m kept in a drug induced state throughout my grandpa’s funeral.
This secret war raged on, as Hector continued to destroy me. I found my voice of truth three years later at the age of nine and pointed my accusing finger at him. I raised my hands in triumph confident my life was about to change, and it did, only not in the way I had imagined. My mother stayed with him, I could not fathom why,-security, perhaps? His fist became his new weapon against me, only he cleverly targeted my mother first. My guilt called me to him, taking her place. Becoming her shield in a strange way soothed me, accepting that his fist was far better than his trembling hands on me.
Finally, I set out to start a new life, only to face a new battle. For twenty years depression tried to take what was left. Wrecking havoc in my marriage, relationships, and careers, its darkness relentlessly loomed over me. Broken and tired, I waned and in my weakness, I found strength as I fell prostrate to Jesus, surrendering all to him.
As this story draws out of me, a miracle of healing unravels before me. I discover I have the power to resurrect the little girl inside. I am her breath; I am her heartbeat.
I wield the power of my pen and with great strength from within me, I write, “Forgiven” across Hector's name, abolishing depression. With that one powerful gesture, I bring the little girl inside back to life. Closing my eyes, I gently draw her out, assuring her that she is safe.
Names have been changed to protect the guilty.
What if I could hit the rewind button and with the power of my pen rewrite my life? Not all of it, only from the moment it profoundly changed, the moment I was murdered.
I remember that little girl, riding high on that John Deer Tractor with her Shirley Temple hair carefully pulled back into pig tails and those big brown eyes glistening as she proudly takes her place on her grandpa’s lap.
What a charmed life I lived as that little girl.
I was five when she died, taking everything pure and innocent with her, instantly and forever changing me. I was left with an insatiable thirst for her. Her spirit of freedom had run boundlessly through those corn fields as she rode with her grandpa. Soon he would become the only man in her life that she would ever trust again.
Hector had become my new stepfather; he was the one who had killed her. I knew Hector's secret, but I had buried it with her. Grandpa hoped that having the surgery would make him well again so he could take me away from Hector. Looking into my eyes, grandpa no longer recognized the girl that was looking back at him, cradling my face he makes me a promise that he’d be back for me.
I refused to visit him in the hospital. I was in denial and in my child’s mind I believed if I didn’t see him in the hospital than he wasn’t really sick. Expectantly awaiting grandpa’s return; I knew he’d be coming for me soon.
A sickening grin came over Hector's face as he took noticeable pleasure in telling me that grandpa had died.
“Liar,” I cried out. “He wouldn’t leave me; he promised.”
Calling him a liar again, my legs gave way underneath me. My mind could not conceive it. In a state of disbelief, utterly inconsolable, I’m kept in a drug induced state throughout my grandpa’s funeral.
This secret war raged on, as Hector continued to destroy me. I found my voice of truth three years later at the age of nine and pointed my accusing finger at him. I raised my hands in triumph confident my life was about to change, and it did, only not in the way I had imagined. My mother stayed with him, I could not fathom why,-security, perhaps? His fist became his new weapon against me, only he cleverly targeted my mother first. My guilt called me to him, taking her place. Becoming her shield in a strange way soothed me, accepting that his fist was far better than his trembling hands on me.
Finally, I set out to start a new life, only to face a new battle. For twenty years depression tried to take what was left. Wrecking havoc in my marriage, relationships, and careers, its darkness relentlessly loomed over me. Broken and tired, I waned and in my weakness, I found strength as I fell prostrate to Jesus, surrendering all to him.
As this story draws out of me, a miracle of healing unravels before me. I discover I have the power to resurrect the little girl inside. I am her breath; I am her heartbeat.
I wield the power of my pen and with great strength from within me, I write, “Forgiven” across Hector's name, abolishing depression. With that one powerful gesture, I bring the little girl inside back to life. Closing my eyes, I gently draw her out, assuring her that she is safe.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)