Our Children - Us!

Luke 18:16
But Jesus called the children to him and said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these.

     After the blog on splintered souls, I have been a little messed up.  I keep getting pictures of my splintered soul poking at my children.  I only slept a couple hours last night and have been emotional all day.  I was feeling a little defeated, like this is so big.  Scott (the speaker I was listening to) talked about how our words form God, our inheritance comes from heaven through our spiritual side and then through this splintered soul and on to our physical self.  What comes out of our mouth and our actions, even though they may be good and from God, have slivers from our splintered soul.  We have people parenting and preaching and mentoring and teaching with splinters.
     I talked to God about this and He had me do something.  I want to challenge all who read this to try it.  Whether you are man or woman, baby Christian or mature, from a healthy family or a family of dysfunction, whether you believe you have been splintered or not.  Seriously, you are not to manly for this. 
     Ask God to choose a picture from your childhood.  I have one on my wall that I try to look at, but emotion bubbles up in me, because it was about the time the abuse started.  Take the picture in your hands and get on your knees before God.  Ask God to show you what that child needs to know.  The adult you, with head knowledge, knows that Jesus loves you and that He will never leave and the adult you is the only one who can tell the child you and the child will believe it.  God will start speaking through you to the little person you once were.  What ever pops in your head, trust it is from God.  I had to tell my little girl that He loves her and He will never leave her and that she is not bad.  I forgave her and asked her to forgive me.  It was hard at first, but then the words just came and God's presence did too.  There I was on my knees with a picture of me at about 7 years old, saying, "Jesus loves you so much."  It was amazing to me how badly I wanted her to know this.
     When I felt Jesus was finished talking to her, He told me to picture laying her in His arms.  Well, let's be honest, that was a little emotional too.  Then I heard him in my heart in a very soft and gentle voice say, "Leave her with me."
     I don't care how much testosterone you claim as your own or how "Whole" you think you are, this is healing and emotional.  When my child was safe in his arms, He started telling me how she felt.  How abandonment is her biggest fear.  Then He started showing me how abandonment has affected all my relationships and how the enemy uses it against me.  It was almost like parent's putting our child to bed for the night, together.  I found a new closeness to Jesus.  When I doubt He loves me, I picture Him sitting in the chair holding the little me and while He rocks her, he and I have an adult conversation about her future.



Enjoy this!!

After the last blog - Whoa!

 

 

Romans 7:14-25

New International Version (NIV)

 

¹⁴ We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. ¹⁵ I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. ¹⁶ And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. ¹⁷ As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. ¹⁸ For I know that good itself does not dwell in me, that is, in my sinful nature.^[a] For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. ¹⁹ For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. ²⁰ Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.
²¹ So I find this law at work: Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. ²² For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; ²³ but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. ²⁴ What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? ²⁵ Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!
So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in my sinful nature^[b] a slave to the law of sin.

 

Splintered Personalities?

“Define yourself radically as one beloved by God. This is the true self. Every other identity is illusion.”
― Brennan Manning, Abba's Child: The Cry of the Heart for Intimate Belonging

     If Adam and Eve had significance, safety and security, and a sense of belonging and lost it when they believed the enemy's lies, wouldn't it make sense that man longs to get these back.  We spend our whole lives searching for these things. 
     In my studying this morning and my conversational prayer, I think a little more of this picture is coming clear to me.  Some may say "Duh" but I have never thought about.  It makes perfect sense, though the further I dig, the more it may change or the deeper I will understand it.
     We have a spiritual life and a physical life.  We are physically on this earth, but we are spiritually in Christ.  Is it our soul that connects the two?  I heard this today and it made sense.  So, isn't this where the enemy would attack?  His desire is to break the connection between the physical man and the spiritual tie to God.  I heard a man say this, this morning, "We have all had our hearts broken, but trauma breaks our soul."  Almost like a split personality, half of our soul is reaching for God and the other half is reaching for the beliefs and desires of our physical being.  Somebody sins against us and the spiritual side wants to forgive but the physical side, set on survival, says, "I don't want to."  Is this why we must die to our old self (physical feelings) and live completely in the spiritual.  Be like Christ?
     The sexual abuse I went through started at about 7 years old.  If my soul split, or splintered as this guy put it, there is the physical life and the spiritual life and they are not connected.  No wonder I have felt like there are two people in my body my whole life.  This explains a lot of mental disorders too.  Bi-polar, split personality, depression, etc.  I see the physical, earthbound side of my soul as a 7 year old, still hurting, still scared, not maturing, but instead struggling to survive.  All she knows is the lies of the enemy.  People are bad, they hurt you, nobody loves me, I am unworthy, and so on and so on.  The Spiritual side of me struggles to grow up, to mature in Christ, but is held back by this tantrum throwing child who is scared and in pain. 
     As God was explaining this to me this morning, He reminded me of a story I wrote years ago.  I believe I wrote about it recently in my blog.  I wrote it for an alcohol counselor who used it to help grown men understand the child within them.  It was about twins banished to an island, because they were different.  They were joined at the fingertip and one would grow into a man while the other remained a child.  The grown man twin hated the child for holding him back and for being the root of all his problems, like being banished to the island.  One day one of the men started to nurture his child, hug him, bathe him, and so on.  The little child disappeared that night inside the man and they became one.  In a sense, he forgave the child.  The Holy Spirit and I had quite a laugh when He reminded me that I had written out the story almost 20 years ago without even realizing how much of the answer it held. (Check my blog on July 11, 2012  Boys or Men)
     This answers so many questions for me.  Like how can I be happy and following God one minute and the next cussing like a sailor in a rage.  Rage is a false sense of strength.  That little broken kid was trying to look big, to feel safe.    So my next question to God was, if the old self is supposed to die, what am I suppose to do with this kid.  If my soul is splintered, this doesn't make sense.  I'm supposed to kill off part of my soul?  He said, "No.  Forgive.  Forgive that little girl for doing what she knows to survive.  Tell her that I will never leave her.  Tell her to trust me.  She thinks I abandoned her which is a lie from the enemy.  He hurt her.  It was not Me.  I have loved her every minute of her life and she doesn't have to be strong anymore.  Just tell her to let go and trust me.  You are the only one who can convince her to believe in me."  This is the total opposite of what I have been doing.  I have been screaming at her to get out of my life.  I've been telling her that she is ruining my life.  All this does is throw her back into survival mode.  These are her biggest fears, rejection, abandonment, and betrayal.  This explains the constant war inside me.  One side of my soul who is believing the enemy's lies and the other side of my soul believing God's truth.  It's not God and Satan fighting over me, it's a split belief system.  It makes it a lot easier to forgive her when I truly see that broken child trying desperately to survive instead of an adult who should know better.  This also makes it much easier to love others.  If we see each other as these split souls, a spiritual person reaching for God and a broken child surviving by doing what they know, how can we judge?
     It is clear to me why the enemy attacks in this way.  One, he breaks the tie between us and God.   We have this immature earthly self who was traumatized, most likely by authority and so they rebel against the authority of God.  Authority is a scary bad thing to a child who has suffered at it's hand by sexual abuse, physical abuse, abandonment, neglect, etc.  God has been setting me up for this for years.  When I was in counseling years ago, my counselor, for reasons unknown, had me meet with him and another client who had been sexually abused along with a sibling through satanic ritual.  All these years I have wondered why he always had us meet together, but at this moment it is now clear to me why so much of the satanic rituals include sexual abuse, child sacrifice, etc.  Satan is splitting souls.  She was the only one who truly understood how I felt, like I had two people living in my body.  The good soul and the bad soul, not realizing they were one, but split.
     I was a stubborn kid.  VERY stubborn.  I knew God was real and good, because my grandma told me He was.  It took 4 predators over many years to convince that stubborn little kid that God was not safe, that God was not going to protect me, that He didn't care about me and He didn't care about me because I was bad.  I put up one good fight, but the enemy won and captured half of my soul.  When Jesus says we are to come to Him like children, I never understood how that was possible.  After all I had seen, how was I to go back to that innocence?  I don't even remember being there.  But with what God said to me today I get it.  The spiritual side of us (in Him) needs to be the one to carry that other wounded child side to Him and lay her in His arms.  Anyone who has been abused understands what a task that is.  When I get this picture of me as the spiritual adult, placing that 7 year old abused baby in Jesus arms, the first thing she does is sit up and try to run.  Authority has done a number on her.
     I continued listening to this man today and even more is revealed.  The part of my soul who is still a child, never matured and trying to survive in Satan's world, has splintered even more.  There is the bully, who will do anything to protect us.  There is the victim who always blames everyone else.  There is Miss familiar who says I won't survive without all these splinters (personalities) that protect me.  The depressed who sees no hope and no way to change this.
     As I listen to more of what this man has to say, he finally, finally gets to the part where he gives instruction to healing a broken, splintered, soul.  He says over time, God will reveal each splinter.  This part of our soul lives in darkness and it is only the Light shined on them that will reveal them to us.  When He does we are to forgive them as though they are another person, "You are forgiven. You are purified. You are redeemed."  Then in the first person we claim, "I am restored."  Then as a whole person, we repent.  He says for the first time since the splintering began we get access to parts of our mind, parts of our will and parts of our emotion that have been denied to us since the day the trauma occurred.  He says only then can we completely, because we are whole, forgive those who committed the sin against us.  Wow.  That makes total sense.  He said that until this day we could only partially forgive.
     This is how the enemy is keeping us from being whole, from being complete.  Now I look back to the illustrations God was giving of the church body as a whole.  No wonder it so broken.  I see these hands reaching out for the lost, but the bones in most of the fingers are splintered.  We can pick them up, but our own pain makes us let go.  The pain in our own splintered body makes it difficult to hold onto anything for very long.  The splintered bones in the legs of the body are painful and we fight to keep following Jesus.  Parts of the body are healthy, but how many of us are struggling because our souls are splintered?  If so many of us as individuals are divided in our souls, this has to affect the division of the church as a whole.  I think this is the wave that's coming.  I think this is the big plan God is about to wash over us and there is going to be a healing of the body like never before. 
     The enemy uses us against each other.  Many diseases are caused by unhealthy emotions.  The enemy has messed with the immune system of the church body.  The pieces of our broken souls are fighting against each other.  To bring them together is to have the inner peace God has offered us.


1 Corinthians 12:21-26

New International Version (NIV)


21 The eye cannot say to the hand, “I don’t need you!” And the head cannot say to the feet, “I don’t need you!” 22 On the contrary, those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, 23 and the parts that we think are less honorable we treat with special honor. And the parts that are unpresentable are treated with special modesty, 24 while our presentable parts need no special treatment. But God has put the body together, giving greater honor to the parts that lacked it, 25 so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. 26 If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it.  

Just Thinkin'

It is with our hands that we do the work of Christ and it is with our feet that we follow Him.  Is this why the nails were driven through these parts of Jesus body on the cross?  Luke 23:36  The soldiers also came up and mocked Him.  They offered Him wine vinegar and said, "If you are the king of Jews, save yourself."  This leads me to believe that the offer of wine vinegar was a mockery.  A sour wine?  Was this a last slam against the most powerful part of the body in doing God's will?  The tongue.
    

Belonging replaced by Abandonment

“As my sufferings mounted I soon realized that there were two ways in which I could respond to my situation -- either to react with bitterness or seek to transform the suffering into a creative force. I decided to follow the latter course.”
― Martin Luther King Jr.

     As I set out to find the reason for slipping back into the pit I have to face that my two strongest strongholds are fear and anger.  I have beat a lot of fear in the last two years, but have barely put a dent in my anger issues.  On a daily basis I am more calm than I have ever been, but when the anger comes it can still feel like trying to control an erupting volcano. 
     The last few days I have been listening to a man speak mostly about healing through forgiveness of our sins, forgiving those who have sinned against us and forgiving our ancestors who may have, through their sins, placed a generational curse on our families.  This has been very interesting. 
     He really caught my attention today when he said there are 3 main heart wounds that cause fear and anger and can possibly harden the victims heart.  The three are 1) Betrayal 2) Abandonment  and 3) Rejection.  Makes sense to me.  These three wounds are a powerful force in controlling our will.  In Neil T Anderson's book "The Bondage Breaker" he states that three things Adam and Eve enjoyed before they were deceived were 1) Significance - Humanity had a divine purpose 2) Safety and Security - God provided for all of humanity's needs 3) Belonging - Humanity had a sense of identity and belonging to God and to each other.  These were lost when the teeth hit the apple.  Do you see what I see?  The enemy has been after the same thing since the very beginning.  Nothing new here.
     There are people who can see into the supernatural world.  Some see the demonic, some see God's angels, and some see other things that I don't yet understand.  But I think I am starting to understand that demons leave their prints on us.  Even if the demon is cast off of us, if he has been with us for a long time, there are prints left behind.  I get a picture of God working the clay to get the enemy's thumbprints out of it.  Pretty painful.  We grow accustomed to reacting a certain way to a given situation and if that print is still there it affects us.  I also believe that when we have a demon spirit attached to us, we can recognize that spirit on someone else.  I think this why abused children and adults who have been abused as children have a special bond and seem to be drawn to each other.  I think this also has something to do with the people who anger us.  They say when you don't like something about someone it's because you are alike in that area.  Say if you have a controlling spirit or deal with promiscuity or a manipulative spirit, you get frustrated with people battling the same demon because you hated it in yourself.  Make sense?
     Today I heard that when shown a spirit of rejection on a person it appears as an arrow in the heart that creates a shunt and it acts like a magnet and draws predators.  Abandonment is like a poisonous dart.  The enemy wants to label an abandoned person as a victim.  Betrayal  - a butcher's knife in the back.  I don't get this, but I do have trusted friends that see this kind of supernatural... stuff.  I don't know if it comes to them in a picture, like God sometimes gives me or if they actually see it on the person.  This all makes sense. You have to heal the heart wounds, through forgiveness. I thought I did that when I went through The Bondage Breaker course, but I'm wondering if it's time to go through it again at a deeper level. I forgave ancestors, but I wonder if I missed something.  
     You can forgive the rapist for the rape, but then you realize you have to forgive him for your fear of the dark, then for how it has affected your parenting and so on and so on.  I also think there is something to forgiving his parent's.  It's a place to start.  I keep listening and reading and studying.  One day God will say, "That's it.  You got it". 


“...abused women... convert their rage and self contempt into a passionate commitment to never be hurt again.” Nancy Groom

Gifts in the Body

“When you know that everything matters—that every move counts as much as any other—you will begin living a life of permanent purpose.”
― Andy Andrews

     When I was young, I was always jealous of those kids who had a passion for something so deep they wanted to know everything they could about it.  There was the kid who was so into baseball he knew all the statistics and had all the cards.  It was all he talked about.  There was the person in the band who taught themselves the theme to M*A*S*H on the saxophone, because they were so into playing.  When Dad left, I had to sell my horse and with it went my passion for it.  I never had a drive for anything, but writing and I even stopped doing that too.  What God showed me today is that I have found my passion.  The one thing I want to know everything there is to know, I can't learn enough about, is God.  He pointed out that it has resurrected my passion for writing.  Hmm, was that planned?  I want to know all the history, everything about what He is doing now, and all there is to know about the future.  I have always liked a good story and this one goes on and on and on.
     I seriously think that God gets a kick out of showing me the simplest things.  He makes them so interesting.  Not just the way He shows me, but the way it all comes together.  For instance this morning He kept bringing up the "church body"  We are each a piece to that puzzle.  Some of us are the hands that lift others up and some of us are the feet and lead others.  We have prophets who hear and preachers who speak.  We all have a place, we all have a purpose.  Some are the arms of comfort and some are the strong backs that carry the weak. 
     He then pointed out to me, and I'm still not sure why, but when Jesus was crucified the nails were driven through His hands and feet.  There is something to that, but I haven't seen it yet.  While I was thinking about this He brought a movie to mind.  A movie where the "bad guys" cut off people's ears or fingers and sent them to the families of the victim, to say either "We have him" or "We killed him".  They also tortured people this way to get them to talk. 
     I can see the enemy at work here.  He fooled those "bad guys" (mafia, gangs, etc.) into thinking they were good, because they had things like family loyalty and would do anything to protect those families.  The enemy used the truth to deceive.  The head of the family was usually a very intelligent person.  In fact in the third part of the Godfather Michael Corleone says to his nephew, "Never hate your enemies, it affects your judgment."  How true is that?  Wisdom.
     The speaker I have been listening to the last few days said today, "The only difference between Adolf Hitler and you is that he was deceived."  The more I thought about it the more sickening it was.  We all know the truth, our truth, but Hitler had his beliefs and he was just as sure of those beliefs as I am that God is real.  He was deceived and I have to admit, I have a little compassion for the guy.  The enemy must have started on him before he left his mother's womb.
     Another thing the man talked about this morning was our free will and that God's gifts and His call on our lives are irrevocable.  (Romans 11:29)  So, what if God's call on Hitler's life was to be a speaker of the Gospel.  He had a gift for speaking.  He had Biblical knowledge, but he also had free will.  I have heard so many times that the enemy comes against us in a big way when we have a big calling.  What if God had an amazing plan for Hitler.  What if all those people who listened and followed him were hearing God's word instead of the enemy.  What if the enemy knew the anointing Hitler had on his life and worked over time to get him working against God and God's people.  Two years ago I spent a lot of time reading and watching everything I could get my hands on about WWII.  Hitler had a lot of mental turmoil.  Looking back at all that I learned about him this makes perfect sense.  It's one thing for the enemy to convince us not to do God's will, but if he can actually get us deceived into working against God, look at all the damage that can be done.  If I remember right, Hitler thought he was working for God at one time, but I think a little pride and greed and ego got fed to him.
     I guess what God was showing me, was how the enemy whacked off a hand?  Maybe a foot?  Maybe it was just a finger? of the church body and sent it to God wrapped in striped pajama's and Nazi uniforms.  It happens every day on a much smaller scale and it's still happening on a big level.  Look at sex trafficking and other kinds of slavery, gifted people are running those operations.  We choose to use our God given gifts and anointing for the enemy or ourselves, instead of for God like He intended.  It makes you wonder where those psychics on the hot lines came from.  This world has some amazingly gifted people on the wrong side.  We all have irrevocable God given gifts.  What...Who are we using them for?

Any fool can count the seeds in an apple. Only God can count all the apples in one seed. ~Robert H. Schuller

Climbing the Cactus

"Life is either a daring adventure or nothing" - Helen Keller


     "Jesus, I'm ready.  I'm going to grab the cactus.  If I go really fast, it will still hurt, but it will be over faster."
     "That's how you do it."
     "Great idea huh?"
     "Not!!  What I mean is that's how YOU always choose to do things.  You live life in 5th gear.  How much time do you have to process in 5th gear?  You eat fast, you talk fast, you move fast, you fall fast.  This is a process and you have to take it one step at a time with my instruction.  This is going to hurt no matter how you do it, but it doesn't have to hurt like you think.  You move slow and break off each spine as you go.  Some people have long sharp spines on their cactus and some have smaller spines.  But sometimes it's the smaller spines that hurt the most."
     "I'm not sure I understand."
     "This isn't a race.  The finish line is the goal, but not reached until Heaven.  The journey is where it's at.  That's where we build relationship.  That's where you learn to trust me and that's where you will see how much I love you.  One "sure footed" step at a time."
     "So where do I start?"
     "At the beginning.  Let's get rid of control.  The first thing you have to do is stop controlling and let me.  I want you to break off those first spines.  Right there, the first one, is control of your life, then controlling others and that big one there, that's your attempt at controlling Me.  No hurry, whenever you're ready go ahead and start busting them off."
     "What do I do with them?"
     "You can throw them completely out of reach or you could drop them into your pit so you can be poked by them if you decide to slide back in.  Your choice."
     So I find a comfortable position and begin to break off the cactus spines of control.  It's tough.  They don't want to break off and I find myself pricking my fingers and hands on other spines.  It hurts, but I diligently and slowly work at it.  "Jesus, I have been working at this a long time and I have barely touched the cactus."
     "I know, but I will be here through the whole process, sometimes directing you and sometimes I will be so silent you will think I have gone, but believe."
     As I continue to work at it, I become so frustrated, I finally say, "OK, I'm done fighting this, I give up.  Will you help me?"  It's then that I see the spines of control fall away.
     "Surrender is the answer for the need to control.  Now, you will need to break off those big spines of unforgiveness.  Then you will be able to reach the shorter ones around them."
     "What are the shorter ones?"
     "Your fuse."  Jesus began to chuckle.
     I found myself smiling with Him, but not understanding.  "What do you mean?"
     "Anger and rage."  He was still smiling.  "You have a short fuse."
     "Funny, really funny.  Nice play on words."
     "Yes, it was.  You will have to forgive to break the spines of unforgiveness and eventually the spines of anger will fall away.  You have to truly forgive and I will help you with that."
     I began again to work at the spines on the cactus, occasionally looking up to be overwhelmed by the length of the cactus and the abundance of spines I had to clear to climb out of my pit.  "Why a cactus?  Seriously, why did you choose a cactus knowing it would hurt?"
     "Dealing with these things is painful, but if you allow me to guide you through the pain is lessened.  My love for you is like a thick blanket thrown over the cactus to protect you from being pierced badly."
     "I'm going to trust You on that."
     "Did you know that a cactus stores water?"
     "I've heard that."
     "The spines are for protection."  Jesus smiled that contagious smile again.
     "I get that.  It's about survival."  I couldn't help but smile back.
     "The spines don't only defend against herbivores, spines help prevent water loss."
     "You lost me.  I don't understand what I am supposed to be understanding."
     That's when Jesus reached out and touched my hand.  "You are the cactus and the water inside is the Living Water.  You have grown these spines for survival, for protection, but Beloved, these spines are holding the water in."
 
“I know God won't give me anything I can't handle. I just wish he didn't trust me so much.”
― Mother Teresa

The Heart

   Proverbs 4:23
Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.


     One of the steps I went through while working through the Bondage Breakers course was to break the connection to the people who abused me.  I'm going to get a little deep here so breathe with me.  When there is sexual contact between two people, they become one.  God intended this for marriage.  But when you are sexually abused or have any kind of inappropriate sex with another person, you are connected to them and part of recovery is to break that connection.
     With sexual abuse victims one of the survival skills we develop is to leave our hearts out of it.  We don't want to feel.  We come to believe physical, sexual touch IS intimacy.  In reality sex is a physical expression of intimacy for married couples to become one so our vision of intimacy is very distorted.  Through life we learn to keep our hearts completely shut out of it for our own protection. 
    If physical intimacy is experienced without the heart, then the physical part of sex is the only intimacy known.  I truly believe that Jesus said it's okay for me to say this so take a deep breath.  We cannot have sex with God, Jesus or the Holy Spirit whether we are a man or a woman we do not feel God's physical touch the way we do with another human being.  Intimacy with Christ is all about a heart, soul and spirit connection.  The enemy was really working over time here the day he realized that if he could convince us to leave our heart out of intimacy there is no way we can connect with Christ?  We don't know how to connect with God or even other people.  This happens by our own will.  Our own need for protection.  It's a flight or fight response to connecting.  I believed sex is used so often by the enemy because it is an excellent way to get us to shut out God and we do it ourselves.  All the enemy has to do is whisper in our ears and the fear of getting close causes us to run.  What ability we do have to open our hearts to another human being is a surface connection.  We are only able to get so close before we turn and run.  Sex is dirty, so intimacy is dirty, so getting to close to another person is bad.
     I'm pretty sure we have all had a deep conversation with a friend.  One of those that you feel all warm and fuzzy inside and you really don't want it to end.  This has happened to me only a few times in my life and I usually throw a wall up when it's over.  But this is a better example of intimacy than what we know.
     Society has even turned the word intimacy into sex.  Last night I heard a man say he had an intimate friendship with another man and I shuddered.  In reality, it was a close friendship, but in my mind it was dirty.  Sexual abuse victims or even people who have had affairs or other "wrong" sexual intimacy associate sex/intimacy with "I am bad".  Obviously there is something wrong with me, a part of me that is bad, or I wouldn't be doing this.  We may not be consciously thinking it but somewhere down inside our damaged heart or soul is a connection.  If I let someone close to me, they will know I am bad. 
     If love is the greatest commandment, what better way for the enemy to mess with us?  What better way to shut us down than to convince us that intimacy leads to pain.  When in reality it is only the wrong sexual contact that led us to pain.  If intimacy is sex and sex leads to pain, well...then where does intimacy lead?  Straight to heartache.  We have to come to Christ like a child, with an undamaged heart...a new heart.  This is one area where the old self has to die for us to connect with Christ at all.  How do we do it?  I'm sitting here sweating just thinking about it.  In fact the enemy has been fighting me hard on writing this.  I have been in a near panic attack since I started.  I don't know how to fix this.  First step is to admit we have a problem.  I am powerless over the affects the past has had on my ability to have an intimate relationship.  Okay God, what's next?  I gave my heart to You, so You are going to have to fix it. 


“Relying on God has to begin all over again every day as if nothing had yet been done.”
― C.S. Lewis, Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer

Who is hiding in your closet?

“It is easy to use the phrase 'God's will for my life' as an excuse for inaction or even disobedience. ... My hope is that instead of searching for 'God's will for my life' each of us would learn to seek hard after 'the Spirit's leading in my life today.' May we learn to pray for an open and willing heart, to surrender to the Spirit's leading with that friend, child, spouse, circumstance, or decision in our lives right now.”
― Francis Chan, Forgotten God: Reversing Our Tragic Neglect of the Holy Spirit

     I started out my new mission (to find what is calling us back to the pit) by asking God to show me what He wants me to know about this.  Where He took me was not at all where I expected.  But, when is it?  He took me to a friends house to give.  That makes sense.  In this life with Jesus, we give to receive, we are blessed by blessing others and we love because He first loved us.  I left there with a book.  I was so drawn into this book immediately so I knew I was on the right track.  The enemy is trying desperately to tell me otherwise, but God is making it clear to me that this is what He wants to show me at this time.

     First of all we love "familiar".  An old chair, a favorite pair of jeans, home, and family.  No matter how messed up it is, no matter how beat up the chair, how many holes in those jeans, no matter the degree of dysfunction, there is a safety in the familiar.  This is why we even go back to those who abuse us.  The familiar things of this world give us a false sense of security.  Addictions and affairs are two good examples of a false satisfaction of the flesh. 
     Our families for generations have done the same things, like maybe we have been farmers, or lawyers.  We have passed down recipes, trades and antique furniture.  We have the same chins and noses.  Often we pass down beliefs, religions and diseases.  What about demons?  What about curses?  So great-great-grandpa Jones has an affair.  If we look at the family since then, we have several affairs, teenage pregnancy, homosexuality and several other sexual sins.  Or maybe we have passed down cancer, depression, or abandonment. 
     What I am seeing is that we have to open the door to sin.  The enemy has no power until we open that door.  Once we do, an assigned demon moves in and brings family.  Even if great-great-grandpa Jones asked  for forgiveness, he still fights the demon.  He has to actually cast off the demon. What if he stops there?  It's still in the house.  So he drives it from his house.  Then his son walks through the door and guess who is on his back?  And his family is on our family.  The family is cursed with sexual perversion because of great-great-grandpa Jones.  The family for generations has carried a family of demons.  We let them in our homes and on our land.  We have to take it back. 
     I'm not sure how we do this exactly, but I have learned a few things.  The cure for sin is love and forgiveness.  We have to forgive grandpa for what he has welcomed into our family.  We have to cast the demons off our families, out of our homes, and even off our land. 
     Demons aren't only assigned to a person.  Think about the town of New Orleans or Las Vegas.  If we could see the demonic as clear as the people we pass on the street, I think we would be overwhelmed with the ugliness and influence they exercise in these towns and many others.  Where I grew up has it's demons.  I have heard this from people who have lived there and people who have visited.  The county I live in now is infested.
     If forgiveness and love are the cure for sin, don't we have to love this county and our towns enough to forgive the sins of the past.  These so called "ghost hunters" are really demon hunters.  Demons portray themselves as small children and such to gain attention and even sympathy from those misguided souls who seek them out.  We hear of haunted houses and haunted towns, but what we are really talking about is demonic infestation.  There was a lot of drunkenness, prostitution and murder where I live.  Those demons are still lurking here, assigned to keep this town from being what God intends it to be.
     It seems a little hopeless, but it's not.  God is more powerful than a family of or a town full of the assigned demonic.  He can wipe out this town in a blink of an eye.  But, what I think He wants is for us to do it.  Take back our families, our homes, our land and our towns, states and country.  He has given us all that we need to do this.  The weapon of His choice is forgiveness.  What would happen if we all started forgiving our ancestors who have accepted the curses on our families?  Or if we all started forgiving the old timers who committed sin in our towns?  What if we forgave those who sinned in our homes.  If you go back and look at the history of one house and all the sin committed there from affairs, to abuse, from gossip to murder and really forgave the sinner, you take the power from the demon.  I have to read more on this.  I'm only sharing what I have seen so far, but it makes sense.  I do know that the Holy Spirit is the one to reveal these things to us.  We should ask Him to show us where we need to forgive and what curses we need to break.   
     If we open the door to the demonic with sin, then we need to and can shut the door in Satan's face with forgiving the sinner.  We can't just throw him in the closet, because that's where sin is comfortable.  Jesus is love and to love is to forgive, so shine the light of forgiveness so bright, the enemy runs back to the darkness of Hell.  That should be the only place he feels welcome.

 
Interesting how we prefer to see the Bible as a rule book, a collection of principles to follow when life gets rough, rather than as a revelation of God's heart. We prefer instructions on what to do over an invitation to connect our hearts with his and to then do whatever he reveals. - Larry Crabb

The Safety of the Pit.

“The more clearly we recognize how deep our commitment to self-protection operates in our relational style and the more courageously we face the ugliness of protecting ourselves rather than loving others, the more we’ll shift our direction.” - Larry Crabb


     I feel like I am slowly drowning in a pit of quicksand.  Turning my life over to God is somehow suppose to lift me out of this?  Really?  I turned my life over.  I have done the things suggested.  There is no miraculous relief.  I just keep sinking.  There Jesus sit's on a rock smiling at me.  Waiting?  For what?  When is He going to work that miracle on the inside of me that makes it all better? 
     All the people around me struggle, but I still feel different.  There is a deadness about me that I can't seem to heal.  My friends cry and hug and feel better, then praise God for what He has done for them.  While they do all this, I sit stone faced, wondering when I will ever feel the way they do.  On the rare occasion that something does touch my heart, I fight it.  And when I leave the audience, it turns to anger.  Anger is safe, I know how to do anger.
     I have read book after book, watched sermon after sermon, talked and listened to God until I don't even know what else we could talk about, and what?  I still feel the same.  There is no miraculous connection, no warm and fuzzy.  We aren't supposed to allow our feelings to rule us and I get that, but what about this emptiness.  I don't feel full of the Spirit.  I don't feel satisfied with God living on the inside of me.  There is still something missing.
     "So Jesus, you think you could give me a hand here?"  I've stopped fighting so the quicksand is sucking me in as fast, but I do feel it reaching my chin.  I guess I better ask for His help before I can no longer speak.
     "You ready to get out of there?"
     "Yeah, I thought I was getting out of here, but I'm pretty sure I have only stopped sinking for brief moments.  I'm still going down."
     Jesus reaches over and rips a cactus out from it's roots and holds it out for me to grab on to, "Here you go."
     "Are you kidding me?  You can't find a rope or regular tree limb?  You can't just snap your fingers or float on over here and give me Your hand?  There has to be a less painful way for You to pull me out of here."
     "I'm not going to pull you out.  I'm going to hold this cactus so you can climb out."
     "That will hurt.  I will be a bloody mess by the time I get to you."
     "Yes you will, but I will be here at this end, waiting and encouraging you."
     "Forget it.  It's too hard.  I'd rather just sink.  Isn't that the way?  I get to go to heaven without the bloody battle to get out of here.  For what?  More years on this earth?"
     "I ask you to be more like Me."
     "I can't.  It's not in me."
     "There is one part of you that is like me already.  I gave it to you from birth.  It's gotten stronger over the years because of your struggle."
     "What's that?  What part of me is right?  What part of me makes the painful bloody climb out of here worth it?"
     "No matter how hard you try to not care about others, you do.  You are like me in wanting others to climb out of their pits.  Funny isn't it?  The one part of you that is totally like Me is the one part you insist on changing.  You try so hard not to care about people, but you can't help yourself."
    "It's not funny."
    "Why don't you get working on climbing out of there?  I've told you what to do.  You know you can't sink into that pit and be satisfied with your life.  You will die regretting that you didn't climb out and join me in pulling out others.  The one who has made the climb is the best encourager of those about to make that climb.  You can stand next to me, while I hold the cactus for the next person and tell them your story.  But you can only tell them the whole story when you truly stand next to me.  Hey, you only have to climb out as far your in."
     "How do I know that if I pierce my hands on that thing and it hurts and they bleed it will be worth it?"
     Jesus held up His right hand and I saw where the nail had been driven through it.  I then saw the blood on His face from the crown of thorns and where His side was ripped open, and He said, "It was worth it."
     Suddenly the climb up the cactus didn't seem so bad.

    So many people say that all you have to do is get in the Word.  All you have to do is move closer to Jesus.  I have said it myself.  But there is more to it for some of us.  There are wounds so deep they seem impossible to heal.  I want to forget those wounds, not dig into them again.  I have spent my whole life developing skills to "not" feel the pain.  I have addictions, anger, and depression to hide in.  If it gets too bad there is always death.  It is so obvious to me that this is going to hurt.  There is a healing I am not aware of that I have to go and find. 
     God has locked me in my room again.  The last time, there were moments of such intense pain that death was an option I kept on the nightstand and some days it was loaded.  Some days I hate the fact that I have shared my story.  I wish I could take it back.  Then I have people say, "Your story has helped me so much."  As encouraging as that can be, it can also be overwhelming.  Why?  Because those people are watching, waiting to see how this turns out.  Lately, I just want to go to sleep and never wake up.  But then what would my life be worth?  How many people would give up?  I can see that other people have lives that are worth something and I want them to know that. 
     Some people don't understand how deep the pain can run.  How no matter what we try and what we do and what accomplishments there are, there is still this deep seeded pain that we can't get away from.  There are people out there just like me who are so disappointed in the Christian life, because it isn't healing that deep wound.  I don't need somebody to stand over me thumping their Bible and giving me scripture.  I don't need people telling me to serve others, love God, and obey the commandments.  That may work for people who have not been up to their chin in quicksand.  They don't understand how comforting the quicksand can be or easy it would be to slip in the rest of the way and give up the battle.  Most people don't "Get it".  I do.
     There is something out there that we are missing.  There is more to this life than baking cookies and being kind to your neighbors.  There is a reason we crawl back into the pit where it is comfortable, where we know how to keep our heads above the sand, even if it's just for a few more moments.  Some people can walk on top of the sand to get out.  Some have barely got their shoes dirty.  Even those who have been buried up to their waists think they get where we are coming from, but they don't.  Until you have tasted the sand and wondered if there is anything worth the fight to climb out, you can't get it. 
     People always say if I was the only person on this earth, Jesus still would have died on that cross, just for me.  That has never made sense to me.  Are you kidding?  Who would choose that much pain for me?  Well, I'm beginning to understand.  I am about to grab onto that cactus.  I am going to figure out why drowning in this pit is not the way to go.  I am going to figure out what is missing.  This isn't just setting a bone or pulling out an appendix or putting a Band-Aid on a scrape.  This is open heart surgery.  This wound comes from a broken heart so I am about to open up this chest and see what is really wrong with this half dead heart of mine.
     Why now?  Why am I suddenly ready to rip open my flesh to figure this out?  God asked me if I was willing to crucify my flesh for one person. Am I willing to kill off the old self?  I don't know about all that, but I do know I am willing to climb out on that stupid cactus so I can stand next to Jesus while He holds it out for the next person.  I will be standing there ready to wash the sand off of somebody.  This is about to get bloody.  This is about to hurt.  But I have been thinking and I have decided if you are in the same pit, why wait?  We can do this together.  Seriously, I am about to drag your butt across a cactus. 

“In order to meaningfully repent of the ways in which we violate love, we must recognize them. We won’t recognize self-protective patterns of relating as sinful violations of love until we face the disappointment in our soul we’re determined never to experience again.” - Larry Crabb