Dear Mrs. Tiggy Winkle, thanks so much for your prayers and support. I have been puzzled by a few of the negative comments. Not so much if they were directed at me, but when they are rude to others writing here, I don’t get it. I can handle negativity, I sure had enough of it growing up, but some are more hurting than I, and it makes me upset to have them attacked. The same criticism they share in a hurtful way can be voiced in a way that is edifying, they do not have to tear down the person.

If people approached me like that when I was sorting things out, I would never have come to God. I was fortunate to have people that gave me what I needed to make the right choice.

Thank you for saying that I am reaching out in love. I think it is only love that can reach through the hurt. I am trying to see myself the way you say I am, and it is hard, but the big diffence for me is that I am still seeking God. I faced the same fears and insecurites before without God.

One day in a Bible study, my pastor was talking about how people who have a breakthrough forget the process that it took to get to that point. He used cigarette smoking as an example. He has watched people who finally come to the point where the can go to the altar for a healing on smoking, and they receive the healing. Then they turn around and come down hard on smokers, forgetting that it may have taken months or years to get to the point of breakthrough. He stated that the Holy Spirit works on people in the way that is best for them. Some of the people in our church that still smoke cigarettes, have just been healed of drug addiction, or other major problems. Cigarettes are not a great healthy habit, but is is not as serious as some of what the person has already broken through. When the person has the first healing secured, then the Holy Spirit will move to another area. To have everything stripped away at once may be the wrong thing for some people, so the Holy Spirit moves step by step. When we try to get in the way of that progress we do more harm than good.

I know that I once asked my pastor about why some of my healing is taking so long and he told me that first, it was so that when I reach out to others that I remember how hard it was for me and have patience and love as people struggle with the issues. Then he told me that give the depth of the hurt I had, that God will not storm my barriers, He is patiently helping me sort things out at a pace that will not feel like a rape of my being. That if God pushed in it would scare me more, so He is working at my pace. He also told me that God knows the best areas to work in first, that there is a divine order in the healing. I am trying to believe this.

People who think that I am not really trying to get this down should spend time first getting to know what I do in a day, how fervently I pray, how I try to keep my life in line with God’s word, how I study, how I reach out to others to help. The damage was so severe that I have come far in a short time. I have a long way to go, but they do not know from where I came.

Some of the people who come to this site are also hurting souls, and my heart goes out to them because I have been there. To be preach at (and I was preached at in those areas) will do nothing but drive the person further inside a shell or drive a bigger wedge between them and God. I would not want to be responsible for that. I just pray that at some point the Holy Spirit works in their lives to help them find God. I know He will, believe me, if I got saved anyone can get saved. I want so much to give back to others what was given back to me.

I am glad I got to meet you on this site. There are some wonderful kind and gentle souls here. People who really have a heart for God. They stand out so much like a light to those still in darkness. You are one of them.

Heather