April 21, 2006
-
Currently I am doing the Beth Moore study Breaking Free: Making Liberty in Christ a Reality in Life. I could only find a picture of the Leader’s Guide, but there is a workbook with a similar cover. This is a tough study for me. Many of you know of my past and can probably imagine why. (Testimony on 3/24/06) And it still is incredible to me that Christ reached through all the walls, barriers, and hatred that I had for Him to touch my heart with love, and sent a wonderful mentor/pastor to help me navigate through some of the minefields.
I sure wish that it was possible to say, now that I am saved everything is wonderful. It is wonderful in the far-reaching aspect of my future in Christ being assured, but there are still the day to day things, and the hurts and pains that don’t just dissipate with salvation. Have you ever been envious of those who have challenges that are not so crushing to you? Challenges that you don’t have to do battle with on an ongoing basis. I am also certain that each and every person can ask the above same question. What seems easy for one is hard for another, and pain is pain is pain is pain. But right now I seem to be battling a bit of depression and a good dose of self-pity, sigh. My teenagers, whom I love dearly, can sometimes make you wonder. My teens have what I would have considered a heavenly life, and yet they complain, hate their life, and it is based on things that I would have thought so trivial (as a teen I was struggling just to live, not commit suicide, and survive massive abuse), being hated for making my teens do their homework, not dropping everything and running to the store for them at a whim, not letting them go someplace, or checking up on them is the worst that they have to face in their lives at home. I am certain pressures at school are tough, peer pressure, the lack of values that is so rampant today, and the demands placed on them there are probably tough ones. It is not an easy world to grow up in.
Right now I am in week 5, Binding up the Brokenhearted, and Beth Moore gave some incredible studies in Day one, She talked about the fact that having your heart broken is an injury in a class all by itself, and says that it is inevitable from time to time that it will happen, and that it is an emotional rite of passage into maturity, but that many individuals are introduced to mature emotions long before they should be – she has that one right there, I was introduced to a broken heart at the age of 8 and it put a huge wedge between me and my perception of God, I decided then that God had abandoned me – I now know He didn’t but it still takes a huge microscope for me to detect God’s hand at that time. I still struggle with why He didn’t do more.
One important point she made is on page 95, “People often contrast the God of the Old Testament with the God of the New Testament. Actually, He’s the same God. Christ’s death on the cross and resurrection from the dead fulfilled the demands of the Law and unleashed the gates of boundless grace, but God has always loved and been compassionate.
She gave several Old Testament references where we had to look at the circumstances involved in the person’s broken heart, and how God bound them up. Genesis 16:1-13, Genesis 39: 11-23, Ruth 1: 3-18, and 2 Samuel 12:15-25. You may want to check these out.
She then pointed out Psalm 127:3-4 and said how do these verses describe “sons” - it is like arrows in the hand of a warrior. And she pointed out that God had one arrow in his quiver – Jesus. And love reached sacrificially into that quiver and pulled out the solitary arrow to defeat the plans of satan.
What love, what sacrifice, and all who will “lower their veiling shields of unbelief and let the healing arrow penetrate shall be saved.” P.96
On page 98 she concludes day one with a description of the word “bind up” in Isaiah 61:1 where it says, “He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted.” The word is chavash meaning to bind on, wrap around; bind up as a wound, bandage, cover, envelope, enclose, and in our context today it is one of hemorrhaging.
God will minister to his children, Beth says, willingly and lavishly whether the hurt is minimal or unbearable, . He sent Jesus to apply pressure to our badly bleeding hurt hearts with scarred hand. It is an intimate activity of Christ.
This paragraph on page 98 struck me hard. “Let’s conclude our lesson with a last thought on Christ binding up the brokenhearted. Notice the first definition includes the concepts of covering, enveloping, and enclosing. Have you ever noticed that when your heart is broken, you tend to feel exposed and less in control of your emotions? I certainly have, and frankly, I hate losing control of my emotions in front of people! Few things feel more vulnerable than a broken heart. Life’s way of reacting to a crushed heart is to wrap tough sinews of flesh around it and tempt us to promise we’ll never let ourselves get hurt again. That’s not God’s way. Remember, self-made fortresses built to protect our hearts not only keep love from going out, they keep love from coming in. We risk becoming captives in our own protective fortresses. Only God can put the pieces of our hearts back together again, close up all the wounds, and bind them with a porous bandage that protects from infection…but keeps the heart free to inhale and exhale love.
Then she challenges us to..” expose our heart one more time…just to Him. After all, this was what His father sent Him to do. The bow’s stretched back and the Arrow’s ready. But it’s up to you to drop your shield.”
Tomorrow I may share more for it will touch close to home, hearts broken in childhood. sigh.
Boy do these studies touch me deeply, the emotions that I still work hard at controlling, the need to withdraw, the need to hide and not be noticed, the fear that God might change His mind about me, all have their origin in a broken heart. I sure could use God’s healing hand tonight and a lot of prayer.
Heather
Comments (7)
Heather, may God’s loving arms surround you tonight and tomorrow. There is a scripture that quotes God as saying, “I change not” (I think it’s in Malachi). That means if you know He “did” love you, it also means He will ALWAYS love you. Jesus didn’t die on the cross so He would later “get down from it” just to avoid dying for YOU. May Jesus go with you to all the memories that these lessons bring back. May He stand in that room with you as you envision what happened there, and may you feel “protected” this time as you relive those events. And may you envision Jesus lovingly holding your heart in His hand, healing it right back up the minute you re-envision it breaking. You are a living, walking miracle of God, for having survived in one piece what happened to you all those years. The Bible says the bad times we experience are so we can help someone else later. There are zillions of hurting children in slavery and bondage to parents and taskmasters in places all over this world, and it will take someone like you to help them when Jesus comes back (the saints resurrect and come back “with” Him, right?). And who knows, you might be called on not too far in the future to help someone who has been through something very similar to you. God will help you and has helped you… God be with you right there next to you as you study these things…may He heal your hurting heart in a very tangible way.
As for the children, I’ve heard it said you must love your children “enough to let them hate you for a while”… it’s hard, but you know what to do.
God bless you and be with you all this weekend, Heather. Love always, Gerrie
Heather, one thing I can tell you for sure–what you are going thru with your kids is VERY normal!!!! I didn’t think I would live thru my teen’s growing up, but I did. Now I ALMOST wish he was a teen again so he would be home.
God is leading you out of the past, one step at a time. I have watched you grow for the last year or so, since I’ve “known” you and I can see such growth!!! It’s hard to really see ourselves, so maybe you can’t see the growth, but I know others can.
My prayer for you, Heather, is that you will let go and let God, as the old saying goes. Maybe all these feelings you have been dealing with (the depression and all) are “growing pains” in the spirit.
I love you, sister!!!!
I love that study…hopefully it will bless you in the way it blessed me
God puts you on my heart often Heather, and I will continue to pray. ~Sherry
Beth Moore has some wonderful studies…and that one sounds to be excellent as well….maybe I should check it out myself. I’ve become an expert at masking the pain of life over the years. No one would ever even begin to imagine that coming from such a loving and wonderful Christian family that I spent a childhood being sexually molested by my uncle and most of my teen and adult years begging God to take my life and trying to help Him along with that at times….the self-hatred. As I taught Sunday School and led Bible studies such as the one you’re doing now and was always involved in music ministry, no one could’ve guessed that I was living with an abusive husband….surely not that sweet gentle man that cried at anything and would help anyone out…except his family at home. But one thing I have learned is that there are a lot of other people out there that are masking the pain too….and they’re good….they can make us believe they have it all together. I used to look at those with trivial problems that thought their life was collapsing around them and wish that was all I had to deal with….but God showed me something. One…I have no idea what anyone is truly going through and to them it’s just as traumatic…wimps…JUST KIDDING..LOL But most importantly…that I’m blessed that God felt me strong enough to withstand Satan’s attacks of this magnitude and that He saw me as someone that He knew would eventually triumph and use those bad times and use them to minister to those that will be going through the same thing some day. What a blessing to finally realize what it means to count it all joy! I’ll definitely have to check out that study!
Have a blessed day!
Michele
I have never been in your situation of abuse,or the amount of pain you had to endure.Do you think that looking at the life you’ve given your kids,makes you think more about what you had to live through,just for the fact that they make you feel unloved as a mother? or apreciated for the fact your kids dont have to suffer pain as you did? being a mom of teens is sooo hard,and additionaly trying to deal with past hurts. I’ll be lifting you up in prayer. Beth Moore has been through horrendous things,and she ministers to women to allow us to be the woman God wants us to be. Hugs Heather!
What a precious child of God you are! Keep up the wonderful postings! Father I pray protection for Heather as she shares You with the readers here that drop in like I did! Bless her for her transparency and protect her from those that would injure her! Let others who drop in find a blessing here! In Jesus’ name. amen.