Forgive Us

I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. John 14:18, NIV

 

We think of no one as more powerless or pitiable than an orphan. Nothing in my life stunned me as much as finding out that I was an orphan, that I was alone in the world. I was around three years old when my foster mom told me the truth. I didn't understand it completely, but there was nothing more painful than that moment. I had no mother or father; the ones who I thought were my parents were not. Even more, I found out that I was being kicked out of the home in several days.

 

Jesus said that He will not leave us as orphans. That He will come to us so that we will not feel the pain and hurt of being alone and uncomforted. Would you take a minute today to pray for the brokenhearted and discouraged, those who have been rejected, beaten, and emotionally abandoned through child abuse? These are good people who were left comfortless, and it is up to us to help them heal. I hope that you never experience the pain the abused have experienced.

 

I have counseled those who feel the need to cut themselves in order to relieve the pain of their ordeal. I have met many who have never reached their true potential because of violence or sexual assault. Their stories vary, but the outcome is that, with so few people to reach out, they are emotional orphans. They may seem like the misfits in your church, they may be awkward in the way they relate to others, but Jesus will come and comfort them through your hands and your love if you adopt them as one of your own.

 

Abortion is so neat and tidy; the belief is that no one will ever know. Yet those cries that were silenced and the cries of the orphans who still cry are heard by You. Forgive us, Lord, if we have made the mistake of rejecting either the born or unborn orphans of this world. Forgive us when we turn our hearts against those who make us feel uncomfortable. Forgive us when we turn away due to the pain of what we see, our own indifference, or lack of time, love, or money.

  

Father, please forgive me for even still I cry. Even though I know Your remarkable love, the pain still stings. But today, I would have been aborted. I would have never known You.

 

I pray for the orphans in faraway lands as well as those in the pew next to mine. I pray for the heartbroken and for those whose hearts beat for days too few to notice. I pray, Lord, for the empty wombs and the empty rooms and the broken hearts of the angels who have grieved. Let us be a people who comfort the brokenhearted and strengthen the weak and heavy-laden. I beg that I never stand before You and ask You when was it that I saw You naked, hungry, homeless, rejected, alone, or devastated. Amen.

 

I dedicate this post to Bob L. who believed in me and treated me as a son!

Comfort the Broken

I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. John 14:18, NIV

I want to focus on this simple, straightforward promise of Jesus, which lets us know that He understands exactly how painful it is to feel alone and that He will come to us personally. 

Jesus cares deeply about us and even more deeply about the brokenhearted. He wants them to be welcomed into our churches and our gatherings. We are not to burden the weak and heavy-laden with further rejection. We are not to shun those whose mannerisms make us uncomfortable. It is the older and wiser of us who will answer for the way these little ones are treated. Will we treat them as welcomed guests or that they are in the way?

When I was in the Marine Corps, every Thanksgiving and Christmas the local churches invited us to come and eat with their members in their homes. I had the opportunity to go on some occasions and, I must admit, the food was terrific. Just being in a family setting was great. They were polite and kind and I always left with a smile on my face.

But the next Sunday when I visited their church, the welcome mat was gone. I was greeted and treated kindly, but no one invited me to share a hamburger, to join them in some Sunday activity, or even asked me to attend their church again. Nobody even said goodbye as I walked away.

Are the broken ones welcome in your church and mine? Are they invited back? Are they preferred and honored? Or rejected, either openly or subtly? Do we invite them out for pizza or hot dogs? Do we open ourselves to them or close up tight?

I know of a beautiful young person who was served as an angel of light to a brokenhearted family. No better picture of being like Christ could ever be painted. She has labored in the background not asking for fanfare, thanks, power, or privilege. She just wanted the opportunity to serve. She gave and gave; even as I write this, she is still giving. Yet she feels unwelcome in her church, rejected by the other members, and therefore, by Christ.

Jesus knows what it feels like to be left alone. Like Jesus, let's make sure that our churches welcome the hurting and broken. Please make sure that you personally are part of the solution. Make sure this type of story never occurs again. Let’s give this beautiful young woman and the many others like her the room to grow into the fullness of Christ. That way, we give comfort to Christ. Shame on us all if we fail!

Step 4: Make Adjustments and Keep Growing!

To those of you who have struggled for years with intense pain, I encourage you that you can heal and you are not alone. To those of you who would love to give up, I understand. But don't give up. Almost nothing works the first time it's tried. Thomas Edison knew that, so he kept experimenting. Abraham Lincoln knew that, so he kept running for president. My wife knew that, so she continued believing in my healing. My friends knew that, so they kept praying for me.

If you have picked your team well, you will continue to grow and heal. If you've made a mistake in choosing one of the people, then make a change and keep on believing. Although there were a couple people who were not interested in joining my team, most of the people did accept and are still praying for more miracles to come.  When we hit snags, we found ways around them through prayer.

If you're having trouble gathering your team or even in choosing whom to ask, get good counsel from someone who loves you, wants to see you heal and succeed, and whose faith is strong.

In ending this little series, I understand that I have not given you all the answers nor can I, for they are not mine to give. The answers all come from God. But feel free to Email me. I am available as a recovery coach.

Step 3 - Together Form a Plan

When you gather your team—people who love you, care about you in a deep and meaningful way, and are committed to praying for you—together you will need to form a plan that will make a real difference in your life. These team dynamics will keep you safe and give you great strength and guidance through tough and treacherous times.

                     

As you are healing, you will go through some of the most turbulent waters of your life. A life of peace, joy, and effective Christian love lies ahead of you. It will not be easy, but it will be worth it. Being healed is going to be far more valuable than you may ever have imagined. There is no limit to what God is going to do through the healed, restored, and fully functional you. But before that can happen, you and your team will need to come up with a simple game plan.

Whatever plan that you and your team decide upon can be adjusted, changed, revised, and rewritten, if necessary. Trust in the team of people you’ve selected. Remember that these are mature people who care about your growth and healing, and that they will need time to really pray about how to encourage you and help you heal. Mature people may take a little longer to reach a decision, but when they do, it is far more trustworthy.

Your team may encourage you to get the help and guidance of your family doctor or to seek the services of a reputable counselor or psychologist. A good team might even suggest that you book an appointment with a psychologist to interview them. A good psychologist would welcome such a meeting because they understand that in order to help someone heal, there must be a great fit between the doctor and the patient.

Your team may also suggest a particular pastor whom they have found to be easy to talk to and, just as important, someone who is worth listening to.

By gathering these resources together, your team will have helped you take your first steps toward true and lasting healing.

Next Time: Make Adjustments and Keep Growing!

Step 2: What about Their Faith?

The faith of the people that you select for your team is extremely important. Faith gives a person the ability to stand and believe even when things feel hopeless. Faith is a rock-solid belief that God has the ability to act even when there is no reason to hope. Faith is the strength of the hopeless, the infirmed, the discouraged, and the broken. You need people of faith on your team.

In Mark Chapter 2, we see friends gather together and hatch a plan. The plan was simple. They were going to carry their paralyzed friend to Jesus so that he could be healed. Picture it for a minute. See them gather together. See them stoop and see them lift their friend. Maybe it was a bit rocky at first as they shifted the load between them. And that is the way it is with a team of people. They must find a way to carry the load for a little while. And that's what the paralytic’s friends in Matthew did. They carried their friend. This was not a terrible burden to them, but a burden of love. These men had faith and they were determined that if they could just get their friend to Jesus that he would be healed. Now we all know that deadweight is heavy and that a paralyzed person is by definition deadweight. Yet they carried him. And as they did so, I would guess that they felt the burden more deeply as their journey continued. They may have stumbled and even nearly fell.  

But their muscles didn't give out and their faith didn’t falter. They had formed a plan and they were sticking to it. We all know that most plans have barriers, but we find ways around them.

The paralytic’s friends’ barrier was that there were too many people standing in the way. There were too many other people who needed Jesus’ help. And there were no disabled entrances through which they could enter. So these men of faith made their own entrance by opening up the roof wide enough so they could drop their friend down on ropes right at Jesus’ feet.

You will not heal completely without people of real faith on your team. You will need people who have the ability to come up against barriers and use wisdom and faith to break them down.

 

Next Time: Together Form a Plan

Step 1: Find a Team of People Who Are Willing to Help You Heal

Step 1.  Find a Team of People Who Are Willing to Help You Heal

Begin with a friend or other adult you know cares about you. This friend must be trustworthy because you are going to share some very real and painful memories. Confidentiality is a must so choose somebody who is able to keep a secret, somebody who has demonstrated their trustworthiness to you in the past. I suggest that you look for someone who is at least 10 years older than you are and is kind, gentle, and deeply interested in your healing.

Stay away from the friend who is always telling you what you should do. Stay away from people who are critical of how you've handled your quest for healing. Critical people are a dime a dozen and should not be chosen as part of your team. A strong family member might be a good choice if they were not part of your abusive situation. If this person has given you sound advice in the past in a loving, gentle way, they may be a good candidate.

The person you are looking for is someone who would be excited to be part of your healing team. If they hesitate or say they don't know if they have the time, then maybe they're not the right candidate. If they immediately give you advice, then they are probably not the right candidate, either. 

I was lucky because I always had three to four people who were able to fill this spot for me. These were people who I could call at any time and say, “You know, I'm having a problem I'd like to share with you,” and they always gave me the time. These were also the people I could call when everything was going well. Even then, they always gave me the time and were excited about my progress. These were the people with whom I always knew that I could be open and honest.

Look for people who love you unconditionally and are ready to do whatever it takes to see you become strong, healthy, emotionally healed, and productive in all that you say and do.

Next Time: Step 2: What about Their Faith?

Grief Must Make Way for the King

Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up. James 4:10, NIV

In the great day of kings, subjects were not allowed to look into the eyes of their king. Man's idea of a king and God's idea is so very different indeed! We are invited to look into our King’s eyes. No, not just invited. Encouraged to look into His eyes!  

My Lord is the lifter of my head and, one day, He did just that. One Sunday, I no longer cried. What made that day different from all the rest, I do not know and cannot tell. I am not God and His workings are so very far beyond me that I can only guess.

So here is my best guess. The deep sadness and pain that comes from repeated abuse takes time to heal, and there is no one reason why someone like me finally comes up from the depths of depression, loneliness, isolation, and despair. The grief of being hated by the ones you love, being abused and beaten by the ones who should have loved you back is a deep and terrible grief—far more terrible than anyone can really imagine.

But there is a time for grief which needs to be expressed in tears, words, writings, and song. There is a place for grief, and it needs to be a place of honor within the church. God intends for us to grieve our losses; it is good for us to do so. It is healthy to express our agony and heartache for He understands the grief and the despair of our hearts. We also need to allow others who are grieving the space to do so.

We need to allow time and space for prayer, counseling, and faith to do their work. We need to give space to the heartbroken and provide a place where they can come and find tenderness, love, and peace. Grieving is very hard work indeed.

Never underestimate the hard work and faith needed to recover or the amount of work it will take to reach those who are in deep despair. But isn't that what we're called to do? Isn’t that our service and our joy? Isn't that what separates us from dead religion? While we cannot underestimate the price that we may pay to ransom a soul from heartache, we must also understand that, in the end, it is the King's gaze that is the ultimate ransom for our soul. 

When the King comes, He looks into the eyes of the brokenhearted and lifts their head so that they can gaze into His eyes. And they are changed. 

What I know is this: My King took a moment in time and changed my life. With His hands, he lifted my head and gave me hope.

Next Time: Why Are We Wasting God's Time?