Biblical Cousneling

The Pain of Emotional Abuse Can Last A Lifetime

Think of a precious child. Maybe it’s your grandchild, a friend’s little boy, the little girl you teach at Sunday school whom God leads you to lavish extra love on. Now, picture someone screaming, “You’ll never amount to anything!” “I wish you had never been born!” “You’re worthless!” into their innocent little heart. It’s unimaginable that people could hurt a child in such a way. Unfortunately, it happens every day in homes across America. And the wounds in the heart of that little child can last a lifetime. Maybe that child was you long ago.

Often, because all the child knows is abuse, they will be drawn to people in adulthood who will abuse them much in the same way where control is at the forefront of the abuse. Angry threats like “If you leave me, I’ll kill you!” Or, “You and the kids won’t get a dime from me.” Both are examples of verbal and emotional abuse and are controlling tactics in abusive relationships

Abuse can also happen without a spoken word – it can be degrading looks, threatening stares, aggressive body language or other threatening behaviors. These actions are meant to inflict fear with great success, leaving the person on the receiving end with emotional pain that stunts emotional growth.

In some circles, even Christian ones, people don’t want to talk about emotions, and when they are discussed, the importance of emotional health and wholeness is minimized. Yet, we know that with deeply wounded people, negative emotions are at the center of thinking, feeling actions, and poor choices.

Emotional abuse attacks at the core of a person’s value, crushing their confidence and chips away at their self-worth, breaking their spirit in the process. God’s word says “A cheerful heart is a good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries us the bones. “(Proverbs 17:22)

Stop the cycle. Seek help. God takes broken things and makes them whole. Run to the Balm of Gilead. Jesus is the balm who can heal the wounds of God’s children.

Don’t Get Even Forgive

When you are hurt and you are wronged by another person, you may want to even the score. When you are damaged and broken by another person, you may want to undo the damage and fix the brokenness by getting even. However, the idea of getting even is a false idea put into your mind by Satan and his forces of deception.The truth is there is no true way of getting even with another person. There is no true way of evening up the score by hurting another person for what was done to you. There is no true way of getting even because hurting someone else does not make your own hurt go away. Hurting someone else does not fix your brokenness.Hurting someone else does not undo a wrong committed against you. However, there is a way to erase the wrong, heal the hurt, repair the damage, and fix the brokenness. You can erase the wrong, heal the hurt, repair the damage, and fix the brokenness by pushing back against wanting to get even. You can push back and heal, repair, and fix the hurt by asking Christ to push with you. You can push back by asking Christ to help you be forgiving.Certainly, the way of the world is not to forgive. The way of the world is to try to get you to even the score by doing to others the same bad things others have done to you. However, look around you. Look at the results of the way of the world. Now look within your heart where God is within. When you look within your heart…the place within you where God is found, then you will see His way is not the way of the world.God’s way is the way of giving you healing. God’s way is the way of giving you wholeness. God’s way is the way of giving you rightness. God’s way is the way of giving you peace.To go God’s way means you must use your might, use your will, and use your heart through the power of the Holy Spirit to push in His direction and ask Him to help you forgive. When you and God both push in the same direction, you win, and you do not just even the score into a tie; you do not just win by a slim margin…you win by smashing the adversary back into the ground from where the adversary slithered forward to bite you and poison you.

The Greatest Human Need Is for Love

The greatest human need is for love. It’s a legitimate need placed in us by our creator. When this need is not met, it can create a void so deep we go through life trying to fill it. It causes us to crave the approval and acceptance of others and drives us to engage in imbalanced relationships where we attach to unhealthy, emotionally unavailable people who often abuse and mistreat us. We will often compromise our morals, values, and beliefs for fear of losing them. This creates a vicious cycle of feeling used, devalued, unappreciated, victimized opening the door to bitterness, resentments, unforgiveness, and hopelessness.

The only way to stop the cycle is to get a healthy dose of real love – the love of Jesus. Love seeks the highest good for another. Our Savior demonstrated His perfect love for us at the cross. We will never be able to engage in healthy relationships unless we receive the fullness of God’s love. Only His love satisfies.

If you are desperately seeking the love and approval of those who continually hurt you it may be a sign that you have not encountered the Love of Jesus in your heart where you see yourself as He sees you – A precious child of the Living God. When you remove barriers that hinder the ability to live in the fullness of His love for you, it will radically change the people you attract and allow close to your heart. You will desire to engage in relationships that honor God, bless you and seek the highest good for others.

Have You Ever Had A Crushed Spirit?

Disappointment. Grief. Pain. Sorrow. Strife. Broken relationships.

All of these in isolation, or all together, are enough to crush even the strongest among us. And a crushed spirit can often last much longer than any sickness. Illnesses often have cures or medicine to alleviate the pain. A crushed spirit knows no such relief. Or does it?

Psalm 34:18 says that the Lord is near to the broken hearted and saves the crushed in spirit. The psalmist goes on to say that while the afflictions of the righteous are many, the Lord delivers him out of them all.

The proverb is true. We cannot bear a crushed spirit. But God can. While we would break under the sheer weight of such sorrow, God upholds us. And we are not alone. God knows our circumstances and is there to deliver us. Is it always immediate? No, but it will happen one day. While he will always be near to us in our moments of deepest suffering, he might not deliver us right away. Deliverance is coming, and while we wait for that day his promise to be near sustains us.

But there is something even more profound about this God who is near to the crushed in spirit. He knows the crushing blows intimately well. How can we know this? Because he crushed his own Son for our deliverance. The Savior, God the Son, was crushed for us. The Father was momentarily separated from him so we would always be near him. No one ever experienced a more crushed spirit than Christ on that day on the cross, all so we would never face such wrath and condemnation. Our ultimate deliverance from pain and sorrow is sure because the cross is sure. Psalm 34:18 is true because the cross is true.

A crushed spirit is impossible to bear; this is true. But by God’s grace and kindness, we do not have to bear such crushing blows alone. We have a God who not only promises his presence in every pain but also knows our pain most intimately. A crushed spirit only God can bear, and he daily bears us up.

Releasing You

Nothing is more grieving than loving someone bent on destruction. Feeling powerless can drive us to insane levels of trying to save our loved ones from the consequences of their poor choices by fixing, managing, and trying to change and control their lives. Often we don’t even realize that we may be hindering the work of the Holy Spirit that convicts, leads them to a place of brokenness, surrender, and repentance.

Our greatness act of love must be to pray, let go and surrender them to God. When we get out of the way, our loved ones stop looking to us to be their savior and turn to their true Savior Jesus Christ who has the power to heal, restore, redeem and set free.

Whether it’s a spouse, child, sibling or a friend, we must release them to the care of God, yet it’s difficult to do because many of us have a misconception about what it means to let go and release. The following poem was written by June Hunt. It’s a beautiful picture of releasing.

Releasing You:

Releasing you is not to stop loving you but loving you enough to stop leaning on you.

Releasing is not to stop caring for you but to care enough to stop controlling you.

Releasing is not to turn away from you, but it is to turn to Christ trusting His will over you.

Releasing is not to harm you but realizing my help has been harmful to you.

Releasing is not to refuse you but to refuse to keep reality from you.

Releasing is not to prove my power over you, but it is to admit that I am powerless to change you.

Releasing is not to stop believing in you, but it is to believe the Lord alone will build character in you.

Releasing is not to condemn the past but to cherish the present and commit our future to the Lord.

-June Hunt

To let go means to get out of the way, release our loved ones at the foot of the cross and offer them up to the care of God.

Prayer for Emotional Healing

Holy and Heavenly Father God,
I pray that today and every day You will partner with me in a thorough examination and cleansing of my heart…reveal, heal and deliver me of all the strongholds I am bound by in my life.

LORD, please expose with Your Truth and Light all the pain, fear, shame, guilt and sorrow that is hidden within dark places of my heart…all the things that prevent me from living a life of freedom, peace and joy that come from a transparent relationship with You.

Father, please show me how to come before You in faith, trust, obedience and submission …and in this exchange, please reveal to me all the lies I have received and believed in my life…partner with me in replacing my deformed belief system with Your Word and Your Truth, which is infallible and endures forever.

Teach me Your Ways, LORD, and show me how to find freedom in forgiveness of self and others…to embrace myself as a new creation…to put away the former things and live each day in the way You designed and ordained long ago…and to see myself through Your eyes, as Your precious child and joint heir with Christ in Your Kingdom of Heaven.

Show me, LORD, how to receive Your Fatherly Forgiveness, Great Grace, Limitless Love and Marvelous Mercy…lead me to bathe in the peaceful, still waters of renewal and sanctification…anoint me with Your Holy Spirit until my cup runs over.

Write a new story on my heart, LORD…one born of The Holy Spirit and guided by the power of Your redemption and restoration…please bless and comfort me with a holy wholeness of healing that is only possible through You, Jehovah-Rapha, my LORD Who Heals.

Abba Father, I praise You for all that You Are, yesterday, today and tomorrow, and pray all these things in the Name of my Savior, Jesus Christ…

Amen.

“Be of good cheer. Your faith has made you well. Go in peace.” (Luke 8:48)

Satisfying Love

We will often compromise our morals, values, and beliefs for fear of losing them. This creates a vicious cycle of feeling used, devalued, unappreciated, victimized opening the door to bitterness, resentments, unforgiveness, and hopelessness.

The only way to stop the cycle is to get a healthy dose of real love – the love of Jesus. Love seeks the highest good for another. Our Savior demonstrated this perfectly at the cross. We will never be able to engage in healthy relationships unless we receive the fullness of God’s love. Only His love satisfies.

When you remove barriers that hinder the ability to live in the fullness of His love for you, it will radically change the people you attract and allow close to your heart. You will desire to engage in relationships that honor God, bless you and seek the highest good for others

Do You Want To Be Made Well?

It’s easier to stuff pain inside, wear a painted smile and pretend that everything is okay, but masking issues of the heart only perpetuates our hurts.

Eventually, undealt issues spring up and defile all areas of our lives including relationships. Inwardly our souls are crying out to be healed. At some point, we may grudgingly seek help. However, it is essential to understand that in order to be healed we must be willing to be healed no matter how painful and difficult the journey.

Jesus asked one question to the lame man at the pool of Bethesda in John 5:2 “Do you want to be made well?” This is the pivotal question for every person seeking healing for emotional wounds. The simple truth is that not everyone wants to be made well. They may start off eager with the best intentions, emotionally feeling that they cannot go on another day, but at the end of the day, do not want to be made well, and those who do not want to get well are not going to get well.

Why would I not want to walk in the freedom from the bondage that Christ set me free from? F-E-A-R! Fear of the unknown, fear of rejection, fear of what may be uprooted and exposed, fear of pain, fear that we may have to give up (someone or something); Or we may not be desperate enough yet.

Perhaps we have grown comfortable in our dysfunction and are comfortable in a victim role. We may not have reached a breaking point yet where we face losing someone we love, such as a spouse, or a relationship, maybe even a job, our freedom, and in our minds – we tell ourselves as bad as our current situation is – “it’s not as bad as so and so’s”, or at least we know how to respond, or how to continue to do life and even serve in ministry. However, we are putting on the painted smile while living in a prison in our own mind. But make no mistake…It is never God’s fault. If we do not want to embark on the journey and “be made well” – we won’t get well. Healing is a choice.

If you are in a place where you are desperate enough to get help and want to be made well, then I pray that nothing will hinder you from getting the healing that you need and will encounter the Healer in a deep and intimate way.

“He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.”
Psalm 147:3

DO YOU WANT TO BE MADE WELL?

The Ripple Effects of Bitterness

“Bitterness is like a rock thrown into a placid pond; After its initial splash it sends out circular ripples that affect the whole pond. It starts with ourselves, expands to our spouse, then to our children, friends, and anyone we come in contact with.” (Pastor & Dr. Chuck Lynch)

People hurt, mistreat, abuse, abandon and betray us.

God sees and validates our pain. But he also tells us to pursue peace so that we do not fall short of His grace and let bitterness take root to defile us.

Bitterness comes when we hold on to hurt and refuse to forgive those who have hurt us. It affects everything around us and causes us to have a hardened heart. We can even take on a victim mentality where we feel constantly wronged by others. It will pollute our overall view of the world and affects how we treat people.

No matter what we are not entitled to our sinful responses to how others have hurt us. Doing so only causes separation between God, ourselves and others. We can’t change people or make them see the error of their ways but God can. But we can take our wounded hearts, bitterness, and unforgiveness to the one who has shown us how to love mercy instead of demanding justice.

Bitterness hinders repentance and forgiveness in relationships. The cure for bitterness starts with our hearts. It’s not something we do flippantly or dismissively without considering the cost of the sin committed against us, its effects and the wounds left behind.

Ask Jesus to help you process the hurts and choose to forgive. You will then have a beautiful gift to offer others – true forgiveness from the heart. A heart that says what you did to me hurt me deeply, but I choose to forgive you and release you from a debt you cannot repay just as my precious Jesus forgave me and released me from mine.

Rooted In His Love & Grace

The strength of a life is in its roots. This is true of a physical tree, and our tree of life. The root system serves to guarantee the existence of the tree. Without healthy roots, a tree system cannot survive. They provide a firm base, an anchor for the whole structure of a tree – the trunk – the branches – leaves – fruit. They are all dependent on that healthy root system. One of the primary functions of the root system is to draw water and nourishment from the soil to feed on. This will allow our roots to grow deep to firmly establish and define us.

To live the abundant life of a believer, we must be firmly rooted in God’s love and grace. But first, we must remove and let go of the toxic things that hinder us from being who God created us to be. Shame has no room in the life of a believer. Beloved, please understand that our past does not define us. The sins that hurt us whether ours or someone else’s perpetrated against us are not who we are. They kept us from being who God created us to be causing us to adopt unhealthy coping mechanism and put up walls around our hearts to keep from being hurt. These walls kept everyone else out including God. Addiction, sexual sin, trauma, neglect, abuse, violence, betrayal, unmet needs may not be able to be erased from our minds, but we can be free of their damaging effects on our souls.

God sets us free by helping us walk through and process the pain, grieve losses, remove all the lies we have believed about ourselves and others, enabling us to offer and receive forgiveness. This releases us from the bondage of being a byproduct of our past. With certainty, research confirms we are affected by negative and hurtful experiences in our history. However, because of Christ’s sacrifice and the transforming power of the Holy Spirit, we don’t have to be a slave to our past any longer. Jesus sets the captives free and firmly plants us in the nourishing soil of His unfailing love and grace so that our roots will grow deep in the truth of who we are in Him, so when the storms of life come we will not be uprooted.