I chose to be real.......
Most of the time all I could say was "Oh God, Oh God," or "I'm scared.....
I found safe friends.
They offered their hearts and home whenever I needed them.
They offered to listen and not judge me no matter what I said.
They offered me tears instead of answers.
The offered me time and love instead of suggestions to make me better.
My friends held onto truth for me when I couldn't.
Job said it this way: A despairing man should have the devotion of his friends, even though he forsakes the fear of the Almighty.
I needed to go to church, to be in a community, especially on the days I didn't feel like it.
I needed to serve.
I needed to read the Bible. All I could do at first was read a few verses over and over. I needed God's comfort and assurance he was with me. The Bible stirred up all kinds of feelings. I found parts of me that were mad at God. Those feelings had to be faced, by reading scripture they were revealed to me. I chose to be real with God. I found out he was willing to meet me where I was. He was faithful.
Finally, I needed to worship. My worship said, I acknowledge you are God...despite what I feel. My circumstances do not affect or define God's goodness.
I'll close with this story:
In the midst of my divorce, I attended a Women's conference in Chicago. I thought it would be fun to go with women from my church. It never occured to me I would see people that weren't current with all that had happened in my life. I was undone at the registration table when someone welcomed me saying, "Oh Mim, how's your baby? I heard you were pregnant."
I smiled and didn't say anything. Only to move onto someone else saying, "OH MIM, I AM SO SORRY. I heard you got divorced."
By the time I was seated, I was a basket case. It was as if I was reliving three years in ten minutes; each innocent but difficult question felt like a stab in my heart. I excused myself and went upstairs to my hotel room where I lay down, broken hearted.
I decided to borrow a car and leave. Then I heard God say, "Mim, that's not how you respond. That's not who you are. You don't run. Stay. I am here with you."
How could I refuse? I went back downstairs and sat like a robot, somehow making it through the first evening. I told the women what was happening, and they prayed for me and cried with me. The next morning I went into the conference with a little peace and some awareness of God.
After a few worship songs, I realized I was singing and worshiping. Suddenly my heart unlocked and I poured out my feelings of self-hatred, anger toward my ex-husband, and distrust of God. I was weak when I was done, but as soon as I finished pouring out my heart I felt God pour His presence into my empty heart with words of mercy.
My whole being was being filled with JOY! I felt JOY for the first time in 3 years. JOY in the midst of deep pain. Joy when bitterness and anger would have been normal.
I was undone, and you know what? It lasted. It wasn't just a weekend or conference experience. The joy carried me through my first broken wedding anniversary. The joy brought me hope and peace. Once again my Jesus was faithful to me. He gave me peace in the midst of deep turmoil, His presence instead of an emptiness.
God asks me to read His word to reveal himself, and He did. God askes me to stay in commnunity and be real and he was able to bring life to me because I was available. God asked me to worship and in one worship session, I experienced more healing than in years of counseling! God asked me to be real, to chose to follow Him. He asks for a good reason.
It is true that what God asks us to do brings us life. God redeems the broken. I am not telling you that I'm perfect or even healed...but I can pass the good news that God is faithful. God keeps His word. He wants and desires a relationship. He was faithful to me. He replaced pain and sorrow with JOY. He planted a deep desire in me to live and live in truth.
My journey into healing followed my conscious decision to say I'm willing to live in pain. I had to decide to do the opposite of what I felt like doing.
Psalm 18 was written by David when his friend Saul was trying to kill him.
6-In my distress I called to the LORD. I cried to my God for help. From his temple he heard my voice, my cry came before him, into his ears.
16-He reached down from on high and took hold of me, he drew me out of deep waters.
17-He rescued me from my powerful enemy, from my foes, who were too strong for me.
19-He brought me out into a spacious place; he rescued me because he delighted in me.
Pain demands a response. This is how God responds when we call on Him.
How will you respond? Today choose to move closer to God, to experience His faithfulness, mercy and truth.
Wednesday, July 20, 2011
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
MIM'S STORY - Part 2
During this time I met a family who accepted me and welcomed me into their hearts and home. I learned about relationships, honesty, trust, vulnerability, safety and unconditional love.
I saw how they responded to pain, I began to understand what it meant to belong to a family, and I stopped reading the romance novels, I did not need them anymore.
I became acquainted with the Vineyard Church. Once again, God revealed himself to me in a greater way. I was ready to experience God's presence. I was ready to experience an intimate relationship with Jesus. I experienced joy and peace and rest in my life. I was building deep and lasting friendships. Each step along the way God revealed more and more of Himself to me. The more I grasped truth, the more I experienced Jesus, I was learning to understand acceptance.
A few years later I was invited to move to Iowa City to help with this church. I quickly became part of the community. I felt healthy and whole. Life was different than I had hoped for. I still longed to be married, but it no longer was my focus. I was happy. I had good friends, an adorable home, and I was learning to love Jesus and others. I lacked nothing. It was at this point that my 'prince' came into my life.
He was handsome, I was beautiful. He had a red convertible and I had perfect hair. He was a Christian. I decided on our 2nd date that I would marry this man, and 9 months later we were married. I was loved and chosen. I had my own family.
On our honeymoon he changed. He changed so much I had to wonder, who is this man? Where did the soft-spoken, kind, Godly man that I used to know go?
I wondered: did I marry my Father? But we had both been single for a long time, and I figured we might need time to adjust. I thought our daily fights might be normal. Within three months of our wedding I had three dreams that my husband left me. These dreams were frightening. I shared them with my husband and he reassured me he would never leave me.
But, what never left was the anger. No conversation or activity was immune to an explosion. I prayed, talked with friends, cried, and tried to get my husband to go to counseling with me. He refused. His anger kept getting worse and worse. Walls, cars, dishes and doors, nothing was safe when he was angry. But, still I hoped. I knew God was good. I knew God was powerful. I remembered the stars. I kept hoping for change.
I became pregnant. Three months later I miscarried. I was in such pain, I thought I would die. I became very depressed. I lost hope. My dream of having children seemed impossible. I could barely hold on. I could only pray,"Oh God, Oh God". My friends offered me comfort and faith. I felt God holding me and my tears.
My marriage did not improve. My husband, my prince, the man I had long dreamed of, had turned into a creature from a nightmare. Our home was a war zone, and I feared I was losing my mind. I remembered the dreams of my husband leaving and I wondered if God was graciously preparing my heart for the end of my marriage.
One day, after yet another explosion of anger, I couldn't stop shaking. I knew I needed to do something drastic. I was not safe. I asked him to move out of our home and he refused. He responded with denial and blame instead of repentance and reconcilliation. If he was staying, I had to leave, so I left within a half hour with two laundry baskets of my belongings and my dog. I was homeless and more alone than before.
Following counsel of my pastors and people I trusted, I knew staying with him would be a lie. My only option was to live in truth and acknowledge he had broken our wedding vows. I had to chose LIFE.
On Sept. 1, 2004, my marriage ended. My prince was no more. Actually, my prince never was. It's hard to put into words the emotions that coursed through my veins. Yet, in the midst of the sorrow and anger, I realized I had choices. I could blame God, or myself. I could withdraw from friends and from my church, I could give up and move away. But none of these seemed right. I did not want my life to be based on lies or shame. I had to decide which I would live in. Would I choose fantasy or would I face the truth?
Somewhere deep inside me a cry was recognized. LIVE! I didn't know if I would make it, I wondered if I would ever experience joy again. Once again, in God's mercy, He revealed himself to me, in many ways. One was through the Bible, the story of Jabez. Jabez's story is found in a couple of verses, hidden in the middle of a long geneology.
I Chronicles 4:9-10 states; Jabez was more honorable than his brothers. His mother had named him Jabez saying, "I gave birth to him in pain". Jabez cried out to the God of Israel, "Oh, that you would bless me and enlarge my territory! Let your hand be with me, and keep me from harm so that I will be free from pain. And God granted him his request."
Jabez was given the family idenity of pain. Can you imagine his childhood? Can "Pain" come out and play? What about his marriage proposal? Will you marry me? Would you like to live with "pain" your whole life?
In the old testament, your name was your idenity, Yet Jabez knew God called out for a new idenity. He asked God to enlarge his territory, and scripture tells us God granted his request. I found hope in this. I thought, I do not want an idenity based on pain.
God hear my cry, hear my request. Broaden my territory, open my heart to more than what I have been given. Don't let me stay in the anger forever. Let me live life again.
I felt God say to me, "You've seen what happens when pain is not faced. You have a relationship with me, you have a family, a community...walk this journey with them. I will grant you your request."
Here's how God had me walk this out.....
(To be continued)
I saw how they responded to pain, I began to understand what it meant to belong to a family, and I stopped reading the romance novels, I did not need them anymore.
I became acquainted with the Vineyard Church. Once again, God revealed himself to me in a greater way. I was ready to experience God's presence. I was ready to experience an intimate relationship with Jesus. I experienced joy and peace and rest in my life. I was building deep and lasting friendships. Each step along the way God revealed more and more of Himself to me. The more I grasped truth, the more I experienced Jesus, I was learning to understand acceptance.
A few years later I was invited to move to Iowa City to help with this church. I quickly became part of the community. I felt healthy and whole. Life was different than I had hoped for. I still longed to be married, but it no longer was my focus. I was happy. I had good friends, an adorable home, and I was learning to love Jesus and others. I lacked nothing. It was at this point that my 'prince' came into my life.
He was handsome, I was beautiful. He had a red convertible and I had perfect hair. He was a Christian. I decided on our 2nd date that I would marry this man, and 9 months later we were married. I was loved and chosen. I had my own family.
On our honeymoon he changed. He changed so much I had to wonder, who is this man? Where did the soft-spoken, kind, Godly man that I used to know go?
I wondered: did I marry my Father? But we had both been single for a long time, and I figured we might need time to adjust. I thought our daily fights might be normal. Within three months of our wedding I had three dreams that my husband left me. These dreams were frightening. I shared them with my husband and he reassured me he would never leave me.
But, what never left was the anger. No conversation or activity was immune to an explosion. I prayed, talked with friends, cried, and tried to get my husband to go to counseling with me. He refused. His anger kept getting worse and worse. Walls, cars, dishes and doors, nothing was safe when he was angry. But, still I hoped. I knew God was good. I knew God was powerful. I remembered the stars. I kept hoping for change.
I became pregnant. Three months later I miscarried. I was in such pain, I thought I would die. I became very depressed. I lost hope. My dream of having children seemed impossible. I could barely hold on. I could only pray,"Oh God, Oh God". My friends offered me comfort and faith. I felt God holding me and my tears.
My marriage did not improve. My husband, my prince, the man I had long dreamed of, had turned into a creature from a nightmare. Our home was a war zone, and I feared I was losing my mind. I remembered the dreams of my husband leaving and I wondered if God was graciously preparing my heart for the end of my marriage.
One day, after yet another explosion of anger, I couldn't stop shaking. I knew I needed to do something drastic. I was not safe. I asked him to move out of our home and he refused. He responded with denial and blame instead of repentance and reconcilliation. If he was staying, I had to leave, so I left within a half hour with two laundry baskets of my belongings and my dog. I was homeless and more alone than before.
Following counsel of my pastors and people I trusted, I knew staying with him would be a lie. My only option was to live in truth and acknowledge he had broken our wedding vows. I had to chose LIFE.
On Sept. 1, 2004, my marriage ended. My prince was no more. Actually, my prince never was. It's hard to put into words the emotions that coursed through my veins. Yet, in the midst of the sorrow and anger, I realized I had choices. I could blame God, or myself. I could withdraw from friends and from my church, I could give up and move away. But none of these seemed right. I did not want my life to be based on lies or shame. I had to decide which I would live in. Would I choose fantasy or would I face the truth?
Somewhere deep inside me a cry was recognized. LIVE! I didn't know if I would make it, I wondered if I would ever experience joy again. Once again, in God's mercy, He revealed himself to me, in many ways. One was through the Bible, the story of Jabez. Jabez's story is found in a couple of verses, hidden in the middle of a long geneology.
I Chronicles 4:9-10 states; Jabez was more honorable than his brothers. His mother had named him Jabez saying, "I gave birth to him in pain". Jabez cried out to the God of Israel, "Oh, that you would bless me and enlarge my territory! Let your hand be with me, and keep me from harm so that I will be free from pain. And God granted him his request."
Jabez was given the family idenity of pain. Can you imagine his childhood? Can "Pain" come out and play? What about his marriage proposal? Will you marry me? Would you like to live with "pain" your whole life?
In the old testament, your name was your idenity, Yet Jabez knew God called out for a new idenity. He asked God to enlarge his territory, and scripture tells us God granted his request. I found hope in this. I thought, I do not want an idenity based on pain.
God hear my cry, hear my request. Broaden my territory, open my heart to more than what I have been given. Don't let me stay in the anger forever. Let me live life again.
I felt God say to me, "You've seen what happens when pain is not faced. You have a relationship with me, you have a family, a community...walk this journey with them. I will grant you your request."
Here's how God had me walk this out.....
(To be continued)
Monday, July 18, 2011
MIM'S STORY - Part 1
This is my story: My knowedge of my biological mother is limited to a few facts.
*She was 16 years old when I was born
*5 feet 5 and a half inches tall
*120 lbs.
*A sophmore in High School
*Blonde hair and blue eyes, and a cheerleader
She gave me the gift of life, for which I am thankful. When I was born, I was put up for adoption. The family that adopted me had experienced a lot of pain; three miscarrages and the birth of a full-term stillborn baby boy. Instead of a family, they had an empty home and empty arms, which they tried to fill by adopting a baby boy and them by adopting me.
It seems that my new mother and I should have been a perfect answer for each others need. But when I was placed in her arms, I cried. Her embrace was unfamiliar and unwelcome. My new mother felt rejected, and I was learning to be alone within my new family.
We looked like this conservative Christian family, with a stay-at-home mom and a pastor dad, and two adopted kids. Later my parents were shocked when they had 2 more kids of their own. We looked like the model family in our station wagon, off to church every Sunday, but the truth was my childhood was filled with abuse, hidden behind a pulpit.
My father had been beaten and abused verbally. He in turn, beat and abused both my brother and me - the family scapegoats. I lived in constant terror, never knowing what might trigger a beating. My punishments were swift and severe. Both of my parents held me down, and my father beat me until his anger passed. I tried not to cry or make a sound. Yet my mind was full of unspoken screams for help.
The beatings seemed linked to my adoption. I heard my parents say, "We didn't have to adopt you. How could you be such a disloyal daughter?" My adoption was thrown back into my face, like toxic waste.
Between the adoption and the environment I lived in, I never felt loved or wanted or accepted. I longed to be held and appreciated. I wanted to belong and to feel safe. If I had played the word association game with you and you had said adoption, I would have instantly said "rejection" The word acceptance never would have crossed my mind.
In the book of Mark in the Bible, we learn that Jesus's family doesn't like what he is doing. He had been healing the sick, forgiving sins, and casting out demons. His family thinks he is crazy. On day Jesus's friends tell him his family has arrived, but Jesus replied, "Who are my mother and brother?" I used to think that was the strangest answer, until I realized Jesus was using this opportunity to give new meaning to the word 'family'.
Mark continues, "Looking at those sitting with him, Jesus said, here is my mother and brothers. Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother. The ones close to him became his family.
This was a radical idea in the first century because they would never redefine your family. Family was your idenity and that couldn't change. But with Jesus, God's family was no longer limited to the blood line of Abraham. Family was defined by knowing Him.
I believe God, in His mercy, offered my parents a chance to understand family in a new way. I believe the pain my father had experienced from his childhood could have been turned into an opportunity for God to bring healing. An opportunity for my dad to embrace truth, to embrace a new type of fatherhood, but he chose otherwise.
As a child, I looked up into the sky and saw the stars and I knew whoever had hung the stars in the sky was big and powerful. It made me feel safe to know that there was someone bigger than my father. God was revealing His heart to me.
I saw the beauty of the sky and believed the creator of such beauty must be good. I felt comforted in knowing someone good was holding up the stars.
No matter how rough my life was, the stars were there to instill hope and a quiet peace when I looked at them. No one in my world could take the stars away.
God was breathing His life in me and I didn't know it.
Ezekiel 16:4-8 says:
On the day you were born your cord was not cut, nor were you washed with water to make you clean, nor were you rubbed with salt or wrapped in cloths.
No one looked on you with pity or had compassion enough to do any of these things for you. Rather, you were thrown out into the open field, for on the day you were born you were despised. Then I passed by and saw you kicking about in your blood, and as you lay there in your blood I said to you, Live!
God gave me the desire to go on. To live. The beatings lessened as I got bigger.
But the damage had been done. I had learned to shut off my emotions. I tuned out words and whole converstions and eventually entire decades of my life.
All I did was go to church and read Christian romance novels. I read about a Perfect Christian woman with perfect hair, who fainted from hunger because she gave her food to her dying mother. And the richest young man drove by in his red convertible and saw her faint on the sidewalk. Struck by her lovely raven black hair cascading around her like a halo, he carried her to his car and took her home. He was not a Christian, but on the last page, just three paragraphs from the end he became a Christian and then 2 paragraphs from the end he proposed and then in the last paragraph they kissed for the first time. Then they lived happily every after....
The romance novels I read had filled my heart and mind with lies about love. Over the years I consumed hundreds of them. I couldn't explain the longing in my heart, but the books filled a need. The problem was the 'fix' didn't last. As soon as a book was done, the 'fix' ended.
I wanted to be married, yet I had no idea what marriage meant.
I had been out of college for a couple of years when my 5th or 6th Prince Charming left me. As he was walking out the door, he turned to me and said, "You should get counseling!"
Counseling helped me see truth. I looked seriously at my life for the first time. Over the next few years I became undone and redone.
I started to understand the wrongs done to me. I started to understand my father and I started to see God. I was overcome with the knowledge that God understood where I had been and that He loved me. I recognized how He had been with me as I looked at the stars and that it was a miracle I was still alive. I knew He wanted me to live, to live abundantly. I began to do that.
To be continued
*She was 16 years old when I was born
*5 feet 5 and a half inches tall
*120 lbs.
*A sophmore in High School
*Blonde hair and blue eyes, and a cheerleader
She gave me the gift of life, for which I am thankful. When I was born, I was put up for adoption. The family that adopted me had experienced a lot of pain; three miscarrages and the birth of a full-term stillborn baby boy. Instead of a family, they had an empty home and empty arms, which they tried to fill by adopting a baby boy and them by adopting me.
It seems that my new mother and I should have been a perfect answer for each others need. But when I was placed in her arms, I cried. Her embrace was unfamiliar and unwelcome. My new mother felt rejected, and I was learning to be alone within my new family.
We looked like this conservative Christian family, with a stay-at-home mom and a pastor dad, and two adopted kids. Later my parents were shocked when they had 2 more kids of their own. We looked like the model family in our station wagon, off to church every Sunday, but the truth was my childhood was filled with abuse, hidden behind a pulpit.
My father had been beaten and abused verbally. He in turn, beat and abused both my brother and me - the family scapegoats. I lived in constant terror, never knowing what might trigger a beating. My punishments were swift and severe. Both of my parents held me down, and my father beat me until his anger passed. I tried not to cry or make a sound. Yet my mind was full of unspoken screams for help.
The beatings seemed linked to my adoption. I heard my parents say, "We didn't have to adopt you. How could you be such a disloyal daughter?" My adoption was thrown back into my face, like toxic waste.
Between the adoption and the environment I lived in, I never felt loved or wanted or accepted. I longed to be held and appreciated. I wanted to belong and to feel safe. If I had played the word association game with you and you had said adoption, I would have instantly said "rejection" The word acceptance never would have crossed my mind.
In the book of Mark in the Bible, we learn that Jesus's family doesn't like what he is doing. He had been healing the sick, forgiving sins, and casting out demons. His family thinks he is crazy. On day Jesus's friends tell him his family has arrived, but Jesus replied, "Who are my mother and brother?" I used to think that was the strangest answer, until I realized Jesus was using this opportunity to give new meaning to the word 'family'.
Mark continues, "Looking at those sitting with him, Jesus said, here is my mother and brothers. Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother. The ones close to him became his family.
This was a radical idea in the first century because they would never redefine your family. Family was your idenity and that couldn't change. But with Jesus, God's family was no longer limited to the blood line of Abraham. Family was defined by knowing Him.
I believe God, in His mercy, offered my parents a chance to understand family in a new way. I believe the pain my father had experienced from his childhood could have been turned into an opportunity for God to bring healing. An opportunity for my dad to embrace truth, to embrace a new type of fatherhood, but he chose otherwise.
As a child, I looked up into the sky and saw the stars and I knew whoever had hung the stars in the sky was big and powerful. It made me feel safe to know that there was someone bigger than my father. God was revealing His heart to me.
I saw the beauty of the sky and believed the creator of such beauty must be good. I felt comforted in knowing someone good was holding up the stars.
No matter how rough my life was, the stars were there to instill hope and a quiet peace when I looked at them. No one in my world could take the stars away.
God was breathing His life in me and I didn't know it.
Ezekiel 16:4-8 says:
On the day you were born your cord was not cut, nor were you washed with water to make you clean, nor were you rubbed with salt or wrapped in cloths.
No one looked on you with pity or had compassion enough to do any of these things for you. Rather, you were thrown out into the open field, for on the day you were born you were despised. Then I passed by and saw you kicking about in your blood, and as you lay there in your blood I said to you, Live!
God gave me the desire to go on. To live. The beatings lessened as I got bigger.
But the damage had been done. I had learned to shut off my emotions. I tuned out words and whole converstions and eventually entire decades of my life.
All I did was go to church and read Christian romance novels. I read about a Perfect Christian woman with perfect hair, who fainted from hunger because she gave her food to her dying mother. And the richest young man drove by in his red convertible and saw her faint on the sidewalk. Struck by her lovely raven black hair cascading around her like a halo, he carried her to his car and took her home. He was not a Christian, but on the last page, just three paragraphs from the end he became a Christian and then 2 paragraphs from the end he proposed and then in the last paragraph they kissed for the first time. Then they lived happily every after....
The romance novels I read had filled my heart and mind with lies about love. Over the years I consumed hundreds of them. I couldn't explain the longing in my heart, but the books filled a need. The problem was the 'fix' didn't last. As soon as a book was done, the 'fix' ended.
I wanted to be married, yet I had no idea what marriage meant.
I had been out of college for a couple of years when my 5th or 6th Prince Charming left me. As he was walking out the door, he turned to me and said, "You should get counseling!"
Counseling helped me see truth. I looked seriously at my life for the first time. Over the next few years I became undone and redone.
I started to understand the wrongs done to me. I started to understand my father and I started to see God. I was overcome with the knowledge that God understood where I had been and that He loved me. I recognized how He had been with me as I looked at the stars and that it was a miracle I was still alive. I knew He wanted me to live, to live abundantly. I began to do that.
To be continued
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