|
Walk
Through The
Emotional Pain
from Hurts
None of us are
void of the
experience of
emotional pain
in our lives.
It comes to us,
uninvited,
sometimes
pushing its way
in and many
times using
people that are
very near and
dear to us.
Emotional pain
has a way of
taking over. It
wants to run our
lives in how we
feel and how
we think. Our
minds are
sometimes over
run with the
thoughts of
emotional
hurt through
words or
intentions and
sometimes with
attitudes of
others that eat
away at our weak
points where we
have bruises
from our past.
Our first
response when
emotional pain
enters our lives
is to recoil.
We want to
pull back and
put up walls
that will keep
us protected
from being hurt
more.
Like a bruise,
pain starts to
reveal itself on
the surface in
many ways. It
starts by
maybe showing up
with depression,
turning inward
with our wounded
hearts, removing
ourselves from
some of our
friends and then
meditating and
nurturing that
part of us that
has been injured
and responding
in a way that
has developed
a pattern in our
lives to keep us
from facing the
pain.
Some, get very
angry. They
feel like a
victim and walk
in pity that
keeps the
emotional wound
“seeping and
open”, festering
and sensitive
and feeling
pain when
‘bumped’ or
‘challenged’.
Some turn to
drugs, shopping,
surface
relationships,
keeping busy and
finding
a hobby that
will cover over
the deep part of
the heart that
needs to find
comfort from the
area that
constantly
condemns them,
keeping the
emotion shoved
down deep in the
dark places of
the heart
so that the
sting of
rejection or
lack of love and
acceptance will
keep them
from feeling
the pain over
and over again
and stir up the
pain within.
The secret to
healing is,
trust.
It is in
allowing
yourself to
become
relational with
someone that can
come along side
you and help you
conquer that
area or room in
your life that
needs to feel
safe and
protected, to
build up that
trust.
First of all,
Jesus has come
so that you
don’t have to
bear the burden
of your pain all
alone. He wants
to heal that
area of our
heart that
throbs with
the need to be
loved and
accepted.
In Matthew
11:28, Jesus
said,
“Come to Me, all
you who labor
(strive, toil,
struggle) and
are heavy laden,
and I will give
you rest”.
He has also told
us not to
forsake, give
up, stop,
gathering
together
with the
“saints”,
believers that
is, because
God’s plan from
the
garden was for
relationships.
First we have
relationship
with God,
then, we relate
to others. This
relational
togetherness
will keep us
from being
isolated in our
pain and grief
and will build
trust in others
so we can be
transparent and
share our deep
areas of hurt.
When our hurts
are kept in the
dark, no one can
see them. You
can’t make
out something in
the dark,
because it takes
light breaking
into the
darkness
for something to
be seen.
This is just how
it works with
Jesus in our
lives. When we
start to realize
we need help in
the place we
find ourselves,
hurting and
struggling,
then, that is
the beginning of
opening the door
for the light to
flood in and
reveal
what we are
having a hard
time seeing.
Philip Yancy
says, “Pain is
the gift nobody
wants”. It’s
hard to see pain
as a gift.
A gift is
supposed to make
us feel good.
Produce joy in
us and bring us
pleasure in
receiving it.
But God is about
working out a
plan in us that
sometimes
doesn’t look so
good when we
finally “see it”
and realize the
things done
to us and in us,
were wrong and
are in need of
recognizing to
the point of
more
pain….yikes,
more? I don’t
know if I can do
that.
Proverbs 17:22 –
A merry heart
does good, like
medicine
But a broken
spirit dries up
the bones.
Jill
Briscoe said on
the radio one
day, “Embrace
your pain…make
it your friend”.
That sort of
blew me away at
the time I heard
it. I was full
of lots of
“stuff” that
had driven me to
participate in
“worldly”
indulgences that
produced an
additive side of
me I didn’t
realize I had.
It was when I
decided to take
a look at the
emotional
baggage in my
life and
ask God what to
do with this
statement that
was so foreign
to me.
When He showed
me that
emotional pain
was my
“revealer”, I
suddenly saw
what
Jill Briscoe
meant when she
said, “make it
your friend”.
I finally got
that taking
responsibility
for my own
feelings and my
response to
them,
would set me
free from the
control it had
and I learned a
new pattern
and way of
looking at these
areas, through
the power of the
Holy Spirit in
my life.
I finally found
the “key” to
understanding
the emotional
baggage I had
carried around
for way too
long.
The way I
respond to
painful
experiences in
my life, is the
thermostat
that is
revealing my
attitudes and
true feelings.
It is the
revealer of the
stuff shoved way
down deep in
those areas that
are hard to look
at
about who I am
and how I am
feeling
and
sometimes, a lot
of times, very
ugly. By taking
a look at what
is bothering me,
I can see that
it wasn’t the
words of hurt
someone said
nor the opinion
of another that
is the problem,
it’s the trigger
mechanism
in side of me
that is the
result of past
hurts and wounds
that never
healed to
the fullest and
it’s the bruise
that gets bumped
by others that
reminds me
that it’s still
there.
I started a
process then, of
using my pain as
a “helper” to be
the “revealer”
of my
inner ‘soulish
man’ (mind will
and emotions)
that respond out
of that place
that is still in
need of
surfacing and
being delivered
to Christ.
Relationships
with those we
trust (and
sometimes, those
we don’t trust)
reveal
the things in
us, so that we
can have these
things come to
the surface and
then allow God
to work through
them and be
totally healed
and aware for
the
first time of
how responsible
we truly are for
our own response
through
our emotions.
God uses people
in our lives to
sharpen us and
sometimes, to
hold us
accountable with
our response and
attitudes of the
heart.
Proverbs 27:17
says, “As iron
sharpens iron,
so a man
sharpens the
countenance of
his friend.
(Countenance:
somebody's face,
or the
expression
on it
;composure or
self-control; to
tolerate,
accept, or give
approval to
something)
In this way,
when we embrace
emotional pain,
we then don’t
have that
tendency
to build walls
up around us,
but we see the
issue that
arises up out of
us as
a place that is
still in need of
healing and
deliverance and
it takes all the
pressure off of
the other people
in your life to
be responsible
for your
‘ouchiness’ or
‘touchiness’ and
makes for an
open
communication
because
you now realize
that your
feelings or
responses are
for your benefit
to examine your
own heart and
attitudes.
This shifts, in
our own minds,
the thought that
others have to
be responsible
to be “careful”
around you and
not tiptoe with
you because you
are now able
to talk and
confront, to be
emotionally
healed and
whole.
Our own pain is
unique to us and
it’s the
“sandpaper” of
God’s gentle
loving
nudges through
the Holy
Spirit's
guidance in our
lives, that
perfects us and
‘sands off” the
rough edges of
over sensitivity
and makes us
smoother
around the
edges. The love
of Christ in our
lives buffs our
surfaces and
causes
a shine to start
to show on our
faces and then
others see the
reflection of
Christ in us and
on us.
Fear keeps us
from moving
through our
“stuff”. It
paralyzes us.
We freeze up
and turn back in
on ourselves and
then depression
sets in because
its
anger turned
inward,
devouring our
own selves in
the process,
staying
stuck in the
quicksand of our
problems.
It’s the victim
mentality,
patting and
nurturing our
hurts that will
keep us
stuck for years,
unless we start
to let go and
trust our own
feelings that
God
has given us as
a “guide post”
to read the
signs of our
hearts and
therefore,
learn to examine
our own emotions
in a healthy
way.
2 Corinthians
13:5 says:
Examine
yourselves
as to whether
you
are in the
faith. Test
yourselves. Do
you not
know yourselves,
that Jesus
Christ is in
you?---
unless indeed
you are
disqualified
When we
eventually get
to the
revelation that
God has truly
forgiven us and
you are ready to
move forward in
the knowledge
and acceptance
of your
forgiveness,
then we become
emptied out of
the things that
have held
us in the
painful grip of
self-punishment
and lack of
taking
responsibility
for our own
emotional
responses, and
we move in a
forward motion
of
healing
deliverance and
freedom.
When are pain
and hurt is
poured out and
the void left in
us is filled up
with the
love of God, now
there isn’t room
left in us for
that bitter
painful
feeling to
reside. We are
filled up with
the love of God
in the area we
have
struggled with
for so long and
now we over flow
with the love of
God and He can
use us for the
purpose He
created us for.
We were created
to worship Him
with reckless
abandonment and
help others in
their struggles
where in with
you have been
helped.
2 Corinthians
1:3-4
Blessed be the
God and Father
of our Lord
Jesus Christ
the Father of
mercies and God
of all comfort,
who comforts us
in all our
tribulation,
that we may
be able to
comfort those
who are in any
trouble, with
the comfort with
which we
ourselves are
comforted
by God.
Don’t ever
settle in to
become
“comfortable” in
the area of your
life of
emotional
pain, so that
you desensitize
yourself to
being able to
feel, by
avoidance or
replacing
your pain with
another habit or
activity or
attitude. His
desire is for
you to
be set free from
the chains of
lies and
unrighteous
behavior that
has controlled
you
for far too
long. He wants
to use you for
the Kingdom of
God, on earth as
it
is in Heaven,
and see you
dependant on Him
for everything
in your life.
It is important
to face your
fears, let
yourself feel
the pain and
have a strong
community of
trustworthy,
mature believers
around you to
help you and
love you through
the pain to
victory…In
Jesus…we ARE
free.
©
Michelle L.
Bjorkman –
January 7, 2008
|
