I've known for a long time that if a truth isn't setting you free, than you'd better examine it a little closer.
I was going to say if it doesn't set you free, then it's not truth. But there are truths that hurt, such as the loss of a loved one, be it through the severing of a relationship or through death, that certainly make you feel imprisoned and trapped and anything but free. But even the pain at the end of a relationship needs to be examined at a certain time during the course of mourning, so you can get up and walk again with hope.
Mourning is not an issue here. We all must mourn and mourn in our own way. We cannot ignore the pain that rips through us on the loss of a loved one. No one is asking that of you, and no one has a right to. But I know there are thoughts we can imprison ourselves with during the mourning period, such as, "I can't live without them..." or "I'll never find anyone else..." and other such thought patterns that really need to be examined for the lies they are.
So, knowing this and knowing God has impressed upon my heart that if I'm angry then I'm thinking wrong, you would think that I'd have the sense to re-examine my thought patterns to see where my thoughts were going wrong, ay. But no, I didn't...
And that's because the lie that comes to bind us can, at moment of impact, appear to be such a great truth that it not only breaks our heart but enters it so deeply that every little thing that comes after that - be it a lie, a truth, or just time - tends to cover it up and while we remember it wounding our spirit, everything else that has come our way now seems more important and that which caused the wound has become 'a truth that just is and will always be' and is pushed aside and never dealt with.
For example, for many years during my walk with God, I longed to minister to, and with, women. If I could have done anything in church, or anywhere, I would've helped run women's meetings and ensured each woman that came my way was spiritually (and physically, if funds could afford it) dressed with beauty and dignity. No woman would leave a gathering I was managing with less confidence and hope than what she entered it with. Not one.
However, in a different church than I attend now, several years ago, at a time when my heart was moving more and more towards women's ministry, a leader of that church came to me and said the leadership team had decided they would not raise me up to be a women's leader because I bond so well with the women...
Yep, I bonded too well with the women, therefore, it was said, I was not leadership material.
When I was told this, it broke my heart. The wound was made. The 'truth' got it. And I accepted what they said as the end of the women's ministry story in my life.
I have reached out to women since then. I even started a friendship group outside the church just to reach out for others. It was started with women in mind, but I opened the door to men, also... During this, I was invited to attend leaders' meetings at [a different] church, but I couldn't. I didn't want to be a leader. And I withdrew from the offer. Also during this, I bonded with many females, as I do. But then one was greatly wounded in the gathering, by another woman, and I found all this anger inside me that I knew I had to take away from the group or I would strike out at someone.
What had happened was, it was still in my heart to bond with women, to encourage women, to clothe them with beauty and dignity, to uplift them, but it was also planted in my heart now "We will not raise you up as a women's leader because...." It no longer mattered what the 'because' was. The fact was, I wasn't leadership material for women. However, there was a war going on inside me.
The part of me that sought to offer women beauty and dignity wanted to take the one who had brought shame and ridicule on another woman in the group, and put her in her place. If I didn't already have so much anger in me, left over from days gone by, I daresay I would've reacted less vehemently - even though I did refrain from attacking as I ached to.
However, because of the old wound in my heart that continually reminded me I was not a women's leader, that told me I was not good enough to be one, that made me feel as though I had no right to have a voice in what happened, (even though I originally reacted to what was done) I failed to enable the wounded woman to rise up with beauty and dignity again. I look back and see I never defended that poor woman as I should've. And, on viewing that, more anger stirs in my soul.
What I'm getting at is that a lie entered my heart many years ago, and I wore it as though it were a gown of truth. It redirected my thoughts away from the heart God had given me, so much so that I no longer wanted that heart... until last week, just before I started this section "Starting from Scratch," when I told God I wanted my heart back.
In daring to open my heart up to God again, and have Him restore it, I attended a women's meeting at church last night. It's the first one I've been to in a very long time. I attended because they had a visiting prophet, and, because I had seen her before, and had witnessed how spot on she had been in my life, my son's life, and that of others the last time I saw her. I trusted her to know that whatever God wanted me to know she would hear it. And she did.
I was prayed for by her twice actually. The second time was when she called for those needing to renew their relationship with God. The first time she called for something that had been spoken over my life to be broken. Afterwards, as I was thinking over what she had prayed over me, I tried to think back to my childhood, wondering what could possibly need breaking, that had been spoken over me, but nothing came to me as I knew I'd been healed of all such things long ago.
However, I felt she was right, but with what, I didn't know.
Then I meditated upon the part where she had said I would 'spin' clothing for women - in the spirit. I played with the image for awhile, and it reminded me of my old desire to clothe women with beauty and dignity, and just as I was about to push the idea of a new women's ministry aside (something that has, over the years, become an automatic response) I was clearly reminded of what that leader had said over me in a previous church. They would not raise me up to be a women's leader as I bonded so well with the women... And as I recalled this, the same part of my heart that broke to let that lie into my heart, was rebroken so God could get that lie out again, and, with the pain and the relief that came, I wept.
You see, I was called by God to honour women. To look into their hearts, find their true beauty, and offer it to them, so they would have the strength to be who they are and to face the path ahead of them, no matter what came their way. I don't look and pick out something and feed them anything to build their ego. I have eyes to see their true beauty, their true worth, their true self, and I simply reflect back to them what I see. I see them not only as God sees them, but as they truly are; who they REALLY are beyond all that life has thrown at them since the moment they were born.
But, to a great extent, I stopped doing this...
Last night, when God broke open my heart (which I had given Him the right to do just last week) He took out the lie that 'man' had spoken over me, and reminded me of the heart He had given me. And, in doing so, I could see I had been walking along a path I knew He had set before me, right up until that leader put that "Wrong Way - Go back!" sign before me. She/her team/her head leader set up a sign, making a dead-end road where there was not one - where there should not have been one. God did not make that dead-end, but I looked upon it as though He had, simply because what had been said had come through a church leader.
I see now that when I came to that [fake] dead-end, I veered off the path God had placed me on and started walking a new path, and every step I made, from then until I cried out to God to make things right last week, took me further and further off track, until it took me so far from God I could hardly see Him anymore. I followed the lie, and not God.
But one cry. That's all it took. One earnest cry, from the depths of my soul, and there He was, seeking to remove the lie and set me free with the truth.
He would've done it long ago, but I protected the lie as though it were truth. I made it my own. I nurtured it. I fed it. I bowed to it. Therefore, I wasn't ready to let it go. You could say it became my master; my false idol... It wasn't until I fell, broken at God's feet, knowing I just could not go on the way I was going any longer, that I finally let God have this lie - my false god.
I still feel a soreness in my heart over this. And, I guess, as it is with any operation, there is a healing period, but at least now I know that when He takes my hand and helps me rise and walk again, I will be much stronger, and far more determined and confident AND PROTECTIVE OF WHAT GOD HAS PLACED IN MY HEART than I ever was before.
Please, if you feel trapped in any area of your life, be it in the loss of a relationship, something someone has spoken over you, or whatever it may be, reach out to God and ask for Him to take the lie, and when He shows you what it is, let it go... and live again. xxxxx
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