Saturday, August 24, 2013

LEARNING AND HEALING

Has anyone ever stopped and contemplated the concept?  In light of challenge, LEARNING is a word loaded with meaning.  I am not sure LEARNING can be separated from challenge...isn't that what we are while we are doing it?  The more significant aspect of the process is how active we become within it and how much we can let go of prior expectations in order to attain our next level of living.  Isn't that also true of LEARNING?  I think I need to settle in to this thought.  I have been digging at a lot of painful realities in my life and I can honestly say that until recently I have been unaware/ignorant of the depth of my own pain and consequently unaware/ignorant that perhaps I wasn't in touch with how my reactions were affecting those around me when I wasn't happy with shattered expectations.

It is no secret that my life has been filled with shattered expectations and tremendous disappointment.  Some of those are more obvious than others but they have been occurring since I can remember...and even before I can remember. We can look at the surface of situations (including me) in our lives and deny.  We can deny that we are hurting or hurt.  We can deny that we are lost within what we should be thankful for and we can deny that there is a consequence for denying.  At some point we will hit a crisis or perhaps God will shine that proverbial light that calls our full attention away from ourselves and toward a new chapter...He calls us onward and upward...and it will be precisely at the appropriate time of His choosing.  I have LEARNED that too...we can't choose when that will be.  I am speaking from experience.  I have longed for God to equip me perfectly for the work He called me to do.  I was even so bold and confident within it to know I was created for it.  And yet, the deeper and further I was immersed within it, the more I LEARNED just how desperately I needed HIM to perform it.  I also LEARNED that what He desired to perform wasn't an accomplished task, but an accomplished me!

I have already LEARNED so much, and there are times when I would even say too much, and yet, because I hate self-pity, I will not even allow myself to think it.  One day, as God allows and continues to heal me, I believe I will have greater impact and be able to embrace it without the regret of what the pain has caused me.  Until then I keep trusting Him to heal the wounded places within my heart and shine the love that He gives me to the world...that is where I am as I know that I have nothing because I began with nothing.  Anything that comes through me that is beneficial is coming from Him for purposes beyond myself. 

I am also LEARNING that when my effort is surrendered,  I struggle.  I never LEARNED how to rest.  I never LEARNED that resting is an action word so I  I am in the place of LEARNING how to allow God to win the battle that fights with me but not for me.  Only His plans win, both with us and for us.  Of that, I have already LEARNED!  There is a cost to LEARNING.  It is an investment, both of our time and our resources.  We have to abandon our notions and adopt new ones...which are often in direct opposition to everything we have previously LEARNED.   

Sometimes there is nothing more that can be done other than to UNLEARN and RELEARN.  Being aware of needing to do so is the first step toward healing.



"Let the wise hear and increase in learning, and the one who understands obtain guidance...."
~Proverbs 1:5

Tuesday, August 13, 2013

Pain Produced for Purpose

Broken places of the heart
Do not fit the role

They leave us withered and beaten
And they cause tremendous pain to our soul.

At times I begin to wonder
How does God have the patience to fix it all?

Isn't His effort needed for the process
Far beyond His redemption from The Fall?

Trusting Him alone becomes a place
I would prefer to enter and not return

Until the battle has been won
But not with the further wounding and the burns.

I know I believe the promise
I live it out each day

I may look and sound a little tattered
My loved ones barely understand

But my hope is in Him and not myself
And that is where I remain.

~Merily Pompa


Before you can live a part of you has to die. You have to let go of what could have been, how you should have acted and what you wish you would have said differently. You have to accept that you can’t change the past experiences, opinions of others at that moment in time or outcomes from their choices or yours. When you finally recognize that truth then you will understand the true meaning of forgiveness of yourself and others. From this point you will finally be free.” ~Shannon Alder