When You Can Do Nothing But Heal--Part 2

Crazy how buying a birthday card can leave a heart laid open and a shirt wet with tears dripped down, but it did.

Next week is my late husband's dad's birthday. Yesterday we bought birthday cards. Today, I feel like a mess.

The evidence of the war raging inside slips down my cheeks, and I type an honest email to my friend trying to find a way to undo this knot of emotions that keep me tied to his family's cruelty. And I confess things I hate to admit because I'm trying to live the Jesus I profess to believe, but ultimately I have to confess beneath the blood of a Savior is a bleeding heart that needs to be saved, and I am confronted with the question of whether I believe He loves me right here as I am...even when where I am is right in the middle of a storm of thoughts and feelings that look nothing like Him.

And I do believe .

I believe His love is greater than my lack of it.

And right now, I feel lacking.

I don't want to buy a card for someone who is cruel, and if they just disappeared, I wouldn't care because if I disappeared, they wouldn't care. Honestly, that hurts me, and more than anything, I don't want them to hurt me anymore.

But the fact is broken people break people's hearts, and I can do nothing about that, but I refuse to live in it.

So I pick up my laid-open, gaping heart and lay it in the hands of the heart Healer.

Daddy, I need to talk to you. This has been going on for over two years now, and you and I both know they are not going to make any effort to fix this. I'm tired of this being a source of pain to me, so I need you to deal with it. I need you to take the lie that is killing my heart and set me free from that prison and speak the truth into me because you are Truth and in you is all the freedom I need. In you is the healing. Your truth is my healing, so, Daddy, give me your truth.

These are the lies I know that are being dumped on me.

I'm not important. How else could they dismiss me like they did?
I am a selfish, horrible person. How else could they justify their actions and accusations?
I am not important enough to apologize to and restore.
People are better off without me. That is what they were saying when they decided Rob was justified in leaving.
I am simply a means to an end. They have a relationship with me because of the kids.

Lord, I know I am important to you. You show me everyday. I know I am important to people in this world as well.
That whole self-ish, horrible thing...moving on.
People's lives are not better without me. I'm here because YOU say the world needs me. YOU say the world is a better place because I'm here. YOU say I'm an answer to prayer. YOU say I am invaluable in invading this world with goodness.
I am not a means to an end.
I am an answer.
I am a solution.
I am purposed.
I am the image of Almighty God.
I am the reasons Jesus came to a manger, lived among people who didn't understand Him, and died on a cross.
I am the one You had in mind when you wrote that love letter we call a Bible.
I'm the one you were thinking of when you wrote all those stories of restoration.
I am the one you painted the sky for this morning.
I am the one you sing over at night. I am the one you give good things to.
I am not a means to an end.
I am the one you searched for until you found.
I am the one you respond to when you hear my cry.
I am the one your heart beats for.
I am not a means to an end.
I am a child of the Almighty King.
I am not a means to an end.
I am YOURS, and that is the end of it.

As for not being important enough to restore, it's important enough that you crawled up on a cross and died there for it. I am important enough to die for. I am important enough for you to fight these battles and get back everything they try to steal. I'm so important that the God of all creation cares about ME. It doesn't get bigger than that.

Daddy, I choose to live in YOUR truth, not their lies. I am not asking you to remove them. I am asking you to remove what leads me to agree with their lies. What they say and do is only painful if it does damage to who I really am.

I am asking you to restore everything to me that their accusations and actions either stole or damaged.

I don't need their apologies to restore me because they have no power over me. You are the only one who has a right to define me. You are the only one who has the right to determine who I am and who I am not.

And, Daddy, show me any way that I agreed with them. Show me how I have taken the identity they tried to dump on me. Show me where my thinking is wrong, and show me how I need to think, not just about me but about them, and I don't just mean not thinking how much easier life would be if they fell off the planet. Lord, show me how you see them. Show me how I give their words and deeds importance they shouldn't have. Show me where I put them in a place as an idol. An idol is simply a person or thing I decide I need to please and from whom I need approval.

If what they say about me holds more weight than what YOU say about me, they are more important than you.

If I remain imprisoned to their lies instead of chooseing the freedom of YOUR truth,

I have made them my gods...

and you just become a Santa Clause who gives nice gifts when I'm good enough for you to be nice to.

Lord, show me where I've made them an idol, and show me how to put them in their proper place of importance.

Lord, I choose you.

I choose to be healed in you rather than broken in them.

Thank you that none of this repulses you. Thank you that you are not disappointed in me. Thank you that my confession  of need pleases you.

Thank you that you are excited to heal this situation in me.

Thank you that you did all you did to reach me because you wanted me to be able to reach you.

Your love overwhelms me. And being "overwhelmed by love" is an awesome identity to have.