Author Jan Frank, a good friend and an awfully astute lady, taught a workshop years ago which I’ve never forgotten.
While speaking about treating survivors of sexual abuse, she pulled out three dolls. One of them had an upraised fist, one was tied up with a rope, and the third had its arm in
a sling.
“Each one of these has a problem, right?” she asked the audience. Then she took the doll with the wounded arm and said “Let’s tell this one repent!”
We all booed – why should someone who’s been injured be told to repent of
her wound?
“OK, well then let’s deliver this one from her bondage,” she suggested, pointing to the one with the upraised fist. Several of us shook our heads, because the upraised fist was a sign of rebellion, not bondage.
“Ah!” she said, placing the dolls in front of her. “You’re getting the point. When someone’s wounded they need healing, when someone’s in rebellion they need to repent, and when they’re bound, they need deliverance. So before advising what action to take, be sure you’re noticed what the need really is!”
That stuck with me. To this day, I hear people refer to rebellion as something a person needs to be healed of, or wounds as something someone needs an exorcism for, or bondage as something to repent of. In all these cases, the proposed cure isn’t applicable to the problem. An approach matching the need is critical, whether we’re dealing with someone we’re ministering to, or with ourselves.
I’ll need to keep this in mind today.
Like anyone, I’ve got my own set of wounds that are still healing, and sometimes they make themselves known. So when I feel insecure with people, that’s usually a sing that my old Joe, You’re Just a Stupid Jerk Who’s Always in the Way and Has Nothing to Offer wound is acting up. It’s an irrational voice from earlier years that has faded quite a bit, but still interrupts me at times. And when it does, the last thing I need to do is repent of having an old hurt.
By the same token, I can’t give myself permission to lust as a way of medicating that old wound, because if and when I lust that’s a deliberate sin to be repented of, rather than a hurt to heal. Making and keeping these distinctions
is important.
Of course, the three problems – sin, wounds, and bondage – are often interrelated; intertwined like a tangled ball of fishing pole wire. So a person may deal with his old hurt by medicating the pain through deliberate sin, creating a strong bondage.
I’ve seen this time and again, and have done it myself. Lots of sins (like porn, drugs, or gluttony) by their hyper-stimulating and comforting nature, seem like a handy anesthesia for emotional pain. When the anesthesia is discovered it’s often repeated, the repetition creating an eventual bondage.
When we realize that all three need to be dealt with, we can then identify what we’re responsible for (behavior in particular) and repent of the sin, then look for help in dealing with our wounds, and get prayer for the bondage we’ve created for ourselves. All three issues can have power over us; all three need to be approached and dealt with.
The hurt in your life, to whatever extent there is such hurt, may well have been inflicted on you. There’s nothing to repent of in that case, but there’s much to seek healing for. The decisions you may have made to medicate that hurt in the wrong way are unquestionably sins you need to take responsibility for, renouncing and turning from them, then staying away from them. The bondage created by the repetitive sin is a power God can and will break, but one you’ll need to bring before Him while crying for deliverance.
Try not to mistake the one for the other. Each is serious; each can be dealt with successfully. Do so today with the God given wisdom to identify and turn from sin, nurture and get nurturing for wounds, and seek deliverance from what binds you.
Because then you find that holiness, healing, and freedom come intertwined as surely as sin, wounds and bondage do. And freedom gained must become freedom protected, as Paul said:
“Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ has set us free, and be not entangled again in the yoke of bondage.(Galatians 5:1)
Comments
Add Comment