Forgiveness

Complicated Soil

Abuse Survivor, Art, bravery, confidence, contentment, courage, creativity, doubt, Faith, Forgiveness, freedom, grace, grandchildren, hope, memoir, painting, patience, Peace, Prayer, Redemption, Stillness, surrender, testimony, Trust, Vulnerability, wisdom, wonder, writing

(Growing by Dying – notes from a talk)

 

The first sketches I sketched as a young girl, were of trees.

I never thought I’d paint any other subject. I’m still surprised over the peace I experience in the process of portraying postures of women, redemptive,

It feeds my soul.

Tall pines, big oaks, pecan laden and my favorite in my grandmother’s front yard …the shade providing chinaberry.

Trees are complex. They aren’t easy to capture the likeness of.

I sat quietly in my “morning spot”, a chair in the corner of the living room, a chair that was my mama’s, that was fancy for her double-wide in the country.

She’d bought it at a yard sale. I grabbed it up quickly when she died, I wanted it to live with me, I wanted the beauty of her choosing a fancy chair for her not fancy home, to be something I would never forget.

In a way, a seed she left for me to believe that a life can be pretty despite poverty, that there is always opportunity to believe in finding beautiful things. 

I’ve had that chair since 2010. I have heard from God sitting there, thoughts formed, hopes and solutions have come.

I have prayed, I have cried, I have napped from exhaustion sitting straight up in this chair.

Before I knew, was tenderly surprised to be asked to speak here, God told me one morning, in a reply to my heart’s longing to know why it seemed I would never be enough, never achieve enough, never be able to see myself as healed and not a victim of so much and so many things. 

The words from God, the gentle awakening? 

“Lisa, your soil is not healthy.” 

Time passed and I sort of tossed the thought around. Thought of all the things I had planted through my life, my children, my marriage, my work for others, my art, my sharing of my words…

“Seeds” in a way, efforts and actual accomplishments that I contributed to the soil of my life, the things that were from my heart and my soul.

The truth of that very odd thought, my soil not being healthy,

simply would not fade. 

Months from the first wrestling to understand the meaning, I have begun to make sense of the strange statement.

So, I want us to consider whether our soil is healthy.

I googled “healthy soil” and “what causes trees to die.”

One answer drew me closer.

THE SOIL MAY BE COMPLICATED.

I made a list of complicated seeds in the soil of my life. 

One list, things and circumstances beyond my control, even generational curses and a second list of traits, qualities and choices I have planted and continue to plant.

I realized there were a whole bunch of seeds that needed to die, no longer needed my failing attempts to bring life from brittle seeds or to keep nourishing and watering what I selfishly or naively chose to decide had to live forever…

there were seeds of my sadness that needed to die.

There are seeds of my history that I’ve let mark and destroy my hope for far too long. 

Consider with me, what your soil, your soul is full of, seeds planted in you beyond your control and marked by sadness, trauma or likelihoods of how you might or might not grow.

Then consider what you’ve planted, tried to force the growth of or coddled and overwatered…

something that needs to be let go.

Because it’s not so much the THINGS that destroy us, stunt our growth, It’s the THING(S) UNDER THE THING(S)!

The seeds entangled in our roots.

My list: 

This process requires bravery. I’ll be brave first. 

SEEDS THAT MUST DIE TO ALLOW GROW

• SHAME that dies becomes freedom to live.

• SELF-DESTRUCTIVE PATTERNS that are put to death give permission to receive abundantly and to believe you’re worthy to.

• UNWORTHINESS that dies leads to confidence/confident in God not others.

• ABANDONMENT that is allowed to die and be grieved leads to deeper trust and intimacy in relationships.

• VICTIM MENTALITY finally laid down leads to an ease in living and breathing and to breaking generational cycles, a legacy of safety and love uncompromised by negative mindsets.

• FEAR that doesn’t live but dies builds courage (quiet confidence is your strength, this is the way) keep moving steadily forward.

• NEED TO CONTROL given up from an unclenched grip to let die leads to surrender (open hand to heaven).

• BITTERNESS disallowed and put to death yields mercy toward others.

• JEALOUSY that’s snuffed out before it grows invites kindness and sincerity in our thoughts and words.

• COMPARISON that ceases breathing gives breath to abiding oneness and ownership of the uniqueness of you.

 

I began to research what the Bible says about seeds and found many passages.  I’ll just stick to the one familiar to many.

The Parable of the Seeds (the first recorded parable) 

“And he was teaching them many things in parables, and in his teaching he said to them: And as he sowed, some seed fell along the path, and the birds came and devoured it. Other seed fell on rocky ground, where it did not have much soil, and immediately it sprang up, since it had no depth of soil.

And when the sun rose, it was scorched, and since it had no root, it withered away.

Other seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it yielded no grain.

And other seeds fell into good soil and produced grain, growing up and increasing and yielding thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold.”
‭‭Mark‬ ‭4‬:‭2‬, ‭4‬-‭8‬ ‭ESV‬‬

God is sovereign and very aware of the times, every detail of our lives.

When I began thinking of what to share in speaking to women, I had no plan to write about my mama’s chair or the beautiful growth I might see as I surrendered the seed of grief attached to the story of an old yard sale chair and allowed myself to see the beauty of me possessing it.

On the outside and above the gnarled and tangled roots, our lives like a tree may be spectacular or just seem healthy and vibrant.

In time though, the “COMPLICATED” soil of our souls may lead to decay, destruction, and depression. 

Every time we share our vulnerabilities lined up with our hopes for healing, we point someone else toward the path of fullness, light and redemption that they glimpse in us.

Truths on the significance of the soil of my soul being healthy, free of the thorns of despair or despondency over past wounds continue to reveal themselves to me.

Walking with my grandson, on the rocky clay road bordered by deep ditches and steep hills covered in brilliant moss, music from my phone in the atmosphere…I paused to shake off a heavy mood.

I quoted to myself a verse that’s meant to turn the tide, a proclamation…

No weapon formed against me shall prosper.

And I walked on, pushing the stroller, the little strawberry blonde head in my view, a pair of tiny feet bouncing to the beat of “Skip to My Loo”.

I walked slowly and thought…

But Lisa, what about the weapons you continue to turn on yourself.

And I stood still with the weight of that call to consider this truth.

Wounds are thorns that become tools, weapons of sorts for us to decide there’s no hope for us,

No outcome other than the expected one we’ve known, the time to grow is over

A life without woundedness is one you’ll never get to know.

There are some weapons we continue to use in fear because of proven past failures against the waiting patiently hope and permission to grow.

Wounds become weapons and weapons stunt our growth.

Wounds become weapons that we turn inward, that we decide are evidence that we’re not allowed to dream, disallowed from hope.

So ask yourself, message me and I’ll send you the tree as a prompt.

How healthy is my soil?

Which seeds are deep and should not be kept alive? Which seeds must die?

Is there woundedness in your life that you turn on yourself to stunt your growth, to destroy your hopes?

In quiet confidence is your strength…this is the way.

Walk in it.

 

Continue and believe.

You are loved.

 

 

 

 

 

Mercy Waits

Abuse Survivor, Art, bravery, contentment, courage, doubt, Faith, Forgiveness, freedom, grace, hope, mercy, mixed media painting, Peace, Redemption, rest, Stillness, Truth, Vulnerability, wonder
Noticing God

“So now we draw near freely and boldly to where grace is enthroned, to receive mercy’s kiss and discover the grace we urgently need to strengthen us in our time of weakness.”
‭‭Hebrews‬ ‭4‬:‭16‬ ‭TPT‬‬

When we wake with the woe of what was imperfect the day before or with what we tripped and fell over in our wayward walking, we can acknowledge it all. We can feel all the feelings.

We can accept the mercy of Jesus, reach up and stand to go on the way again, the way to freedom, freedom that waits to save us from ourselves again.

Waiting

We can acknowledge that if it were just ourselves trying to recover, without the knowledge and embrace of His incomprehensible love, we’d not be who we are today.

I might not be here at all.

The smallest amount of believing in the promise of God’s love and mercy leads to overcoming life’s troubles, failures, and sorrows just as much as it does for the one who has never doubted at all.

Mercy meets us where we are.

The Veil

The ones at “the bottom” they’ve hit are just as cared for and cherished, significant in God’s eyes as those who’ve never known “bottom” experiences at all.

Can hardship, shame or regret be good for our souls?

Maybe, if we handle them gingerly like tiny little jewels worth sitting with and quietly considering the value of them in the exchange for the mercy that’s waiting there.

Waiting, always for our timid and tender open minds

Open hearts.

Open hands.

“Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”
‭‭Hebrews‬ ‭4‬:‭16‬ ‭ESV‬‬

Continue and believe.

Tell Me Your Story

Abuse Survivor, aging, bravery, Children, confidence, contentment, courage, family, Forgiveness, freedom, hope, love, memoir, patience, Peace, Redemption, Vulnerability, wisdom, wonder, writing

I woke from a crazy vivid dream about being on the brink of my “dream job”. I would be partnering with a wise and super professional in every way woman, to be involved in some way with the Atlanta Braves. I was one final interview from the job and from moving to Atlanta G-A!

Now, I sit in the too cold for Carolina weather wrapped in a blanket and pajamas so thick you’d wonder if there’s a body in there.

In my dream, I was escorted by this close to perfection in appearance writer and coordinator of “human interest” activities for the baseball players.

They liked me, were excited. I was “in”.

My mama was there…I introduced her to “Miss Everything” with “this is Bette”.

There were other parts of the dream that were intensely telling. No surprise, I was lost in Atlanta, it was pouring down rain and I was driving in a panic and in the wrong direction on the interstate that would take me to the interstate back home.

I wanted to go home and I would tell “Miss Everything” by phone if I could find my way back to there.

In my dream, I found all sorts of things in my purse, one was a check I’d forgotten about.

Although the amount was only five figures including the two behind the decimal, it was enough.

There are many parts of my life buried deep, many aspirational paths away from who my life has made me.

There are crazy dangerous can’t find my way in the storm scary roads. There are dark ones. There are exciting ones. There are wounds from of all the wounding.

There are bravery required ones.

And who’s to say how bravery is defined?

What God has decided is your treasure and what your legacy will decide unbeknownst to you…for others to say “this was her treasure”.

“For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
‭‭Luke‬ ‭12‬:‭34‬ ‭NIV‬‬

I’ve been reading a variety of memoirs. No secret, I’ve had a long held goal/hope/calling to write my story.

So, I’ve been reading to learn, to learn how the author will engage me in the hard story of their life with an equal measure of softness to get me to the part of it that was redeemed.

There are a handful I’ve shelved.

Call me critical, but I prefer ones the person writes themselves, not a ghost writer.

And books about trauma, abuse or addiction?

Well, there are two I’m grateful I was mature and wise enough to put down early.

I’m sorry to say one was Matthew Perry’s. I couldn’t endure the hardness of him to discover the soft place he eventually found.

I do have favorites and I’ve just downloaded a fourth. I’m not a book critic, so I’ll keep that to myself except to say I was surprised by the authors’ ability to detail their horror without causing fear in me.

This is what I needed, what I believe readers need.

To tell their stories in a way that didn’t cause me harm emotionally. These books are and were gifts. They’ll remain with me.

I see the search that didn’t quit in them to find the quiet treasured pearl in the turmoil and torment of their wounded lives.

Hard to believe, but they found a way to shine.

“I will when I can.” I have pencilled in the back of my Bible. It’s a response to a counselor’s question long ago.

“When do you think you will be able

to write it?”

And my answer, I’ll bravely share…

“When I no longer need to be noticed, when I decide it’s okay to forget.”

This post just got real brave, didn’t it?

My husband woke me from the Atlanta dream saying I’d been “yanking” the blanket.

I stilled myself, smiled in dawn of Thursday and remembered the last bit of the dream.

I found my way home.

My quiet life.

To continue and believe.

“Turn the page, Lisa Anne.” mama

“Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.”
‭‭Luke‬ ‭12‬:‭7‬ ‭NIV‬‬

You are loved.

Like a tiny sparrow flitting back across the cold blue sky to its nest.

You are loved.

So am I.

Christmas Comes

aging, Children, Christmas, contentment, courage, Faith, family, Forgiveness, grace, hope, memoir, Peace, Redemption, Vulnerability, wisdom, wonder, writing

When December came, I willed myself to move toward Christmas in a more hopeful way. I’d read somewhere to look for “enjoyment” not to pursue perfection in my home, my gatherings, my notice of life all around me.

I have had one particular Christmas that I tended to decide my uncertain feelings about Christmas because of.

This year, God put an expression in my heart and as the days of December unfolded, it became my solid truth, my olive branch of peace to receive and to offer up.

“It won’t always be this way.”

This is the truth, friends.

Meaning that Christmas as a six or seven year old that was scary and scarring is long past.

All of us lined up in a row, the question my mama asked, “Who do you want to be with, me or your daddy?” The tiny little brown station wagon loaded down and pointed in the direction of leaving never left, nor did any of us kids. It was not my mama’s finest moment, it wasn’t mine either. But, oh the moments and the Christmases since. They’ve been a mixture for sure of ugly and pretty. Still, hope has never left me, has always come ‘round again.

I don’t have to fight for Christmas to be good, I don’t have to prepare for sadness, despair or even illness simply because those things have happened at Christmases before.

Christmas days in hospitals or bedside with illness or in bed yourself may have happened and may again.

Christmas next year won’t be exactly as it was a few days ago. It may be sweeter, there may be hardship, the people who are present and the times we are together may require acceptance and change.

This is life. Life is a good gift.

I’m missing so many moments as far as having “moment” photos, the goal.

Moments like standing next to my worshipful daughter singing “Joy to the World” in candlelight. Like the room filled with people as my brother offered prayer. Like the faces of all the babies when the paper was ripped and spread all over the room. Like the expressions of those I love in conversations about life now and in the coming year and although the word wasn’t spoken…evidence of redemption.

Those were moments not fit for pointing a camera at, those were moments stored up in hearts.

Hearts that are reservoirs of hope.

Mine is full. I pray theirs is too.

And you. Living in light of it all.

I wasn’t sure how Christmas would be this year. Nor can I be sure of the next.

Only certain that hope will come near again.

Passing Through

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This cross on canvas was added to my website on Monday. It’s 5×7, small enough for a shelf or side table. Beside it is an old ceramic rooster. I don’t know if I collected it or inherited it from my mama.

There’s a basket full of beach shells and a jar filled with goose feathers from “Aunt Boo’s”. The antique dry sink was Greg’s mama’s.

When I pass by in my coming or going, my eye meets the cross and I pause if only for a second. I am just passing by, passing through, heading to the laundry room or out the door for the day.

Yesterday, I looked through the verses I chose for the 2024 calendar. I found the one I’d pulled from the passage about the woman at the well.

I especially rested on a few words. “he had to pass through”.

“And he had to pass through Samaria.”
‭‭John‬ ‭4‬:‭4‬ ‭ESV‬‬

Traveling alone, walking from Judea to Galilee, he sat down to rest beside a well.

And a woman with a sordid past met Him, He met her there.

I think that’s what this cross and all the crosses signify for me and I pray for the ones who have one for themselves or have gifted them.

When they pass by and glance for a second, I hope they know, sense, and remember, Jesus meeting them there.

Holy Spirit whispering, all will be well.

John included this brief story of lasting significance in his recordings of all of Jesus’s healing, all of his many experiences with Jesus. He included for, centuries later, women like me who are reminded and receive new mercies every moment because of its significance.

Your personal story of being met by Jesus matters. Treasure it. Cleave to it. Strengthen it.

But, don’t keep it to yourself. There are many people in need of it, of being quenched by living water, freely offered no matter the present or past.

In your passing through, be very sure,

Jesus is near.

(Crosses are available (custom orders too) at Quiet Confidence Art

Distance and Love

Abuse Survivor, Art, birthday, bravery, courage, creativity, curiousity, Faith, family, Forgiveness, Holy Spirit, jubilee, memoir, patience, Peace, Redemption, rest, Vulnerability, wonder

I saw the man again on Monday but, yesterday I wasn’t paying attention. I neglected to glance over to find the front yard of the trailer hidden in a shady hollow place.

Overgrown it was the day I saw the pair standing so far apart they would need to raise their voices.

The grass was high like wheat and a man with a flock of blonde hair all crazy stood with his hands crossed and a positioning of his torso saying “I ain’t staying much longer.”

Facing him was another man, his head tilted to one side in a way that said sincerity.

I wondered about the relationship.

Father, step-father, mama’s friend, uncle or older brother.

I wondered who had caused the crack in relationship and who was resisting more the reconciliation of it.

I also wonder why I wonder. Why I see humans in conditions that are fragile and why God made me to want those conditions to be better.

I know God made me this way and somehow I know the intervening is not for me to accomplish, only God.

So, I pray for strangers. I just do.

And I think about them. I still pause to consider.

“What’s their story?”

I woke with thoughts about love this morning, about the importance of “for my part” demonstrating love.

Love that doesn’t put us in danger of emotional harm is just a positioning of our hearts and mind, we can stay safe in showing love when it’s hard by just deciding we want restoration for someone, we want them to know they are loved by their Creator and if they’ll allow it, by others too.

“Relationship, especially family, requires a commitment to relationship despite differences, dysfunction, and most importantly delays in the other person longing in the same way for relationship.”

I laid still in the place of very good and needed rest and questioned why these words came.

I figured it must be that I’m still curious about the family in the overgrown yard.

I saw the older man a second time. Tall and skinny, a bearded man with baggy britches and an oddly colored pipe dangling from his mouth.

He was swaying in a rhythm with a weed eater as he cleared and cleaned the high grass and weeds.

He was making the situation better.

There was contentment in his movements.

Maybe in the knowledge that he tried and is trying. So, I’ll drive past the place of these two people again next week and I’ll believe the best is being done to restore what’s been neglected or wronged.

And I’ll believe more strongly in the truth of love being demonstrated in small ways to invite change (even if we don’t get to see it).

Because, it’s not about us anyway, it’s about the one who’s messed up and in need of love believing it may be possible…

Restoration.

“God is a restorative God. He is restoring all losses.” John Eldredge, author of “Get Your Life Back”

Continue and believe.

“Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins.”
‭‭1 Peter‬ ‭4‬:‭8‬ ‭ESV‬‬

I discovered yesterday that 2023 marks a “Jubilee” year for me as I approach my birthday. It’s surprisingly tender, this discovery…almost too difficult to put into words. Maybe I will, maybe I’ll just rest in the discovery of a year symbolic of release and restoration.

There are no coincidences with God.

Looking Intently

Abuse Survivor, anxiety, birds, bravery, confidence, contentment, courage, doubt, Faith, fear, Forgiveness, Holy Spirit, kindness, memoir, Peace, Redemption, Stillness, surrender, Vulnerability, waiting, wisdom, wonder

I stood still to find it again and then the bird perched in boldness and just waited on the top of the tomato cage. Its belly was brilliant, glistened like silk. It seemed untouched, unmarred, original and articulately designed.

At first, I thought “a tomato already?”. A brilliant spot of red amongst the lush green growth of vine.

You are loved by God.

Two pages of my journal are covered in words in reply to the question, how does God see me?

I finished Henri Nouwen’s “The Return of the Prodigal Son”. There are multiple asterisks in the margins and many underlines.

I paused here yesterday. Read and reread about A First and Everlasting Love.

“For a very long time I considered low self-esteem to be some kind of virtue. I had been warned so often about pride and conceit that I came to consider it a good thing to deprecate myself.” Henri Nouwen

Nouwen reminds of Psalm 139, that before we opened our eyes to life, God had brilliant plans already decided in the way He made us.

Often, I think of the beauty of being wonderfully made and not so much the “fearfully” part. What does it mean to us that we are made “fearfully”.

I would say it means “well-made”, not haphazardly, not without intention and plan, well-thought, very, very distinct and worthwhile.

So, I continue to return to the truth for me and for you.

We are valuable according to God and that value doesn’t change according to the limitations I know like fear, self-destructive patterns, lack of confidence and/or lack of the notice of others.

This is the “footprint” I want to leave here when I’m gone.

Your value is not determined by what has happened to you or what you hoped would and did not.

Your value is according to God. He fearfully planned it for you to discover just how “wonderful” you are.

Your value is not determined by the plans of God that got trampled by malice, meanness or evil decisions of another.

Your value remains untainted, to be discovered with sweet and steady intention…you keep going towards it.

Continue and believe.

“I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well.”
‭‭Psalm‬ ‭139‬:‭14‬ ‭ESV‬‬

Already Known

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It’s both awesome and awful to realize just how completely we are known by God

From our first breath to here.

I stood at the kitchen window and noticed the lime green glow of Spring on the grass.

The trees.

I remembered the sycamore tree, the hand sized leaves and the broken branches.

Thirty-plus years ago, I cut down branches heavy with green leaves and decorated a tiny cinder block room.

There was a grand plan. I’d be teaching children about the man who climbed the tree to get a chance to see Jesus, Zacchaeus.

It would be my first time as a Vacation Bible School teacher and I was intent on winning best decorated classroom.

The first night, a line of children trailing me down the hall, I giddily swung open the door to discover a disaster.

Leaves wilted and woeful covered the floor and the stench was unbearable in the poorly ventilated room.

I don’t remember teaching the children about a greedy man who got to see Jesus and then fed him supper.

I remember who I was then and am grateful to be not quite the same today.

Just as Jesus knew Zacchaeus was hated by many, was sneaky, corrupt and greedy, He knew I was just learning back then.

Just learning what matters to Him.

Not fully grown, but fully known.

We are already known. The secrets, the shame, the actions we take wrongly motivated,

Jesus is not surprised and doesn’t keep a record. It’s we who do.

My mama used to say, Lisa, stress’ll kill you. I’m here to say I believe its not so distant cousin, shame is more fatal.

The Woman at the Well in the heat of the day encounters a man who shouldn’t be there. She calculated her replenishing of her water to go to the well when she could go unnoticed.

She is surprised by a man who tells her he can help. He has a certain kind of water that won’t run out, she’d never have to be sneaky again in coming to the well.

“Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
‭‭John‬ ‭4‬:‭13‬-‭14‬ ‭ESV‬‬

She’d never have to be thirsty again. She decides to accept the stranger’s offer.

“Please, sir,” the woman said, “give me this water! Then I’ll never be thirsty again, and I won’t have to come here to get water.”
‭‭John‬ ‭4‬:‭15‬ ‭NLT‬‬

And we know Jesus wasn’t talking about a cool drink of ice water on a humid day. He was talking about the refreshing peace of an abundant life.

Jesus tells the woman to go and get her husband and come back. She tells him she’s not married and he answers with “I know.”

Then he tells her what he does know. That she has a reputation and is well known for being with husbands of others and is now with a married man.

Whoa! or “How dare you?” she could’ve said.

She was brazen after all.

But he continued to enlighten her and she listened, connecting his gentle wisdom with the possibility he might be the Messiah.

So, he told her that indeed he was.

“The woman said, “I know the Messiah is coming—the one who is called Christ. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.” Then Jesus told her, “I Am the Messiah!”
‭‭John‬ ‭4‬:‭25‬-‭26‬ ‭NLT‬‬

Then she is overjoyed and goes to tell all the townspeople what they already knew about her she’d tried to avoid.

The reputation she tried to cover was now a proclamation…you’ve got to meet Jesus!

“Many Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me all that I ever did.”
‭‭John‬ ‭4‬:‭39‬ ‭ESV‬‬

There was no shame anymore, only her story.

Only a tax collector’s, a disciple’s who denied and regretted, a woman’s wearing shame and a lascivious reputation.

A woman like me who didn’t know anything about the value of the story of Zacchaeus, only wanted to be noticed because of trees in a room.

God is patient. He already knew and knows our journeys.

Yesterday, I stood in the parking lot with a woman. As women our age do, we caught up on the lives of our children. We compared wisdom and we exchanged worries.

She asked me to keep writing.

Said she needed my storytelling.

My story of rescue and of tripping and getting back up gradually as I learn.

Today, when you recall your own mistakes, missteps and wrong motivations, will you pause with the truth of being known?

Will you accept the grace that has never said give up, go your own way or isolate in secret shame?

And he gives grace generously. James 4:6

Will you decide to know that being known is love?

You’re already known.

Continue and believe.

Quietly Forgive

Abuse Survivor, anxiety, confidence, contentment, courage, Faith, Forgiveness, memoir, Redemption, traumatriggers, Vulnerability, wisdom, wonder

On the day everyone’s talking about love, I’m reminded of the “love passage” and a new thought I embraced over the past couple of years and am still embracing.

Let some things die.

It’s your choice not to keep a record of wrongs.

While it seems you may be giving cruelty or wrong a free pass…you’re actually opening wide the gates to you being joyful, free, arms spread wide to love completely.

You can forgive others without them knowing, that’s what safety is.

You can decide to forgive without it being a big face to face conversation.

It’s a decision of the soul, after all.

It’s a private quiet decision.

It’s therapeutic, self-helping.

You have grown now… you know what is safe. Respond lovingly to your own wounded heart known by no one on earth better than you.

You’re likely correct about your decision to forgive being met by more words that wound.

That’s on them.

They’re not where you are in deciding to live fully. They’ve perhaps not acknowledged their damaging role in your story.

So, just mull on the the decision to “let it be your life before” and not taint the life you’re making quite intentionally well now.

Try it. Decide to forgive.

See your capacity for genuine and healthy love expand.

Test my theory, see if you even feel less condemnation, less disdain of yourself.

“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.”
‭‭1 Corinthians‬ ‭13‬:‭4‬-‭7‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Continue and believe.

Forgive someone today.

Gift yourself by the doing.

No one needs to know but you.

Little Lights

Abuse Survivor, Angels, confidence, contentment, courage, curiousity, doubt, Forgiveness, grace, hope, kindness, mercy, Redemption, Stillness, Vulnerability, wisdom, wonder

Someone in a prayer group I’m a member of commented, “Pray for me because of this root of bitterness trying to grow.” And the replies understood the concerns, the need for prayer…even urgency.

Because bitterness begins in secret and then the roots grow thick and stronger and threaten us until they take over.

What is bitterness? I could share my list of things that are secret and of things I’ve vented in conversation with others (about others).

Roots destroy fertile ground. Love and peace cannot thrive when bitterness keeps growing.

“Strive for peace with everyone, and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord. See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God; that no “root of bitterness” springs up and causes trouble, and by it many become defiled;”
‭‭Hebrews‬ ‭12‬:‭14‬-‭15‬ ‭ESV‬‬

More importantly, our roots destroy relationships with others. Bitterness that makes sense only makes us sadder.

Sometimes I look around and see how very different I am and feel from others and I remind myself to bring peace not judgment, love not frustration and a subtle but steady light that points to the source of my joy (even if it’s dim on the days questions, doubt or bitterness crouch at my door.)

When Elizabeth was born, I sang “Deep and Wide” over and over and over. I can’t say why (other than God) I sang it over and over from the first moment I cradled her tiny head in my hands.

With Henry, it’s been “This Little Light of Mine” and like his sister, he doesn’t seem to mind that it’s the same words over and over. I want him to see my light as I want Elizabeth to know the depth of mine and God’s love.

Love one another.

Don’t grow bitter.

Your life has no space for hatred to take over. Only room for joy to grow high enough to create a canopy for all who stand near you.

“Forget not to show love unto strangers: for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.”
‭‭Hebrews‬ ‭13‬:‭2‬ ‭ASV‬‬

I’ve never met an angel or have I perhaps, only dimmed and unnoticed by distraction?

I believe I shall notice more gently, silence the bitter banter of all other.

Continue and believe.

You are loved.