Pressing Forward

During my childhood, I endured many years of abuse on various levels. My father had war flashbacks where he thought I was "the enemy". As a result, he would try to take my life. I know now he didn't mean to hurt me. However, as a little girl, my little girl emotions were confused by his actions. At times he would show me great acts of kindness. Then at night his gigantic hands would find their way around my little neck choking the breath of life from my body. Those times were less severe when my mother was present. My guess is that when she was in the house, he would probably inflict this torture on her. I don't know this for sure, but this is my theory. My mother had a hard time coping with all the violence in our household so she would leave for months at a time. This was especially hard since I would serve not only as caregiver to my disabled, alcoholic father; but I would serve as mother to my little sister. In the evening, I would grab my little sister, hide her under the bed and then do all I could to shield myself from my daddy. I never realized until recently that this treatment by my father profoundly affected my confidence and the way I saw myself. Other abusive situations in my childhood served to reinforce the message that I was not worthy as a human being. The message I received was that I must be so deeply worthless that I deserved to be mistreated by those that were supposed to love me. I grew up a very fearful person. On the outside, I pretended to be confident and at times some may have even thought I was pretentious. This was a façade I carried to protect myself from further hurt. When I became a Christian, I came to realize that God loved me despite my sin and shame. However, I was still filled with shame and self condemnation over things that were done to me. I also think I developed a wrong opinion of men in general. I have been able to live what has appeared to be a successful Christian life because I never had to risk exposing myself that deeply to anyone.

True oneness requires you to become completely exposed not only on a physical level, but on an emotional and spiritual level. It was easy to expose myself on a spiritual level and even on an emotional level. But, after my marriage, the physical revelation was more difficult for me. All of a sudden I found myself back in that place of being filled with shame and condemnation. My beloved, in his attempt to remove the wall I had so carefully built around myself, inadvertently increased my feelings of shame and fear. He meant to help me and I didn't mean to hurt him. Neither of us realized any of this was happening. All we knew was that things were not going well between us and those feelings seemed to trigger a series of situations that widened the void that was growing between us. These situations were, in my opinion, further exacerbated by family members who have had a difficult time accepting me. They don't know me and perhaps its the unknown that they fear the most. Its hard to trust God blindly I am sure. It is my hope that they didn't mean to be so blatant in their rejection of me, but my husband and I felt deeply saddened by the situation nonetheless.

I have learned a lot during the last few months. I have learned that my husband loves me. I have learned that the Father loves me. And I have learned that God wants better for me than the path my beloved and I started to take. I am thankful that even though there were a series of very sad events we experienced, God also started a series of very miraculous events to thwart the path of destruction. I can honestly say that today I see my beloved and I back on that path God had for us towards true oneness... in every sense of that wonderful word. We will experience God's best for our life despite anyone that doesn't think we belong together. Because the truth is that God brought us together for a reason that goes above and beyond anyone else's opinion.

God wants that for you, too. He wants you to experience true oneness in Him. He wants you to experience true oneness in your relationships. Know that whatever experiences seem to threaten you to destruction today; God wants to use those experience to do a miraculous work through you, for your good, and the good of others.