House Re-construction

My wife and I have owned a number of homes over the years.  Most were older than I was, and it seems like something falling into disrepair happens at the most inopportune times.   

I have come to understand many spiritual lessons through experiences of owning and living in a house.  

Coming to faith in Jesus in a conversion experience is like transferring the deed of a property for God’s ownership.  Our physical, mental, and emotional being is no longer our own, but we have been bought with the price of the blood of Jesus (1 Corinthians 6:20).

At conversion, the Holy Spirit awakens our dead personal spirit, and comes to live inside our bodies (Romans 8:9-11).  Then the fun begins.  The process of transformation and sanctification are illustrated well by property ownership.   A number of places in the Bible speak of our body as a tent, temple, dwelling, or house.  Anyone who has lived in a particular house for a length of time knows that houses can take a lot of work to maintain.  Although houses are viewed as an asset on a financial balance sheet, tax collectors have come up with a method of depreciating their value over time because repairs and improvements are so expensive.  The older the house, the more surprises that may be found when trying to fix something.  Chipped paint may lead to broken plaster which may lead to finding a plumbing leak and so on.  For this illustration, when we “sell out” to God, he buys us “as is.”  Now the repairs are in his control, and in his terms of timing, methods, tools used, materials used, floor plans, space utilization, landscaping, outside buildings, etc.  .    

In the Bible, the ancient Israelites are spoken of as a “house,” where God dwells among his people.  In addition to a community meaning of “house,” since the coming of Jesus to the earth, the Bible also refers to an individual’s heart as being a “house”  for the Holy Spirit to dwell within.  

As individuals and as a community, the verses below indicate God’s people sometimes have a hard time maintaining their devotion to God.  God is faithful to grant them peace in their hearts when they remain faithful.  Christ Jesus’ temptation and suffering now provides full access to Father God and a way for our “house” to be made alive in him.   See the second chapter of the book of Hebrews for an introduction to the following quote.  

 

“Therefore, holy brothers and sisters, who share in the heavenly calling, fix your thoughts on Jesus, whom we acknowledge as our apostle and high priest.  He was faithful to the one who appointed him, just as Moses was faithful in all God’s house.  Jesus has been found worthy of greater honor than Moses, just as the builder of a house has greater honor than the house itself. For every house is built by someone, but God is the builder of everything.  “Moses was faithful as a servant in all God’s house,” bearing witness to what would be spoken by God in the future. But Christ is faithful as the Son over God’s house. And we are his house, if indeed we hold firmly to our confidence and the hope in which we glory.

So, as the Holy Spirit says:

“Today, if you hear his voice,
     do not harden your hearts
as you did in the rebellion,
    during the time of testing in the wilderness,
where your ancestors tested and tried me,
    though for forty years they saw what I did.
That is why I was angry with that generation;
    I said, ‘Their hearts are always going astray,
    and they have not known my ways.’
So I declared on oath in my anger,
    ‘They shall never enter my rest.’

See to it, brothers and sisters, that none of you has a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God” (Hebrews 3:1-12; NASB). 

A heart turned towards God, finds peace.  A heart turned away from God has no rest.  A believing heart turns toward God.  An unbelieving heart turns away.  Belief in God empowers peace.  Unbelief destroys any opportunity for us to experience peace in our body, mind, and soul.  At conversion, believing in Jesus begins a process whereby more and more measures of faith and trust (belief) is placed in Father God for our identity, provision, and protection.  We are still prone to complaining and blaming like the people of God described above, but now we have Jesus as “the Way, the Truth, and the Life”  (see John 14).  

This process of change requires altering our beliefs.  Our beliefs must be brought into alignment with God’s “beliefs.”  This is done through surrendering possession of our house to God.  God now owns our heart, and we must cooperate with the re-construction he wants to do.  God may want to tear down a wall to make more space in a room.   We build walls of self-protection in our hearts that often damage our relationships.  God may want to strip old paint off the door frames of another room to expose the original wood.  We often make surface excuses to hide our imperfect perceptions, and we mask who God originally intended us to be.  God may just want to clean the junk out of some dark closets.   We hide things in places that become dark holes of disappointment and depression.   Just about any task of house renovation and maintenance can be likened to alterations in the human heart.  

The more re-making a house goes through, the more useful and beautiful the living space becomes.   The more  change in the right direction the more peace and rest that follows.   Room by room, piece by piece our heart is changed into a place of beauty and productivity.  A house foundation that is shored up and strengthened, will bear the weight of upward expansion, and also be better prepared for storms ahead (see the story Jesus told in Matthew 7:24-27).  Storms of life are inevitable and may take the form of relationship or business breakups, unemployment, pandemics, health problems, or some kind of injustice,  A heart transformed into greater wholeness, has greater capacity, resilience, and forbearance for these kinds of troubles.  

Some may find this difficult to believe, but one of the best ways to discover where our heart needs transformational healing and re-construction, is to allow ourselves to feel the pain of our inner hurts.  Just like a house may look a bit messy from demolition work before re-construction can continue, cleaning up the messes in our lives is somewhat necessary before beauty is restored.  I can speak from my own experience that every corner cleaned up is one more step to sweeter rest of soul.  More on the role of pain in the recovery process may be found in the article called Pain Evangelism as Discipleship at:  

http://authoredhersh.blogspot.com/2018/09/pain-evangelism-as-discipleship.html  

Applying answers to some questions like these may help facilitate house re-construction.   Where might there be some unbelief in my life?  What specific lie(s) might I be believing?  What is the truth that will turn me towards God?  What might I be holding onto (or hiding) in my house hoping that God’s re-construction won’t come to this closet/ cabinet/ room?  What am I thankful for that God already began (or completed) to make my house a better place to live?  Am I giving God praise for the good works he is doing?

Be blessed with re-construction.     

 by Ed Hersh, Blue Rock BnB Healing Ministry

Healing Prayer Basics

When life hurts, where do we turn?  To whom do we look to for healing?  Healing prayer is turning our attention to God, and through communication with him, changing our perspective on the past, and gaining new hope for the journey ahead.

            I describe here, a few important considerations.

First, to receive healing from God, cognitive insight is not enough.  Although the part of the human being we can see (physical) is most obvious, the unseen part (non-physical or inner being) is more dominent, thus very real.  The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma by Psychiatrist Bessel van der Kolk explains in simple language how our emotional brain limits our rational brain.  Exploring our deepest feelings, desires, and core beliefs about our world must be part of the healing process.  

Next, our heart is broken because our world is broken.  Since the first human sinned, the Bible explains how we each fall short of the original design God has for our lives.  As we grow from childhood into adulthood, our hurts and wounds magnify our pain.  The broken things in our past create more brokenness and sometimes the real source of pain becomes hard to uncover.  

Also, we must acknowledge there are no exceptions.  We all need healing to become a whole person.  In the physical world, every child gets, at the very least, banged knees, splinters, or broken skin that is vulnerable to infection and disease.   If time passes before the wound is discovered by a caretaker, it may have to be reopened and cleaned out for it to heal properly.  Though emotional hurts and wounds may not be visible, they are real, and the passing of time makes them worse.  Insensitivities, neglects, mistreatments, rejection, losses, and shame (self inflicted or by others) does not go away on its own.  It requires a process to dislodge, and remain free of set-backs.   

For some, pain may be caused by trauma, violence, gross injustice, abuse, or severe neglect.  But common to us all are hurts caused by things like illnesses, injuries, broken relationships, family breakups, bullying, slandering, lying, stealing. immorality, and accidents.  If a painful experience hasn’t come to your mind in reading so far, try this little exercise.  Pretend that your life is over, and by  God’s grace, you are enjoying your new life in eternal glory.  Jesus comes to you, and asks you to volunteer to go back to earth in your former body, family, economic status, and the same earthly circumstances as your life was before, with one exception.  You are allowed to make one change.  What would that change be?  Whatever you wish could be changed about your life circumstances likely carries some disappointment, frustration, annoyance, discomfort, unrest, or dissatisfaction.  These symptoms create a tremendous amount of toxic stress (infection of the soul) smf negatively impact your work, relationships, self-concept, and life’s meaning and destiny.    

To become completely free of the unwanted stresses, let us consider a few more basic principles of healing prayer.   In order to discover the root cause of hurt, we must allow ourselves to “feel” the hurt long enough to identify specific feelings and emotions associated.  These feelings and emotions are always driven by specific beliefs developed and reinforced by circumstances over time.  Perceptions are created, conclusions are drawn, opinions are formed, and critical judgments are made about how life works, and should work.  The older we become the more our present core beliefs are so buried in our subconscious that we can’t even remember how and where they came to be.  Another factor on our ability to remember is the intensity to which the hurt or wound was inflicted.    Greater degrees of abuse, for example, tend to carry greater degrees of denial or dissociation,  Denial is a useful self-protection coping strategy for a time, but becomes a huge burden as time goes on.   So, naming our present feelings and naming our accompanying beliefs, are first steps in the process.  

Beliefs are powerful.  Every behavior and action we take has a belief behind it.  If we believe we are competent and capable, we will step out in confidence and display self-assurance in our work, play, and relationships.  If we believe the opposite about ourselves, we will be trapped by self-doubt, self-condemnation, and self-rejection.   An example that demonstrates this principle involves the circus elephant.  In former days, the training of  an elephant began early in the elephant’s life.   The only environment the small elephant knew was a chain that kept him in the location the trainer chose for him.  The elephant grew into adulthood believing he was limited by the confines of the chain.  When the chain is removed for circus tricks he remains with the trainer because he knows nothing else.  Freedom (escape)  does not even occur to him.  In general, animals are trained through repetition, and the natural inclinations of humans are the same.  We gravitate to the familiar, even if the familiar is harmful or not in our best interest.  A victimized person will subconsciously seek to be victimized because their beliefs confirm to them a lack of worthfulness and value.  Even depression and anxiety can be reinforced by believing life only offers despondent or scary circumstances.  

Not only do our beliefs trap us, but they are guaranteed to be telling us lies.  Our default tendency (from conception onward) is to perceive and interpret unpleasant surroundings in a negative way.  This sets us up to believe things that are not true about God, ourselves, and other people.  As children we are especially vulnerable to lies taking root in our thinking.   For example, a five year old girl who overhears her daddy say to his friend about her, “We wished she would have been a boy,” can set her up for huge ramifications.   I’ve heard numerous cases where seemingly harmless words or actions by a caretaker result in wounding.   Generally speaking, children often tend to blame themselves for bad things that happen.   The little girl’s inner voice may hear her daddy’s words as, “I should have been a boy,” or “I’m really not loved because I’m not a boy, “I need to try to become a boy to be loved,” or “I’m not lovable,” or “I am a mistake,” or all sorts of other lies.  Parents’ divorces usually result in children blaming themselves for the breakup.  Injury or illness to siblings can create false guilt and self-condemnation.  False beliefs tend to create more false beliefs so circumstances in adulthood are merely replays of childhood woundings.  This negative bent in our personhood is part of the broken condition of humanity since sin and shame entered our world.  Shame is at the root of all false beliefs.  To explore more details on how and why shame is at the root of our core identity, read Dr. Curt Thompson’s book The Soul of Shame: Retelling the Stories We Believe about ourselves.

The solution for false beliefs is true beliefs.  As noted above, our physical brain and mind is not the only part of us to be convinced of the truth.  Our heart (inner being) must come to an understanding of truth that secures, preserves, and advances our whole being.  

Jesus said of himself that HE is the way, the truth, and the life (see John 14:6).  Jesus is the Healer.  We cannot know Father God except through Jesus His Son (see John 14:6-7).  God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit work together to provide healing for our innate broken condition.  Healing prayer is an avenue by which we can allow the Holy Spirit to reveal hidden things in the broken parts of our subconscious, so they can be brought into light and take away  the opportunity for shame to continue to condemn us.  We exchange lies for truth.  We exchange condemning judgments for empathy.  We exchange despair for hope.  Disappointment and dissatisfaction can turn to contentment and fulfillment.  

Healing prayer can be hard work.  Not that prayer should be difficult, but being honest with ourselves and with God long enough to receive the truth God has for us, is the “work” that makes for, the sometimes difficult, steps in our journey.  Facing the pain in our experiences, confessing the error in our reactions, repenting, and surrendering to God’s solution, is viewed by most as too hard or scary to try.  But I encourage all who read this to decide to be one of the few.  I’m here to say the rewards are worth it.   God is our Refuge and strength (Psalm 46).   Holding on to old hurts and wounds becomes far more painful than receiving healing from Refuge.    

My next article will discuss more specifics of how to practice healing prayer.  

by Ed Hersh, Blue Rock BnB Healing Ministry