How to Rise Above Abuse (Counseling Through the Bible Series) (43 page)

2. Injustice
⁴⁰
—Your Right Is Violated

Everyone has an inner moral code that produces a sense of what is right and wrong, fair and unfair, just and unjust. When you perceive that an injustice has occurred against you or others (especially those whom you love), you may feel angry. If you hold on to the offense, the unresolved anger can begin to make a home in your heart.

3. Fear
⁴¹
—Your Future Is Threatened

Everyone is created with a God-given inner need for
security
.
⁴²
When you begin to worry, feel threatened, or get angry because of a change in circumstances, you may be responding to fear. A fearful heart reveals a lack of trust in God’s perfect plan for your life.

4. Frustration
⁴³
—Your Performance Is Not Accepted

Everyone has a God-given inner need for
significance
.
⁴⁴
When your efforts are thwarted or do not meet your personal expectations, your sense of significance may feel threatened. Frustration over unmet expectations of yourself or of others is a major source of anger.

“Man’s anger does not bring about the righteous life that God desires”

(J
AMES
1:20).

Search your heart and determine that you will not allow anger to dictate your decisions or control your emotions. Instead, turn your hurts, rights, fears, and frustrations over to God and enter into a total dependence upon Him to meet your needs. Remember:

“The L
ORD
will guide you always;
he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land
and will strengthen your frame.
You will be like a well-watered garden,
like a spring whose waters never fail”

(I
SAIAH
58:11).

She fled to an isolated place, but was found by almighty God.

Hagar was the maidservant of Sarai, the woman through whom God had promised both a blessed heir for her husband, Abram, and descendants as numerous as the stars. But when day after day after day passed with no son yet conceived, Sarai proposed her own plan for fulfilling God’s promise—a plan that directly involved Hagar.

Sarai proposed that Abram have sexual relations with Hagar. And if she conceived, the child born from their union would be considered Sarai’s own. Because Sarai’s suggestion was customary for the time, Abram followed her advice and, along with a child being conceived, a struggle was birthed between the two women:

“After Abram had been living in Canaan ten years,
Sarai his wife took her Egyptian maidservant Hagar
and gave her to her husband to be his wife.
He slept with Hagar, and she conceived.
When she knew she was pregnant,
she began to despise her mistress”

(G
ENESIS
16:3-4).

Many of us assume that once we reach adulthood, our pain from childhood will just disappear and no longer affect us. But this “disappearing act”
does not happen unless we identify our past pains from childhood and resolve them. While we are not the sum of our experiences, we are shaped by our
responses
to our experiences.

God does not want us to store up the bad things that happened to us by stockpiling our anger. Rather, He wants us to be like a storehouse from which the bad fruit of anger and resentment, distrust and fear is discarded and the good fruit of joy and peace, patience and kindness, and forgiveness are retained.

“The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in him,
and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in him”

(M
ATTHEW
12:35).

Resolving Anger Rooted in Childhood Victimizations

The next time anger wells up in your heart or uncontrollable tears stream down your face, ask yourself:

•
What am I feeling: hurt, injustice, fear, or frustration?

•
Did I have any of these same feelings when I was a child?

Here is how you can face your anger from the past and begin to see how your present anger is connected to your unresolved childhood anger:

•
Ask God to reveal
buried hurts, injustices, fears, and frustrations from your childhood.

•
Take four pieces of paper
and label one “Hurt,” one “Injustice,” one “Fear,” and one “Frustration.” Then write down every instance of each you can remember from your life.

•
Release your anger
over each instance to God and replace the anger with God’s peace.

•
Forgive and pray
for those toward whom you have harbored anger.

•
Burn the pages
as a sacrificial offering to God.

•
Ask God to reveal
the relationship between your past and present anger.

•
Ask close family members and friends
what they think makes you angry and how they know when you are angry.

•
Ask forgiveness
from anyone you have offended by your anger.

•
Assume personal responsibility
for your present feelings of anger.

•
Meditate on how God has demonstrated His great love for you
.

If your heart yearns for love and acceptance, remember:

“This is how God showed his love among us:
He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him.
This is love: not that we loved God,
but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins”

(1 J
OHN
4:9-10).

Sarai complained to Abram about Hagar’s mistreatment of her, and Abram gave her the authority to do as she pleased regarding Hagar. Sarai immediately began to treat her harshly.

Hagar then fled to a lonely place by a spring in the wilderness, but soon found she was not alone. God compassionately spoke to her, instructing her to return and submit to Sarai. He assured Hagar that her offspring would be greatly multiplied. However, this offspring was not the promised seed yet to be fulfilled through Abram and Sarai.

“You are now with child and you will have a son.
You shall name him Ishmael, for the L
ORD
has heard of your misery.
He will be a wild donkey of a man;
his hand will be against everyone and everyone’s hand against him,
and he will live in hostility toward all his brothers”

(G
ENESIS
16:11-12).

Finding freedom is a process that takes time and has periods of regression. You may have seasons when it seems like no progress is being made at all. The first step in the process is deciding that you want to heal and believing that healing
is possible
with God. As you place your hope in Him and seek His plan for you, wait patiently for the Lord to lovingly show you the way.

“No one whose hope is in you will ever be put to shame,
but they will be put to shame who are treacherous without excuse.
Show me your ways, O L
ORD
, teach me your paths”

(P
SALM
25:3-4).

Healing Is Possible

Q
UESTION
:
“After someone has been victimized, is healing really possible?”

A
NSWER
:
Yes, through the power of the Lord. It will take time, but healing is a positive process through which you will experience spiritual growth.

“Heal me, O L
ORD
, and I will be healed;
save me and I will be saved”

(J
EREMIAH
17:14).

As you begin the process of healing—of finding freedom from your bondage to victimization—there are several painful realities you will need to face and work through.

Recognizing your prison walls
is necessary in order to tear those walls down and experience the freedom—the total freedom—God has planned for you. Ask yourself:

— Do I feel there is no way out of my situation?

— Do I think love is based on my performance?

— Do I feel powerless in my relationships?

— Do I lie to avoid conflict?

— Do I think other people are better than me?

— Do I have a lack of trust in people?

— Do I have difficulty saying
no
?

— Do I fear rejection?

Acknowledging your bondage and your need to break through
the walls that are keeping you from having healthy relationships is critical to the healing process.

— Acknowledge your bondage by confessing it to God.

— Acknowledge your realization that your bondage has hindered both your relationship with God and your relationships with others.

— Acknowledge your need for God’s divine intervention in your life.

— Acknowledge your dependence on Him to empower you to walk in freedom.

— Acknowledge your need for a new way of thinking about Him, yourself, and others.

— Acknowledge your need to see yourself from God’s viewpoint.

— Acknowledge your need to understand what constitutes a healthy relationship from God’s perspective.

— Acknowledge your bondage by sharing it with one or two trusted confidants who will agree to hold you accountable and help you work toward becoming mature in Christ.

Remember the admonition in God’s Word that we are to…

“carry each other’s burdens,
and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ”

(G
ALATIANS
6:2).

God Is Trustworthy

Q
UESTION
:
“Who can I trust to help me?”

A
NSWER
:
God knows how to make sense out of your confusion, and He is completely trustworthy. He will also bring trustworthy persons into your life to aid you in your healing process and to provide healthy, long-term relationships that help keep you on the path toward healing.

“Trust in the L
ORD
with all your heart
and lean not on your own understanding;
in all your ways acknowledge him,
and he will make your paths straight”

(P
ROVERBS
3:5-6).

•
Remembering past victimization
is sometimes the first step toward healing.

To induce memory, God often uses…

•
Journaling can help you
to move through the stages of remembering.

Writing down your thoughts and feelings helps you…

—face the fact of the abuse

—recall the feelings associated with the abuse

—uncover hidden fury associated with the abuse

—process your feelings about the abuse

—objectify the abuse

—organize the events surrounding the abuse

—discover the ramifications of the abuse

—gain insights into any present abuse

You’ll want to memorize this Scripture passage:

“I have been deprived of peace; I have forgotten what prosperity is.
So I say, ‘My splendor is gone and all that I had hoped from the L
ORD
.’
I remember my affliction and my wandering, the bitterness and the gall.
I well remember them, and my soul is downcast within me.
Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope:
Because of the L
ORD
’s great love we are not consumed,
for his compassions never fail”

(L
AMENTATIONS
3:17-22).