If you have a “deep-seated and lingering disorder,” the Lord wants you to know that it does not have to be the central focal point of your entire existence. He wants you to trust Him and cooperate with Him as He leads you to victory over that problem one step at a time.
Don't try to use your problem as a means of getting attention or sympathy or pity.
When I used to complain to my husband, he would tell me, “Joyce, I'm not going to feel sorry for you.”
“I'm not trying to get you to feel sorry for me,” I would protest.
“Yes, you are,” he would say. “And I'm not going to do it, because if I do, you will never get over your problems.”
That used to make me so mad I could have beaten him to a pulp. We get angry at those who tell us the truth. And the truth is that before we can get well, we must really want to be well — body, soul, and spirit. We must want to enough that we are willing to hear and accept truth.
God works differently with individuals. Each of us must learn to follow God's personal plan for us. Whatever our problem may be, God has promised to meet our need and to repay us for our loss. Facing truth is the key to unlocking prison doors that may have held us in bondage.
The Justice of God
Instead of your [former] shame you shall have a twofold recompense; instead of dishonor and reproach [your people] shall rejoice in their portion. Therefore in their land they shall possess double [what they had forfeited]; everlasting joy shall be theirs. Isaiah 61:7
The word recompense means “repayment.”2 So when the prophet says that the Lord will recompense us for our shame, dishonor, and reproach, he means that God will make it up to us for all the hurts we have experienced in life.
The Bible says, Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave the way open for [God's] wrath; for it is written, Vengeance is Mine, I will repay (requite), says the Lord (Rom. 12:19).
One of the greatest mistakes we make is trying to avenge ourselves, to get even, to bring the scales of justice into balance, rather than trusting God to do that for us. If we try to do it ourselves, we only wind up making a huge mess.
When the Bible talks about recompense or justice, it simply means that you and I will get what is right for us, what is coming to us.
Now, as blood-bought children of God, we know that as long as we trust in the Lord and are obedient to Him and repentant of our sins and failures, we will not get what's coming to us in the form of punishment for our sins, but we do get rewards for our righteousness. Jesus took our punishment, and we get His inheritance.
The Bible says in Psalm 37:1,2: Fret not yourself because of evildoers, neither be envious against those who work unrighteousness (that which is not upright or in right standing with God). For they shall soon be cut down like the grass, and wither as the green herb.
The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit. (Rom. 5:5.) We don't want anyone to “be cut down” and “wither,” even those who have harmed us. In my own life, I thank God I have come to the place of not wanting to see my tormentors have a miserable life. But what God has promised us who belong to Him and follow Him is that those who have hurt us will one day pay for their transgressions against us, unless they come to a place of repentance. But God will make it up to us if we trust Him to do so.
Too often believers don't seem to realize they are not to take matters into their own hands. Many of them are angry at what has been done to them — and that anger manifests itself in many destructive ways.
Part of the problem is that we as Christians have not yet learned that “into each life some rain must fall.” Psalm 34:19 says, Many evils confront the [consistently] righteous. … Even though we are the children of God not everything will go just the way we want, and not everyone will treat us just the way we would like to be treated.
But the Bible teaches that if we continue to trust God no matter what happens to us, if we keep our eyes on Him and have faith and confidence in Him, He will balance out the scales. The second half of Psalm 34:19 says, … but the Lord delivers him out of them all! The time will come when everything will be set straight. Our enemies will be repaid for all their treachery, and we will be paid back double for all we have lost and suffered.
True justice is worth waiting for.
A Very Great Recompense
After these things, the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision, saying, Fear not, Abram, I am your Shield, your abundant compensation, and your reward shall be exceedingly great. Genesis 15:1
In this passage we see that the Lord came to Abraham and promised that if he would be faithful and obedient to Him, He Himself would be his great recompense and reward. Later in Galatians 3 we are told that the blessing of Abraham was not just for him alone, but for all of us who are the children of Abraham through faith in God's Son Jesus Christ.
Each of us can be as blessed as Abraham was, if we will be as faithful and obedient as he was.
In our ministry, my husband and I have a fabulous life. God is so good to us! Many times things are so wonderful for us I feel like a fairy princess. I am amazed at what God has done as I think to myself, “Here I am traveling all over the world, people are coming to hear me speak, I'm on radio and television, and God is opening doors to me everywhere I go — I am so blessed!”
God will bless you too — if you will walk in His ways and trust Him to be your recompense, your very great reward, your vindicator. Before the blessings came, I had to learn to let go and let God handle the situations.
In Genesis 12:3, as part of the covenant the Lord made with Abraham, God told Abraham that if he would obey Him, God would bless those who blessed him and curse those who cursed him.
If you will stop being angry at all the things that have happened to you, and quit trying to get revenge on all those who have harmed you, the God of justice will balance it all out and make it all right!
For years I went around bemoaning my past and all the unfair things that had been done to me in my lifetime. For years I kept asking God, “Why me, Lord? Why me?” I was driving myself crazy with that self-pitying question.
Finally the Lord spoke to me and said, “Joyce, you can be pitiful or you can be powerful. Which do you want to be?”
All of us manifest what has happened to us in our life. Our past experiences are the cause of much of our negative attitude and behavior. But while it may be the reason we are the way we are, it is not any reason to stay that way.
God is telling each of us today, “If you will trust Me enough to turn over your past life to Me and let Me handle it, I will make it all up to you. Quit trying to do it yourself; you're only making things worse!”
One important part of leaving things in the hands of God involves forgiveness, which we will discuss in more detail later.
One man once told me, “I operate a counseling center, and the number one problem with the people we counsel is unforgiveness.”
From my own life and ministry I know that is true. Although we have heard many messages on the subject of forgiveness, we still have to learn to deal with it. Otherwise the scales of justice in our lives will never be balanced, and we will never experience the full, abundant life God wants to bestow upon us.
If you will learn to trust all of your past to the Lord, He has promised to repay those who have caused you misery (although God's way of repaying is often different from the way we would imagine) and to repay you twofold for the misery you have suffered. Isn't it worth giving up all past hurts for that kind of a recompense and reward?
The Two Ways
Enter through the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and spacious and broad is the way that leads away to destruction, and many are those who are entering through it.
But the gate is narrow (contracted by pressure) and the way is straitened and compressed that leads away to life, and few are those who find it. Matthew 7:13,14
We have seen that Jesus said, “I am the Way.” Here in this passage, He speaks of two different ways: the broad
way that leads to destruction and the narrow way that leads to life.
As I was meditating on this passage, the Lord quickened it to me by saying, “Joyce, on the broad way there is room for all kinds of fleshly things like bitterness and unforgiveness and resentment and vindictiveness. But on the narrow way there is only room for the Spirit.”
In the flesh it is easy to take the broad path, but the end result is destruction. It is much harder to take the narrow path that leads to life.
Emotions move us to take the easy way, to do what feels good for the moment. Wisdom moves us to take the hard way that leads to life.
The question is: which will we choose?
God Wants To Be Good to You!
And therefore the Lord [earnestly] waits [expecting, looking, and longing] to be gracious to you; and therefore He lifts Himself up, that He may have mercy on you and show loving-kindness to you. For the Lord is a God of justice. Blessed (happy, fortunate, to be envied) are all those who [earnestly] wait for Him, who expect and look and long for Him [for His victory, His favor, His love, His peace, His joy, and His matchless, unbroken companionship]! Isaiah 30:18
Notice again that God is a God of justice! He waits and expects and looks and longs to do the right thing!
Hebrews 6:10 tells us, For God is not unrighteous to forget or overlook your labor and the love which you have shown for His name's sake. … That's why all of us who earnestly wait for Him are blessed.
God is in His heaven waiting to be good to you and me. He is a God of mercy and justice, not of anger and punishment. He wants to balance out the scales of our lives, to make it up to us for all the hurts and wounds we have suffered — no matter what they may be.
Whatever your present situation or past experience, God wants to be good to you! He has a good plan for your life.
Keep Walking!
And your ears will hear a word behind you, saying, This is the way; walk in it... Isaiah 30:21
No matter what has happened to you in your lifetime, even if you have been abandoned by your spouse or abused by your parents or hurt by your children or others, if you will stay on that narrow path and leave all your excess baggage behind, sooner or later you will find the peace, joy, and fulfillment you seek.
Jesus is the Way, and He has shown us the way in which we are to walk. The Lord has sent upon us His Holy Spirit to lead and guide us in the way we are to go, the narrow way that leads to life and not the broad way that leads to destruction.
We must keep walking in the ways of the Lord: And let us not lose heart and grow weary and faint in acting nobly and doing right, for in due time and at the appointed season we shall reap, if we do not loosen and relax our courage and faint (Gal. 6:9).
The Bible does not promise that when we do right, we will reap the reward immediately. But it does assure us that if we keep doing right, eventually we will be rewarded.
God says, “As long as the earth remains, there will be seedtime and harvest.” (Gen. 8:22, author's paraphrase.) We might read it like this, “As long as the earth remains, there will be seed, time, and harvest.” We must be patient like the farmer. He plants the seed and expectantly waits for the harvest. He looks forward to and talks about the harvest.
If you will continue to walk in the way the Lord has prescribed for you in His Word and by His Spirit — both in this life and in eternity — you will enjoy the recompense for everything you have suffered.
So keep walking the narrow path that leads to life — life in all its fullness and abundance!
3
Healing of Damaged Emotions, Part 2
In this chapter we will look at the steps through which the Holy Spirit leads us in the healing of damaged emotions.
I first became aware of these steps when the Holy Spirit led me through them to healing from the damaged emotions I had suffered from years of abuse in my early life.
I believe they will help you too as you seek to find victory over your emotional problems and restoration of your broken spirit.
Step i: Face the Truth
… If you abide in My word [hold fast to My teachings and live in accordance with them], you are truly My disciples.
And you will know the Truth, and the Truth will set you free. John 8:31,32
If you are to receive emotional healing, one of the first things you must learn to do is face the truth.
You cannot be set free while living in denial. You cannot pretend either that certain negative things did not happen to you, or that you have not been influenced by them or reacted in response to them.
Many times people who have suffered abuse or some other tragedy in their lives try to act as though it never happened.
For example, let's suppose a young girl has an abortion or bears a child out of wedlock and then gives it up for adoption. That traumatic experience can cause her to be emotionally damaged and wounded in later life because she develops opinions and attitudes about herself based on what she did.
In the same way, a person who has suffered through verbal, physical, or sexual abuse can develop a bad self-image under the misguided concept that if she was mistreated, there must have been something wrong with her to bring it on herself or that she must have deserved it.
From my own experience, as well as my years of ministry to others, I have come to realize that we human beings are marvelously adept at building walls and cramming things into dark corners, pretending they never happened.
During the eighteen years of my early life that I spent in an abusive environment, I had to face the fact of what was happening to me while it was actually taking place. But as soon as I got out into the world away from that situation, I acted as though nothing was wrong. I actually lived two separate lives at the same time. I never told anyone what was going on in my private life.
Why don't we want to bring things like that out into the open? We are afraid of what people will think. We are afraid of being rejected, of being misunderstood, of losing the love of those we care about who might have a different opinion of us if they really knew all about us.
It is so wonderful to have Jesus as a friend, because we don't have to hide anything from Him. He already knows everything about us anyway. We can always come to Him and know we will be loved and accepted no matter what we have suffered or how we have reacted to it.
We must remember that God knows everything. The Bible says He even knows the words in our mouth that are yet unuttered. (Ps. 139:1-4.)
One time in the early days of my walk with the Lord, before I learned I could not hide anything from Him, while I was praying I began to ponder whether I should tell Him something I had on my heart.
As I was debating within myself, God spoke to me and said, “Joyce, I already know all about it.”
“Well, then, why do I have to tell You, if You already know?” I asked.
Do you know why we have to tell the Lord what is going on in our hearts and lives? He wants us to get it out in the open! That is part of the healing process.
If you are having problems in your life right now, whatever they may be, face the truth, then acknowledge it to the Lord in prayer. Ask the Holy Spirit to heal you, and He will begin to lead and guide you in the healing process.
Step 2: Confess your Faults
Confess to one another therefore your faults (your slips, your false steps, your offenses, your sins) and pray [also] for one another, that you may be healed and restored [to a spiritual tone of mind and heart]. The earnest (heartfelt, continued) prayer of a righteous man makes tremendous power available [dynamic in its working]. James 5:16
I think there is a place for eventually sharing with someone else that which has occurred in our life. There is something about verbalizing it to another person that does wonders for us.
But use wisdom. Be Spirit-led. Choose someone you know you can trust. Be sure that by sharing your burden with someone else, you do not place it upon that individual's shoulders. Also don't go on a digging expedition, trying to dig up old injuries lon
g buried and forgotten.
For example, if you were abused by your grandfather forty years ago, and now your grandmother is eighty-five years old, don't decide to go to her and tell her what happened way back then. That would not be wise. It might help you to release it — but it would burden her.
It is so important to use wisdom and balance in these matters. If you are going to share your problems with someone, let God show you who to choose as a confidant. Pick a mature believer, someone who is not going to be burdened down or harmed by what you share or use it to hurt you or make you feel worse about yourself.
Many times there is a release that comes to us when we finally tell someone else those things that have been crammed in the background of our lives for years, especially when we discover that the person with whom we share them still loves and accepts us in spite of them.
When I finally worked up the courage to share with someone what had happened to me in my early life, I actually shook violently every time I tried to talk about it. I felt just like I had had a hard chill. It was an emotional reaction to the things I had kept buried within me for so long. I was shaking with fear.
Now when I talk about my past, it is as though I am talking about somebody else's problems. Because I have been healed and restored, my past doesn't bother me anymore. I know I am a new creature in Christ. (2 Cor. 5:17.)
Many times in my meetings, people will come to me to share things that happened to them twenty, thirty, or even forty or fifty years ago. Often they will weep and sob as the horrible truth comes out. I believe many of them get total release when they realize they can talk about these hurtful things and still be accepted.