Healing The Wounds
Now, it's a simple fact of life that we cannot give something we don't have.
Although you may begin to see the weight or your life upon your son or daughter, at the same time you may sense a lingering doubt or fear or sense of failure inside. Because you, too, had a question growing up. You were once a boy and a young man, wondering if you had what it takes. How did your dad answer your question? What was his message to you, about you, as a man? Whether you are aware of it or not, that answer has shaped you into the man you are today.
But the fact remains--most fathers find it hard to validate their children, because they have a wound in their soul.
Now, this booklet is about how to love your sons and daughters. I want to help you offer what they need from you. But to love them well, to fight for their hearts, you have to first get your heart back.
When the Bible tells us that Christ came to "redeem mankind," it means a whole lot more than forgiveness. Simply forgiving a broken man is like telling someone running a marathon, "It's okay that you've broken your leg. I won't hold that against you. Now...finish the race." That is cruel to leave him wounded in that way. No, there is much more to salvation. The core of Christ's mission was foretold in Isaiah 61:
The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me, because the LORD has anointed me to
preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to
proclaim freedom for the captives and release for the prisoners. (v.1)
The Messiah will come, he said, to bind up and heal, to release and set free. What? Your heart. Christ comes to restore and release you. This is the central passage about Jesus in the entire Bible, the one he chose to quote about himself when he stepped into the spotlight and announced his arrival (Luke 4) This is what makes Christianity such really good news. God can, and wants to, heal your heart.
How can you first find the healing of your wounded heart? It begins with surrender. You might remember a famous passage of Scripture that goes like this:
I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in. (Rev. 3:20)
It is Jesus who is speaking, and the door he refers to is the heart. He asks your permission to come in. How simple...yet how life-changing. You simply invite Jesus into your wound; you ask him to come and meet you there, to enter into the broken and unhealed places of your heart. That is the first step--to take him at his word and invite Christ in, give him permission to heal all the broken places within you. Ask him to release you from all bondage and captivity, as he promised to do.
Next, you may find that you need to grieve. The wounds you received were not your fault, and they mattered. Oh, what a milestone day it was for me when I allowed myself to say that the loss of my father mattered. The tears that flowed were the first I'd ever granted my wound, and they were deeply healing. All those years of sucking it up melted away in my grief. It is so important for each of us to grieve our wound; it is the only honest thing to do. For in grieving we admit the truth--we were hurt by someone we loved, we lost something very dear, and it hurt us very much. Tears are healing. They help to open and cleanse the wound.
Then, you let God love you; you let him get real close to you. I know it seems painfully obvious, but I'm telling you, few men are ever so vulnerable as to simply let themselves be loved by God.
I once asked a friend, "Brad, why don't you just let God love you?"
He squirmed in his chair. "I have such a hard time with that, just being loved. If feels so naked. I'd rather be in control." Later he wrote me this:
After it all came crashing down, I was overwhelmed by sadness and grief. The pain is incredible. In the midst of that God asked me, "Brad, will you let me love you?" I know what he is asking. I feel anxious that I need to go e-mail all these schools and secure a future. But I'm tired of running away. I want to come home. I flipped through my Bible and came to John 15, "Just as the Father has loved you, I have also loved you; abide in my love." The battle is very intense. At times it is all clear. At others it is a fog. Right now all I can do is cling to Jesus as best I know how and not run from all that is in my heart.
Abiding in the love of God is our only hope, the only true home for our hearts. It's not that we mentally acknowledge that God loves us. It's that we let our hearts come home to him and stay in his love. This is what another man said to me after he opened the door of his heart to Christ:
My father never left; he just never had time for me or words of encouragement. He has spent his entire life making himself the center of attention. For the first time I understand why I am highly driven, why I never let anyone get close to me--including my wife--and why I am an impostor to most people. I broke down and cried. I feel the presence of God in my heart like I have never felt him before...the beginning of a new heart.
And, next, you must forgive your father. Paul warned us that unforgiveness and bitterness can wreck our lives and the lives of others (Eph. 4:31; Heb. 12:15). I am sorry to think of all the years my wife endured the anger and bitterness that I redirected at her from my father. As someone has said, forgiveness is setting a prisoner free and then discovering the prisoner was you.
You must understand that forgiveness is a choice. It is not a feeling, but an act of the will. Neil Anderson has written, "Don't wait to forgive until you feel like forgiving; you will never get there. Feelings take time to heal after the choice to forgive is made." You allow God to bring the hurt up from your past, for "if your forgiveness doesn't visit the emotional core of your life, it will be incomplete." You acknowledge that it hurt, that it mattered and choose to extend forgiveness to your father. This is not saying, "I probably deserved part of it anyway." Forgiveness says, "It was wrong, it mattered, and I released you."
The last step is to ask God to father you and to tell you what he thinks of you.
You see, no matter how old you are, no matter how much you have (or have or not) achieved, you still have a Question. Do you have what it takes? The only one who can really settle that for you is God. You must ask God. And you must stay with The Question until you get and answer. How will it be possible to validate your son and daughter when you are walking around with a huge question mark on your chest? Or worse, a gaping wound that screams, "Failure; Worthless; Crybaby!"
Oh, what wonderful stories I could tell you of how many times God has spoken to me and to other men since we've been asking The Question. My friend Aaron went to a park near our home and found a place of solitude. There he waited for the Father's voice. What he first heard was this: "True masculinity is spiritual." Aaron has for so long felt that spirituality was feminine; it put him in a terrible bind because he is a very spiritual man and yet longs to be a real man."
Remember, Scripture promises that the Father's voice is never condemning: "There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus" (Rom. 8:1). Whatever he has to say to you, it will not involve reproach or rejection in any way. We are forgiven. God has given each of us a new heart (Ezek. 36:26; Luke 8:15; Rom. 2:29). That is what is true. Period. From that place we ask God to speak personally to us, to break the power of the lie that was delivered with the wound.
This is a small portion from the booklet "You Have What It Takes" by John Eldredge
John Eldredge states it comes from his book "Wild at Heart"
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