Regular, morning or maybe not so regular, I decided to watch The Faith Channel, a Christian Channel on Dstv and after Creflor Dollar came Joyce Meyer and she talked about how she had been abused as a child, abused by her dad. This information alone is heart wrenching. Imagine yourself being afraid of the one man in the whole world that should represent security to you.
She talked about a time when her dad abused her in his car. A police man stopped by and was going to arrest them and she thought, finally someone would save me. Only for her dad to return to the car to tell her that he lied to the police man that she was his cousin and the police man said the only way he would let them go is if he could have sex with her too and her father agreed! Take a minute to take that in. As If it isn't bad enough that a father is having sex with his daughter, he is okay with another man sleeping with her to get freedom for his own sin. She even talked of a time when he took her to a grave side to abuse her, have sex with her. Till this day she doesn't like it when a clenched fist seems to be drawing close to her face.
................But the grace of God! It's able to take us from the lows of lows and set us high up above with kings. With all of the abuse she went through she could have become ruined, drenched in her past, but God helped her to rise above all of it and put her on a pedestal where she could positively influence many people, possibly for generations to come.
Your past is what it is. Your PAST! It doesn't have to define your future. The word and grace of God is available to helps us! Joyce Meyer went on to forgive her dad and the test of that forgiveness came when God asked her to move her parents closer to where she lived. She wrestled with that instruction for a while, wondering why she should do that for people who basically inflicted pain on her. Eventually though she yielded, she obeyed God and brought them closer. Before her dad died he apologised to her, even telling Joyce Meyer's husband that he was a good and gracious man, because he had never tried to hurt him for all the bad things he did to Joyce. He knew many men wouldn't have been able to stand him. He did give his life to Christ before he died and was a good old man in his last years.
Yes God forgives.
Romans 10:13 For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.
God loves us ALL! Let this also be a reminder to you that forgiveness is not just a gift from you to the offender, don't always view it as a favour from you to the offender, see it also as a gift to yourself. To forgive means to also release yourself from the hurt, from the guilt, from the pain, from the shame.
....And Joyce talked about how she had asked herself before why all this was allowed to happen to her and at a point God stopped her in her tracks and told her to stop asking. Often our experiences bad and good can be leverages to our success if we would only look at them that way. Sometimes we go through a thing so that we can better understand people and help them grow out of their own struggles. And so out of the depth of her abuse she rose up to become a solution giver and helper to many people today by the grace of God.
God chooses whoever He will.
1 Corinthians 1:25 Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men.
1:26 For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called:
1:27 But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty;
1:28 And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are:
1:29 That no flesh should glory in his presence.
Don't ever discredit yourself or anyone for that matter.
Just avail yourself.
X0X0
Faith.A.A
Really touching. Its amazing to know how God can give our lives a meaning despite the happenings of the past.
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