Amy Boucher Pye

Category: The Living Cross

  • Forgiveness Fridays: Forgiving my abuser; forgiving my accusers

    Today’s post tells the story of heartache and pain, but new life after forgiveness. In the light of all of the current news about abusers and the women who suffer from them, it feels timely. The writer, who asked not to be named, suffered not only at the hands of her husband but by those who believed the lies spread about her. Yet she found freedom in forgiveness.

    When I wanted to be baptised by full immersion, the minister – the most gentle, patient man I had ever come across – touched my back to show me how I would be dipped under the water. I nearly screamed because it involved trusting him completely. I was most upset but he got the ladies of the church to lay on hands and pray for me. I also went back to my Bible and my God and read that He is the greatest Counsellor of them all. I understood that I had to forgive my abusive husband, who had caused so much fear and pain, but initially I was unable to recall the incident that had affected me so much.

    I was baptised in the summer of 1988 and testified that “Perfect Loves drives out fear.” However, by the next summer, my husband threw me out for bringing God home. As I was unable to see my son much and was concerned for his welfare, I started custody proceedings. One evening my husband picked up my son, told him to stay in the car and came into the place where I was staying and nearly strangled me. The year before I had used the name of Jesus to protect me from violence but now I could barely scream.

    Someone heard and interrupted him – he claimed to have stepped on my toe! As the accommodation I had was not secure, I ran across the field to friends. He went directly to the Manse and said “I haven’t done anything!” I was in shock but had a cup of tea and as soon as the memory came back, I prayed, for I wanted to forgive him.

    Over time, I was able with God’s help recall the experiences and feel God walk with me through them, as He reassured me that He was there and in control. I received forgiveness for my own guilt and to forgive in the sense that if my abuser asked God for forgiveness he would be forgiven.

    I learned that the trauma of violence and menacing threats can have a deep effect on the unconscious as well as conscious mind. Fear is a normal human reaction when memories are triggered. Some think that there are two reactions to fear – fight or flight. But there is a third reaction – freeze, like a rabbit caught in car headlights. It means that a person cannot stop the abuse and can be made to feel guilty (e.g. you asked for it). To freeze is to submit to some pain in fear of something worse, which is how I reacted.

     

    Photo: Tim Geers, flickr

    I grew up in a family where my mum was unfaithful all her married life, despising my dad and me as his daughter. After my abusive husband threw me out and I was granted a divorce, I was fourteen years single and celibate. I did not realise that my mum behind my back accused me of some awful things, such as sleeping with every man I spoke to being the least unpleasant. Perhaps it was harder, though, to have to leave the church where I had found faith, for people were nice to my face but later told others I should be thrown out – and I never knew why. Apparently I did not need to be told as I knew what I had done!

    So I left my church and started going to a small country chapel. But I felt rejected for “being divorced”, even though I would not have been divorced if I had not found God. I might have been one of the stats, killed by my husband as he threatened it often and long.

    I continued to go there, and fourteen years after the trauma of leaving my abusive husband, Andrew asked me out. I told him that I was “damaged goods”, but he said that I was a new creation in Christ. I prayed, heard God and said yes to him.

    Three weeks after Andrew had said he wanted to marry me, and the day he bought my engagement ring, he was told by another couple in the chapel that they would not take communion with him because he was marrying a divorced woman (even though the man himself was divorced and remarried). Andrew’s parents too had heard much gossip and told him that he was wrong to marry me. In the face of this opposition, he had to choose to do what he thought God was telling him to do. He chose to obey God and pursue me, even though he would lose the friendship of the only Christian friends he had and the respect of his family. But after three years, we were reconciled to those who had opposed our union, and when Andrew’s father died, his mother said that he was fond of me.

    My church have a policy of not marrying divorced people, so we married in the registry office and the vicar sat in the front row to witness it! We each had to cling to our Lord and our faith, not each other. Later Andrew said he felt like Joseph (in the New Testament) as he doubted when the people he respected all told him he was wrong to marry me. He also felt like Joseph (in the Old Testament) as he felt thrown out and sent away by his family. But in all of this, forgiveness has been the key as we trusted God and found freedom from bitterness.

     

    I had known for years that I did not like anything around my neck. But I found Andrew had the most gentle touch I ever came across. He works with his hands but they are soft – his touch felt like a feather. He wanted to touch my neck, and involuntarily I jumped like I had a shock. It was an unconscious reaction, but he put his strong arms around me and starting talking to God in the same way he spoke to me.

    I had been healed of much but had thought that complete healing would only be in heaven where there is no more sorrow, crying or pain. But Andrew has a deep profound faith and asked our Father God, believing that He wanted me healed now. Not that I didn’t think God was not big enough to deal with this, but I felt somehow I didn’t deserve it. Andrew’s attitude of faith encouraged me to ask Father God also to heal if it was his will for Andrew’s sake as much as my own – it seemed so unfair to him and my reactions made me feel very guilty.

    When he prayed for me, it was not a warm fuzzy feeling but then you must remember this is healing of emotions and teaching the brain to react in a different way. Over about ten days I realised there was a difference as Andrew continued to pray whenever I needed it. Now I like my neck being touched; it gives me pleasure. After all, Satan comes to take the best; to steal and destroy, but God restores and makes all things new! Father God honoured Andrew’s faith and increased my own.

    I have been forgiven much, and I forgave. Forgiveness means leaving the justice issue with God rather than wanting vengeance. By doing this, it made a painful memory into plain history and enabled me to move on.

    My book The Living Cross looks at the theme of forgiveness through daily readings based in the Old Testament and the New. Find out more here.

  • Forgiveness Fridays: No Longer a Caterpillar by Claire Daniel

    I believe today’s contribution to our forgiveness series will resonate with so many people. I can certainly relate to that having a stream of thoughts and accusations running through my mind of things I shouldn’t have said or done. How can we forgive ourselves? Read on…

    Ten years ago, as summer faded into autumn, I experienced a season of overwhelming depression that upended every aspect of my life. It altered my very thoughts and feelings, and made my internal and external world feel utterly shaken. Overcoming this all-consuming illness was a difficult journey, where everything felt uncertain. Hope was hard to find, yet never truly lost.

    I now live daily aware, grateful for the changes that have occurred in me having experienced that season and in so many ways stronger, having been broken and restored. Yet still, at times, I remember. In moments of vulnerability, forgiving my past self is not easy. Unexpected things will trigger off a memory. I am reminded of things I said or did whilst ill and waves of guilt and remorse can still come flooding back into my consciousness. This usually happens when I least expect it and I still struggle to reconcile these memories with the person I am now. I cannot erase them, or forget. If I am absolutely honest, I am still working on how to completely forgive myself.

    I love the beauty and grace of butterflies but they also represent for me a powerful metaphor for the journey we take, in life and faith. Like a caterpillar, we need to go through a process of change, in order to be renewed and transformed. This often means experiencing times that are ‘dark,’ where we need to enter a ‘chrysalis’ season, where change feels slow or even halted entirely and progress seems slow.

    I was recently struck by a verse someone shared with me from Zephaniah. In looking at it in context, we see a book that seems so full of doom, yet is ultimately about a God of redemption. Zephaniah 3:17 says, in the NIV translation, ‘The Lord your God is with you, the Mighty Warrior who saves. He will take great delight in you; in his love he will no longer rebuke you, but will rejoice over you with singing.’ It is interesting that in the Good News translation the phrase ‘new life’ is used rather than the word ‘rebuke.’ God will rebuke you no longer, but gives you a fresh start, a clean slate.

    Yet how often do we still rebuke ourselves? We berate ourselves for our actions, whether consciously or subconsciously. How can we truly say we live in freedom through Christ, yet continue to hold ourselves in contempt for something we said or did in the past? I think this is partly human nature but I also believe that forgiveness is a choice, an action. We can choose to hold on to the guilt that binds us and reproach ourselves or we can surrender it to God and ask him to help us forgive ourselves. We can make a conscious decision to let go of long-held feelings of shame or regret. When we recall our past behaviour we can strive to replace these with a real understanding of the truth – that we are loved by God and he rejoices over us, our past forgiven.

    When we place our hope in God, we can trust that he will keep on transforming us, replacing our disgrace with his grace. There will still be ‘caterpillar’ days or ‘chrysalis’ seasons where we feel we aren’t moving anywhere or we repeat the mistakes of the past. In these times God is still gently honing us, teaching us through the seasons where daily life and faith is a struggle and we feel so very far from becoming the ‘butterfly’ God created us to one day be. Even when we have moved on in our life, there will be vulnerable moments when we feel those feelings afresh. Memories will remain, though with time they will intrude on our thinking less often. It is one thing to know that God forgives us but to truly forgive ourselves can be so very hard to do, to fully embrace the freedom God has for us – no guilt, no shame, our sins forgotten.

    Part of my recovery from that season of my life involved reclaiming hope and believing afresh that I am forgiven and restored. I continue to daily place my trust in God, to refine me. If we have truly changed, like a caterpillar who has entered the chrysalis, the fact is we cannot change back. The echoes of past transgressions can be silenced by choosing to let them go, giving them over to God, when they threaten to darken our present. We can take a stand, refusing to let the memory of the past define us today or prevent us from being the person God is daily transforming us into – perhaps not yet a butterfly but no longer a caterpillar.

    Claire Daniel is author of 80 Creative Prayer Ideas and Prayer Journey into Parenthood and lives in Water Orton, Birmingham, with her husband and their two busy boys. She is passionate about prayer, supporting parents on their journey into parenthood and encouraging others to explore different ways of praying and meeting with God in every season of life. She provides support to groups, churches and organisations seeking to use creative prayer ideas in ministry or develop new ways to pray. She leads workshops on creative prayer and speaks about prayer and the journey of parenthood and faith at conferences, churches, and retreats.
    http://www.clairedaniel.org.uk/
    www.facebook.com/creativeprayer
    www.facebook.com/parenthoodprayerjourney
    Twitter: @Creative_Prayer

  • Forgiveness Fridays: A Teasel in the Wind by Sharon Roberts

    Forgiving ourselves can often be harder than forgiving others. Sharon Roberts shares her story of learning to forgive herself – a journey of forgiveness that she still walks, as I suspect many of us do. I loved learning about teasels, too.

    My story of forgiveness had to start from within. In my journey of forgiveness I’ve had to focus on the relationship between the sins of inheritance and how can God forgive a sinner like me.

    What do I mean by the sins of inheritance? My mum had schizophrenia and bipolar, and because of that, I felt useless. After all, I couldn’t stop her from becoming ill and spending a long period of time in hospital. I felt too that my behaviour was a contributing factor to my mum’s illness, for members of my family said so. I had the ability to push buttons of family members, which would confirm their accusations.

    In infancy, I experienced rejection, and abandonment was a feature of those early years. I always felt like an outsider; one who was a disappointment; the useless human. I have believed it all my life. The root cause is the childhood experiences that had left great chasms of regret and failure. I was the outsider – the attention seeker, the drama queen. I felt I made everyone’s life a misery. To escape that internalised misery became a battle, with my first line of defence being belittling myself, causing myself to be humiliated and to hide the feelings that I long felt in my heart. I learnt to believe what I was hearing and feeling.

    I had searched for forgiveness in my family and community, but realized these earthly relationships were never going to give what my soul required. The forgiveness I required was far more than the accepting of my own personality defects, but that Jesus loved me.

    However, the forgiveness was coming from a male father construct. And for me, the relationship with my own father was volatile and we could – and still can – push emotional buttons. That button has been depressed so frequently that forgiveness is never been fully established. The relationship is damaged.

    To heal my pains, I would rescue emotionally damaged people and put them in a lifeboat, trying to get them to the shore. This is the way I chose to seek personal forgiveness for the actions that had caused so much hurt to others – or at least so I felt.

    But the more this happened, the more the pain increased, especially when the support I offered was rebuked or shunned, with them jumping from the lifeboat and seeking their own way back to land. My feelings of inadequacy returned as self-hatred soared through me like a red-hot poker. I was unable to forgive myself. The pain I saw others in, and my failure to get the desired response, meant I could not forgive myself. My actions became subconsciously narcissistic and added to my internalised guilt, frustration and rejection. Each time a footprint was left on me and it took time to fade, although some are still there and may never change.

    Not understanding forgiveness on a spiritual level, I served myself an unappetising meal of self-regret and hatred and seasoned it with a poison that tainted my palate. The problem with this type of relationship with one’s self is destructive and its ripples can be felt throughout one’s life. You stop looking at the Cross and continue to paddle the lifeboat by yourself.

    Then one day I began to understand – perhaps as an answer to prayer – that these flaws were actually part of a unique picture, the picture was colourful, it was more beautiful than I had ever imagined. It danced like a teasel in the wind.

    Prickly Wild Teasel Dipsacaceae Dipsacus Fullonum

    Now let me explain this analogy. A close friend one day described me as a teasel in the wind. At first, I was bemused by the thought of looking like spikey, undesirable plant, used by the National Trust to keep the public from positioning their bottoms on a famous or delicate chair. Teasels, meant to me keep off something too precious. Then I went online and found the picture of one. This is where the journey of forgiving my hatred of myself began. A friend who had prayed for me planted a teasel seed, via God.

    I started to follow the advice of others. I sought Jesus and stopped and observed a teasel. Its beauty is not instant; you have to sit and observe, to get to know it. Its prickly appearance makes it seem unapproachable, but after a little time, its beauty is apparent. Its purple colouring attracts the attention of bees – creatures also maligned and misunderstood. Bees are not forgiven for protecting themselves, for which they die. They are never remembered for the work they do and the part they play in our beloved life cycle.

    I forgive the bees but can I ever forgive myself for being me? Time tests this regularly, and on a good day I can see the beauty that God forgave me a long time ago. When He sent Jesus to look for the missing sheep, He found me. Scared, broken, fearful I was, and slowly Jesus has helped to bring this teasel into bloom. Sometimes, it doesn’t get as tall or as noticeable as the others. But it tries again and may need to be rescued, re-cultivated.

    It has always been easier to forgive others than it has been to forgive my own mistakes and personality flaws. Not forgiving myself became the norm, and there was, is and will be, days that I just can’t move past these negative feelings.

    When I was a child, I was the sheep that was different, the black sheep. As an adult, I learned that Jesus came for this lost sheep. As a much wiser adult, I truly believed that lost sheep could actually munch on teasels.

    Sharon Roberts has lived with her partner of 30 years, walking their roads together with some of the terrain being more treacherous than others, but making it through. She is the mother of two grown-up sons who are a source of inspiration, and the grandmother to one. She finds that being a grandmother is the reward that just keeps on giving and helps her on the journey to self-forgiveness.

  • Forgiveness Fridays: A Work in Progress

    What about when forgiveness seems impossible? A mountain too high even to contemplate climbing? Today’s contribution comes from an unnamed friend who writes honestly and movingly. She knows that she is a work in progress – and yet she has hope for the way forward.

    Sometimes I wonder why I find it so hard to forgive. Is God picking on me with all the bad and hard stuff? Maybe I exaggerate. I know many people are much worse off than I am; people with nothing, less than nothing, and I should be grateful.

    Let me tell you a bit of my story. My grandmother was killed in Auschwitz, as well as my uncle, and aunt, and a cousin, and there’s another cousin about whom there is a mystery. I feel I shouldn’t complain, for whole families were wiped out that way, and I didn’t experience it myself.

    But also, my mother died by suicide when I was a child. She spoke her last words to me, and they were not kind. My relationship with her was bad, really bad. It took me till my 60s to admit to myself that she was cruel to me. I’ve had to work on forgiving her.

    I admit too that I’ve made some not so clever choices in my life. I rushed into marriage too young, to a non-Christian, and started a family very quickly. Then within that first week of our child’s life I was in a mental hospital with post-natal depression. Becoming a mother, I realise decades later, I flipped. The last thing I wanted was to be a mother as my mother had been towards me.

    Being put into a mental hospital is horrid, I can tell you. I’ve been put in one three times, after which I came to think about myself as someone who is mentally ill. I’ve really struggled with that.

    For 10 or so years I didn’t go to church. Looking back I wonder did God allow that, or even cause it that way. Brokenness is somewhere in the heart of the Gospel, yet my experience is that people even in church find brokenness hard to accept, for they’re uncomfortable with it. They seem to want to fix it. They seem to ask, ‘Why don’t you tow the party line and be healed?’

    People can be very unkind and add to the hurt. Having experienced so much pain, I concluded I must be a bad person who sinned. But it’s God choice who he heals, and when, and in what way. To this day I struggle with depression and still carry the imposed thought, ‘If only you forgave you’d be set free; be healed.’

    I know that perhaps it was not a wise choice to marry a non-Christian. I still hear the question, ‘Were you a Christian when you married him?’ The implications are, ‘You did wrong, you’ve only yourself to blame’. It’s difficult. Though the drive of his life, his motives, are completely different from mine, still I love him and want the best for him. I am told he is my spiritual sand-paper.

    After all, I read, ‘Wives respect your husbands.’ I also read, ‘Do not separate what God has put together.’ Who is to say that my marriage is outside God’s plan? If others don’t know what to say they might do well to remain silent, because now I have even more things to forgive.

    About 2 years ago things went very pear-shaped when everything fell apart around me, like a tsunami in my life. I even questioned God’s existence. I wanted to walk away from God. But I’ve come to know that ‘God’s arm is not too short’, and he cannot let me go. I belong to him.

    It feels like I’m buried under a huge mountain of forgiving I have to deal with. Can I summon up enough faith to move this mountain and believe it will be moved? I just don’t know where to begin, for it feels like a daunting task. I know I should forgive and that God’s grace is sufficient.

    Jesus tells us clearly the consequences if we do not forgive others their sins, and also the results when we do. However, on the cross Jesus gave responsibility of forgiving to his Father, even though quite evidently it was he who was being sinned against.

    Through all of this, I know that God is at work in my life. Even though I still sometimes feel like the unforgiving servant I know there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ. He is working his purpose out, in and through me. God has not finished with me. This is not the end of the story, and that gives me hope.

  • Forgiveness Fridays: Facing Fears after Forgiveness by Lucy Marfleet

    Although we may have forgiven someone who hurt us, we might yet still harbour fears that they, or someone else, may hurt us again in a similar way. Those fears might rule our hearts. Lucy Marfleet shows how she was freed of these types of binding fears. Please read her encouraging story.

    I don’t remember much about learning the piano. I do remember the fear though. It accompanied every lesson, starting in my stomach as I was driven every Saturday morning and reinforced in every scale and arpeggio I had to practise through the week. It played out in my nervous and incapable fingers and it cast shadows through my young mind.

    I hated learning the piano, I remember that much. I was only at primary school, but had been raced through several grades with no option of stopping lessons.

    I don’t think it was the piano itself though.

    It was my piano teacher. He made me desperately uncomfortable. I wanted to please him, but I felt watched, judged, small and incompetent. He came up and sat close to play duets or show me what I was doing wrong, sometimes reaching his arm around me. He drew glasses on my music, ostensibly to draw my attention to places I needed to work at. I saw in the small pencil doodles his eyes watching me, even when I was at home. I didn’t want to look at them.

    When he died a few years after I finally stopped lessons, my mum commented that as a child I had said I loved him. I had forgotten that. Sometimes children say that sort of thing about their teachers. But there had been such mixed feelings about him. I couldn’t understand at eight or nine why I was scared; I felt sharp and flat all at once when I was around him – eager to get his praise, terrified of his presence, his nearness, his criticism.

    And there was a sad edge to the experience. He had died by suicide, with the reason being because the police had found unhealthy pictures of children on his computer. Was he overstepping the mark with me? Hardly – I cannot recollect anything sinister he did or said. But he exerted power over me in ways which terrified me. These days you might bracket it as grooming.

    I was terrified of men for some years after the experience, finding ways to avoid being alone with them, dressing unattractively, wanting to prove myself in my own right. The fears didn’t stop there either. I feared elements associated with the lessons, with the piano teacher, with music and particularly with physical contact. I made mental and emotional blocks and guarded myself against anything which reminded me of failing.

    God didn’t want to leave me there.

    Slowly over the following years, each area of fear was challenged as my trust grew. It started with forgiveness.

    I had to learn my need for forgiveness. That forgiving in practice is so much more hard work than the theory. That there is no quick fix. Forgiveness meant letting go of the grips of fear, even the fears I was gripping on to. God gently and slowly led me through each fear and helped me overcome them.

    I was scared of failure. It took two years of my life working and studying in the world of engineering, culminating in an incredibly bad set of results at university, to show me that I was not cut out for it. I had to retake my exams in order to change subject. I got down to intensive study, passed each module and transferred to a subject which I love: theology. The failure was a step towards a more positive future. Later I failed to get funding to do my masters in biblical studies in a good UK university. This failure too was met by an unexpected opportunity to study in Prague instead. Studying at the International Baptist Theological Seminary has opened up other exciting doors through contacts I’ve made there. I have learned to embrace failure rather than fear it.

    I was scared of men. This was a big fear; perhaps the major one for me. In my mid-twenties I had never had a boyfriend and assumed I never would. Who could I trust? How could I touch them? I shunned physical contact. I opened up to my minister, who prayed with me. Less than a month later, God spoke to me as I sat at a table with a group of other Christians that I was about to meet my husband. It was true; I did. He was even an engineer. Those two years getting inside the mindset of engineers turned out to be worthwhile after all. God brought me a gentle man who was willing to learn to love me well. It took me months to be willing to let him kiss me, but we both realised that God’s timing made perfect sense.

    Telling images – on the left, me in 1996, trying to smile, but trying to hide my body shape. On the right, me in 2011, two kids later and frightened no more!

    I hated music. Despite playing in music groups in churches, I very rarely connected emotionally with it. But God loves music; I’m sure of it. Gradually over time I was able to dissociate myself from feelings of anger or apathy and learn to enjoy it, to even seek it out and learn new things. There are ways music can be used to express things words can’t say alone.

    I hated feeling small, voiceless, insignificant. God’s underlying grace has carried me through so many storms, including many days of deep depression as I yearned for wholeness and significance. When I was weak God strengthened me and gave me purposes in helping others at home and abroad, and moved me from self-damaging thoughts to being able to champion the needs of the voiceless. He has much still to do with me. I am still very much a Work in Progress.

    But my story is that forgiveness has opened up a road to healing and wholeness. This journey God has been taking me on gets better as I understand more of his mercies in action. I have shifted from a minor to a major key emotionally. Now I understand that God is Good, and that Good Things are Going to Happen.

    Lucy writes at www.lucymarfleet.com and www.jamandgiraffes.com. She has degrees in theology from Durham University and the International Baptist Theological Seminary. She is also a trained teacher and has worked in schools and prisons. Her writing stems from a passion for the Old Testament and for those on the edges. Recently she completed a series on interviewing biblical characters for Families First online magazine. She tries to tell the truth in imaginative ways.

  • Forgiveness Fridays: Forgiveness is Freeing by Lynne Cole

    When it comes to forgiveness, everyone is different. I love Lynne’s story for her honesty and how she tells the gradual nature of her becoming free from carrying someone else’s sins, as she puts it so aptly. I continue to be humbled and grateful for the bravery displayed by the contributors to this series, such as Lynne.

    There I was, standing in a spot where his grave might have been, and I’m griping tightly onto an A4 piece of paper. A piece of paper that held the truth of what actually happened to me during four years when I grew up too quickly.

    Looking around, all I see is green grass with very few markings of where graves could be. I expected to see at least a head stone with his name etched into it… something that would make it real. But there was nothing. Only little numbered markers dotted around declaring where each person is buried. With there being no grave stone or a recognisable grave, I concluded that he had no meaning to his life.

    Standing there, I remember clearly when my mother told me, 21 years earlier, that he had passed away. It was four months after he was arrested. He hadn’t even reached the first hearing of his trial.

    My memories of that day are vivid. I was so angry that he had “escaped” his prison sentence, and I felt betrayed because he was now “free”. I also remember feeling relieved. He was dead… and I was glad. I hoped that he had met God at the pearly gates of heaven and that he was sent straight to rot in hell.

    I know, I know and I know. This sounds very unchristian. I am fully aware of that. However, this was how I felt towards the man who had sexually abused me for four years. After all, he took away my childhood.

    I wanted him to suffer so much for the pain and hurt that he caused me. I wanted him to feel the pain that I felt…Not just in those four years, but the years afterwards that I had to endure I as tried to come to terms with what I went through.

    When I stood at the graveside with my mum on one side and my husband on the other, I held on to that piece of paper as though it was part of me. This piece of paper held all the truth of every single detail that he did to me.

    Every. Single. Detail.

    You see, when I was 11 I was too scared and too ashamed to voice what truly happened to me. No-one EVER got the full truth, and that truth had been inside me for 21 years. At the graveside, I finally let it all out… And then I burnt it. In that moment, the spirit of condemnation left my body and I was free.

    Four years later, I look back and I question myself if I have still forgiven my abuser – just in case my time at the grave was a passing moment. The honest answer is yes! I wouldn’t wish what I went through on anyone, but I wouldn’t change what I went through either. I no longer feel shame over what I had endured and I can honestly say, with my hand on my heart, that I have no regrets about my past.

    I am proud of who I am today.

    Forgiving my abuser did not mean what he did to me was right. It also does not mean that I would get my childhood back. Instead, forgiving him meant that I could move forward with my life. I have learnt that unforgiveness keeps us locked in to anger, resentment, bitterness and hurt. It keeps us apart from Jesus.

    I didn’t get to the point of forgiveness lightly and reaching it wasn’t one of these “aha” moments when something clicked into place. Rather it took me 21 years that lead to the moment at his grave, of sorting through a mountain of emotional mess, through counselling and reading various books, to reach the point where I wanted to be free from the chains of unforgiveness. I no longer wanted to carry the burden of someone else’s sin.

    Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you. (Ephesians 4:32)

    I believe that forgiveness is necessary in order to move forward, but it can only be done when you are ready to do so. No-one should be forced to forgive someone else if they are not ready. It doesn’t matter how long it takes either… 2 years or 21 years… but when it happens? Forgiveness is freeing.

    Lynne Cole is a full-time working, married mother to 3 gorgeous children…two girls (aged 8 and 7) and a little man (aged 5). She blogs in the free time that she has, which is very little! She believes that a broken past does not mean a broken future and that we are all beautiful despite what we have been through. Her desire is that she is able to give people a little encouragement and hope through what she writes. She writes from the heart, honestly, about anything… things that have happened in the past, what she is going through right now and what she hopes for the future.

    Come visit her at:
    Blog: www.beautifullybroke.org
    Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/beautifullybroke.org/
    Instagram: lynne.cole

     

     

  • Forgiveness Fridays: The Sacrifice and Rewards of Forgiveness by Maureen Chapman

    Childhood wounds can be devastating, as we see in Maureen Chapman’s story. But we don’t have to be defined by them, as she shows.

    I have spent most of my 7 decades of life learning about forgiveness. I was born on the morning of the first day of World War 2 in North London, England. My mother, who was pregnant with me and had to get married to my father, was terrified and angry. She wanted to have me adopted but changed her mind.

    When, at the late age of 37, I was pregnant for the first time, I broke a long silence, maintained by her, to inform her by phone that she was to become a grandmother. She was cold, told me I was too old and that anyway, lots of women had babies every day, so what? A few weeks later I miscarried.

    Photo: Ross Griff, flickr

    I hated her. I am a Christian, and knew the Lord’s Prayer about forgiving and receiving forgiveness from God, but I was bitter, angry and hated her. It didn’t take me too long to discover that my relationships were being soured by these negative reactions.

    Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love. (Colossians 3 v13)

    I knew I had to forgive, but I did not want to be exposed to any more malice. Reluctantly, I handed my hate and unforgiving attitude to God.

    Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger…… Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other just as in Christ, God forgave us. (Ephesians 4 v 31)

    There is always a price to pay for forgiveness. Jesus paid the price for us on the cross.

    The relationship with my mother never improved, but I learnt to understand something of her nature. Her own mother died when she was 9 months old. Her father had been gassed in World War 1, suffering poor health and widowed with eight young children to care for. She was brought up by her eldest sister and a succession of housekeepers.

    Having never received love, she was neither able to give love nor receive it. Moreover, after my birth she had suffered a severe postnatal depression, complicated by shingles. She struggled to care for a young baby, not least through the London Blitz and the later bombing raids. She had no emotional support from anyone except my father. He was very deaf, not accepted by any of the armed forces, so worked in a bomb factory by day, and fire watching in the City of London by night.

    My own bitterness and unforgiving attitude had blinded me to her needs. I was demanding love when she had none to give. In turn, she tried to make me her scapegoat to atone for her sins.

    God found a way to forgive us all by sacrificing His own son Jesus to take away our sins. He took this enormous step because He loves us.

    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. (1 John 4 v 9)

    We obey Him by extending that loving forgiveness to those who hurt us. The rewards are joy and peace. We live in harmony.

    When I visited my mother just before her death, although she refused to speak to me, except for three short sentences, I was able to pray that God would show her mercy, for He had made her and knew her better I did.

    Since my mother’s death, my husband and I are at last reunited with members of my family. It’s not been easy, unravelling the many lies, misconceptions and misunderstandings that divided us. It is happening and brings joy to all.

    Forgiveness is the very heart of the gospel and love the very heart of God.

    Maureen Chapman, born into a deaf family, is a retired nurse/midwife, missionary to Nepal, hotelier and mini-market owner. She is owned by a bossy Border collie called Honey and loves gardening, walking, meeting people as well as writing, especially for children. She is learning to blog at maureenmusing.wordpress.com

  • Forgiveness Fridays: If we had just one day… by Debbie Duncan

    Debbie Duncan asks some searching questions, all brought to her mind when her daughter spotted a dragonfly over the water. What would you do if you had just one day to live?

    Recently on one of our recent hot, summery days we decided to escape the heat of the house and head to a place by water.[1] As we walked by the river we stopped and saw a colourful shimmering dragonfly. My daughter said, “Adult dragonflies only live one day. What would you do if you just had one day”?

    Her question got me thinking. What would you do if you had just one day? Most of us would you want to tell our nearest and dearest that we love them. What else would you do? I think we would want to know we are forgiven and we’d want to forgive others.

    The famous French sceptic and key thinker of the enlightenment age, Francois-Marie Arouet (aka Voltaire) was a deist. He did not believe in the Bible or that we have a God who intervened in the world. In contrast, his view of God was one of a distant figure.

    Voltaire died a terrible death. His nurse is said to have said of him: “For all the money in Europe I wouldn’t want to see another unbeliever die! All night long he cried for forgiveness.”

    Thankfully I know the forgiveness that God can bring. I asked Jesus to be at the centre of my life quite a few years ago now – 34 years recently! I know however that I am not as loving and forgiving as I should be. When Peter asked Jesus how many times should he forgive his brother or sister Jesus answered, “seventy times seven” (Matthew 6:21-35). Perhaps he was reminding the Jewish people of the 490 years they spent in captivity, in slavery. We are reminded that even during the most difficult of times we need to forgive. He wasn’t tell us to forgive 490 times but reminding us there is no end to forgiveness after all; He gave His life so we can know God’s forgiveness. It is really a challenge to forgive and not allow bitterness take hold.

    Edith Louisa Cavell was a Christian and a nurse who is celebrated for saving the lives of soldiers on both sides during the First World War. She is also known for helping 200 soldiers escape German-occupied Belgian. She was arrested for helping soldiers escape and charged with treason and sentenced to death. Despite international pressure she was brought before a German firing squad in 1915 as a spy. Her last words are said to be, “Patriotism is not enough. I must have no hatred or bitterness towards anyone.” Her Christian beliefs led her to help those who needed it – German or British and even her firing squad.

    I don’t want you to think I have a fascination with death! The challenge is to live each day as if it is your last, living as Jesus would live. Loving and forgiving others – even facing a firing squad or a painful death, even forgiving the thief beside you on a cross.

    Debbie Duncan is a senior lecturer in nursing, a church leader and minister’s wife. She is married to Malcolm and is mother to their four grown-up children. She is author of over 40 professional articles, is writing her second textbook and is co-author to Life Lines with Cathy Le Feuvre. Her first solo book The art of daily resilience was published by Lion Monarch in February and she is currently writing her next book. Connect with her at twitter: @dduncan42; her website: debbielduncan.wordpress.com and via email: debbielduncan@yahoo.co.uk.

    [1] We ended up walking along the Thames river at Runnymede which is a beautiful and historical site where the Magna Carta was sealed in 1215.

  • Forgiveness Fridays: Choosing Forgiveness

    What role can pride take in keeping us in a prison of unforgiveness? A friend who wished to remain unnamed shares vulnerably of how God encouraged her to escape this prison by choosing to forgive one close to her.

    When I was in my mid-teens, my dad left my mum for another woman. I was devastated for my mum and myself.

    The timing of my dad’s departure felt callous and calculating. He chose a time over the Christmas holidays when I was away at a friend’s house, and also after the recent death of my grandad (my mum’s dad) whom my mum was very close to, being an only child. I was angry with the lies my dad had told us about working late at work when really he was out with his girlfriend. As this happened when I was 14; this was already a time of huge emotional turmoil for me.

    Over the years, my anger towards my dad over these painful events has exploded with huge vitriol at times, but, over the past two decades or so, God has brought powerful forgiveness and healing to our relationship. After about 5 years after my dad left, I started to hear God challenge me about my hatred and negative attitude towards Dad’s girlfriend. In my pain I had refused to have any contact with her. I think God spoke to me through a sermon about Holy Communion and making peace with those we have fallen out with. God asked me to love this woman with His love and not allow the pain of past hurts to block any chance of relationship with her.

    I had to choose to lay down my angry and judgmental opinions of this lady I had avoided meeting and choose the more humble way. Being able to forgive her for stealing my dad from our family and causing us immense pain and loss started a new chapter in my relationship with her. I was being treated for depression at the time, which the professionals believed to be triggered partly by the separation of my parents.

    Choosing to forgive didn’t mean I was instantly healed, nor that my relationship with my dad was repaired miraculously right then. Somehow God enabled me to move through my place of pain and show grace to C* where I’d previously only known hatred and resentment. Maybe I didn’t realise it straight away, but I had started on the path to freedom from my dark past which was negatively impacting my health in the present. In 1 Corinthians 4:3-5, Paul makes the point that he’s not in a position to judge others or himself; only God is able to judge our actions and he also says that he is the greatest of all sinners (1 Timothy 1:15), despite being considered one of the world’s most influential leaders in history.

    The mistake I had made was to sit as judge over my dad and C’s choice to break off his marriage to my mum, despite the immense damage and upset my family and I had endured as a consequence. I let pride get in the way of humility until I was able to admit my own sins and allow God to forgive me for my pride, anger, bitterness and resentment towards Dad and his girlfriend. Rather than finding my identity in those negative feelings and hurts and letting the depression and pain define me, I had to surrender to God’s love and mercy for Dad and C, and in that be better able to receive God’s unconditional love, acceptance and new identity as His beloved.

    In choosing forgiveness I’ve had to be courageous enough to revisit my feelings and thoughts about my dad’s leaving has affected me; I’ve had to tell him of the impact of his actions and release these to God to at the foot of the cross, firmly believing that “He has removed our sins as far from us as the east is from the west” (Psalm 103:12, NLT). Rather than beating myself up further about my mistakes, which I make from time to time, I have to choose to trust that “there is no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1, NIV) and remember that “He does not punish us for all our sins; He does not deal harshly with us, as we deserve. For His unfailing love toward those who fear him is as great as the height of the heavens above the earth” (Psalm 103:10-11).

    High cross at Ffald-y-Brenin, Pembrokeshire, Wales.
    Photo: the High Cross, Ffald-y-Brenin, Wales. Source: high-cross.jpg/Clickasnap

    I find comfort in this photo of the High Cross at Ffald-y-Brenin, for it’s a visual reminder to us all of what Jesus did for us at the cross, taking our sins and wounds on his shoulders, and casting them as far as possible away from us.

    Even as I write this blog, I am wrestling with these issues of forgiveness for others who have deeply hurt me. God continues to show me where my anger is getting in the way of forgiveness, healing and a deeper sense of His love for those who have grieved me and myself. Thankfully, God’s grace is a constant source of comfort, despite my personal weaknesses and I know I’ll work through it with God’s help.

    Is there someone in your life you need to forgive? Take a moment to quieten your heart before God and listen to what He says.

    *C Dad’s girlfriend, named to maintain her anonymity.

  • Forgiveness Fridays: When actions speak louder than words by Carol Bostock

    We might hear of some grand acts of forgiveness – parents forgiving their child’s murderer, for instance – and think that our small acts don’t measure up. But daily life seems to be filled with the small stuff. Can we extend forgiveness in the daily, and if so, how? I love Carol Bostock’s story for all of its rootedness in the ordinary – even to the level of the sticky, congealed chocolate.

    It was the day after my mother’s funeral. We had buried her in a woodland burial site after three traumatic months in intensive care following a failed liver transplant. It was very small group at the burial site and I had led the service.

    A number of family members were staying in my father’s house for another couple of days. Everyone was tired, emotionally worn out, stressed, not quite knowing what a future without my mother looked like – what it would mean for my father, what it would mean for us all.

    It was after lunch and my father had gone to lie down. We were all in that strange state of being in someone’s else’s home, not liking just to sit about talking and laughing as if it were ‘life as normal’ but looking for things to do that felt vaguely useful or helpful.

    I can truthfully say that I no longer remember the start of the argument, what was said by whom. But suddenly, another family member and I were having a row. Tempers flared very suddenly. Flash points were hit. Harsh and unkind words were said. We both stalked off, seething.

    I didn’t even have a place to go to and be mad. It was not my house and there were people, it seemed, in every room. Angry and frustrated I went into the garage. I kicked a box, very hard twice, replayed the row in my head over and over, thought of all the cutting, clever things I wished I had said. I was too full of anger and resentment to see how badly I had behaved.

    Then, sudden and unexpected, came that unmistakeable heavy presence of the Lord.

    “So now I suppose You want me to forgive him,” I said ungraciously and kicked the box again, even harder.

    Very, very clearly, He answered. “Actually, I want you to clean out his car,” He said.

    I stood for ten minutes or so in the dim garage, struggling. Then I went and got cloths, water, vacuum cleaner, cleaning products, polish, and a rubbish sack and set to. He owned a number of pets, all of which seemed to have shed hair and fur liberally over the car. A packet of chocolate somethings had melted into a gooey, congealed mess in one of the side pockets. The boot compartment was full of mud. It took me the best part of three hours to clean.

    I don’t think I ever formally said to the Lord, “I forgive him and please will you forgive me”; neither did I ever formally ask the family member to forgive me. But I know that on that Saturday afternoon I was forgiven by Jesus for my wrong heart attitude, and I think that at that time and in that place for my family member, actions spoke louder than any words could have done.

    ♥♥♥ 

    But when he was still a great way off, his father saw him and had compassion, and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him. Luke 15:20

    When the Prodigal went home to his Father’s house, he never got the chance to say all of his carefully preplanned apology because the Father ran, fell on his neck and kissed him. The Father just wanted to get to the hugging and the kissing…

    ♥♥♥

    Working full time at Beauty From Ashes, a Christian inner healing ministry, as a Prayer Minister, Conference Speaker and Retreat Leader, Carol Bostock is walking an unknown path since her husband of 38 years is in the last stages of cancer. Read more at Setting Up Signposts and receive updates at their Facebook page. You can also find out more about Beauty from Ashes, and contact Carol at carol@beautyfromashes.co.uk.