As I take the time to wait for my friend to catch her breath during our Made to Crave study, I too hit the pause button. I haven’t continued on but I have kept up with the healthier choices made so far. The exercises, healthier portions and drinking more water are going well and the choice to do so doesn’t seem like such a sacrifice these days. But it hasn’t been easy. I decided that I would use this pause to deal with my black hole…figure it out and put it to rest.

Scratch that.

No, Jesus decided that He would deal with my black hole. Honestly, I could go on ignoring it and pretend it doesn not exist. He exposed it to me in His loving, sanctifying way and the next step is up to me. I can keep my black hole and the sin it represents or I can surrender it to the Redeeming One. But in order to surrender this wound I have to repent and in order to repent I must know and acknowledge my own wrong. Can you tell I’ve spent the last two weeks in Job?

I believe this journey over the past couple of weeks is why the Spirit has urged me to do this study. And it has been a hard few weeks. Spiritually the last four weeks have been tough. Walking away from my beloved church family was and still is very painful. The lessons I am learning from that break are hard but also beneficial. The lessons are a part of my surrendering the black hole to my Redeemer and are part of a promise He made to me several years ago.

His Promise

I grew up abused and that really messes a girl up. My worldview is messed up. My way of relating to others is messed up. My attempts at understanding that I am messed up is …messed up. I truly have no concept of “normal”. I hadn’t even begun to deal with any of this until I found myself pregnant with my first child. By the end of that pregnancy I was terrified. I knew all about how not to raise a child but very little about how to raise a child in a healthy and happy home. I had heard all the stories about how those who are abused will abuse their own children and that scared me. Really scared me. I did not want to pass this generational sin to my son. In my desperation I got bold with God. I remember praying and telling Him that if He truly loved me He would remove this instinct to abuse from me. If He wanted me to raise this child for His glory He would have to cure me. And He did!! I knew it instantly and this is the best I can explain the experience.

And in that healing my Heavenly Father said I love you. He took a part of my black hole away that day. He will take it all away if allowed. He is an amazing God and some days I really do not understand why He bothers with humanity…especially me.

I tell my children that I love them everyday. I have no memory of my father saying those words to me. In that statement is the origin of my black hole.

 I have “daddy issues”. It looks really funny on the screen and I feel kinda silly admitting something so obvious. I thought that I had dealt with this stuff in the past. But that is my problem. I “dealt” with it by buying the lie my father told me and then letting it fester into a black hole that will eventually kill me. My father does not love me and that is a harsh wound for a little girl to bear. I thank God everyday for my husband who does love his children. Inside of me is a broken-hearted little girl who wants to be loved by and to return love to her father. I can look back over my life and see the consequences of this pain. I made many bad decisions. I even did good things but with incorrect motivations.

I repent

I am free

Bye, bye black hole.