how to heal.

  Hi there! 

I've been wanting to do this for quite a while: to start a new blog that wasn't tied to a location or vocation or season of life. Because those things can and will change, and we can't build our identity on them, right?

As I've thought about what to call this new blog, the name "Parallels and Plot Twists" keep coming to my heart and mind. If you've been keeping up with my writing up until this point, you've probably noticed how much I love a good spiritual parallel. God gives us so many tangible, experiential analogies to help us understand more of who He is and how He is at work in the world. And He is the ultimate Author and best Storyteller--the master of a good plot twist (as is certainly evidenced by all the unexpected, unplanned aspects of my own story!).

But how did we get here? For over a decade now (how??) I've had a blog called "Love From Rome" (because I initially started it as a way for people to keep up with me during two years in Italy). Then I kept writing after returning to the U.S., through seasons of getting a master's degree in counseling, meeting my husband, having babies, and moving back overseas. (For all those stories and more, visit http://lovefromrome.blogspot.com)

My last post on that blog was two years ago (that, too, is crazy to me), when my family and I were still overseas. I wrote it in the middle of what has probably been the darkest and most challenging time of my life--a season I was asking more questions about the nature of suffering and the goodness and trustworthiness of God than I ever have before.

So, though it's hard to sum up a few years in a few sentences (especially if you don't know the backstory), here's my best effort (to quote The Princess Bride, "Let me explain...no, there is too much; let me sum up"): We were serving with a missions organization for what we thought would be the rest of our careers. We were in the Netherlands, where my husband and children are citizens. We loved our Dutch church and our friends and neighbors. We moved there when our first child was 6 months old and had our second baby over there. And we moved back to the U.S. when our second child was 6 months old. We didn't finish our first term. The decision to leave (and all the conflict and hurt that led to that decision) were gut-wrenching. 

[And see, here's what's kept me from writing this for the past year: not knowing how much is appropriate to share publicly about our reasons for walking away. I'm still not completely ready, though I hope to write more about the specific issues someday, because I believe they are important and I've learned over the past year that our experience (unfortunately) is not unique. So, for now, this may be more of a read-between-the-lines kind of thing for our personal story (though, let's get coffee--I'm happy to share it) with the hope that this post about healing could be applicable and helpful to more people because it's a bit more general.]

So, we've been back in the U.S. exactly a year now (yeah, lot's of complicated feelings about that). And God has been so gracious to teach us so much about healing and has been walking with us in this long journey of restoration. He has been extravagantly gracious in providing what I was praying for when we made the decision to leave without having another job lined up/without know where we were moving to: "A safe place to land" with the sweetest community to heal and grow in. So, here are a few things He's been teaching me along the way:

1. It's not about the trial.

I wrote early on in our reentry process: "There's a battle going on that's bigger than our circumstances, and the endurance the Bible is talking about is about the strength of your faith and the fate of your soul, not about your faithfulness to any organization or entity or even commitment (other than to the Lord). And enduring in your faith is infinitely more important that just 'not quitting' something." Philippians 3:14 says "I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus" (Or, in the NLT, "I press on to reach the end of the race and receive the heavenly prize for which God, through Christ Jesus, is calling us"). Ultimately, our never-ending, more-joyous-than-we-could-possibly-ask-or-imagine relationship with Jesus (that one day will be face-to-face in a place more blissful and perfect and pleasurable than our finite minds could ever dream up) is the prize. This "race" we're running is not about all we can accomplish along the way. It's not about "success" or "failure" in our form or agility or athleticism or anything else we think might make us impressive (or not). It's not about what other people think of us. It's about if, when we reach our last breath, we can say "I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith." (2 Tim. 4:7). 

2. Sometimes you have to go something really hard to really heal.

As we were making that final, excruciatingly hard decision to leave, God encouraged me with 1 Corinthians 10:13: "No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it." So, building on our first point, if what God is really concerned with is whether or not I ultimately cling to Him or choose to walk away from Him, if a certain relationship or authority structure is toxic to the point of seeming to poison my very soul in some way, THAT is the thing or person or organization it is good and right to walk away from (and true endurance is choosing not to walk away from God Himself in the midst of it--which can be extra challenging if the person or organization who caused harm was a representative of God in some way). Contrary to popular (Christian) belief/teaching, there are times it is appropriate and right and good to walk away. I went to a parenting conference this past weekend where the speaker said that we should be saying something like this to our kids "If an adult or any person is telling you to do something that is not good and right, you do not have to obey that person, and we will support you." Sometimes there even has to be a severing, if that is a pattern that is ongoing, if it is causing continual harm, and if it is causing interference in your relationship with or obedience to the Lord. To lean into our first parallel here: God gave me the physical experience of healing from shoulder surgery over the past year to reflect my internal journey of spiritual/mental/emotional healing. So, in the same way, sometimes we need to go "under the knife"--enduring the pain and severing and stitching and weakness and painstaking process of healing to get to a better, stronger place. [Side note: This is not a blanket statement. The answer is not always to leave/sever any more than the answer is always to stay. This, like so many other things, is a wisdom and discernment issue. I'm just saying not to wait to have your proverbial surgery until your metaphorical shoulder is falling out of the socket at certain angles.]

3. Healing is not predictable or linear or perfect (in this life), but it is important and worthwhile work. 

Healing takes time. And let's face it: We're not patient people. We've got things to do. A life to get on with. After shoulder surgery, I was so frustrated by how long it took me to get back to "normal" (so much longer than my husband, who had had a similar surgery the year before). I couldn't pick up my babies or drive for a while. I had to depend on others to help me take care of my kids and take me places and even help us move into a new house (because yes, we were still in the middle of so much transition). And then, after overcompensating and doing all the heavy lifting with my left arm for several months, I strained something and actually have more pain on that side now. So what did I learn from all this? 1. Healing takes time and I can't rush it and 2. I can't heal myself on my own (in this analogy, I needed the orthopedic surgeon, the physical therapist, the people around me, and, most importantly, the ultimate Healer). And I'll likely always struggle with the neck and shoulder issues that I have/they'll always be something I have to work to manage. It's similar with my emotional/spiritual healing: I still get triggered, especially by authority figures or when boundaries or my own personal limits aren't recognized or respected, and it's a reminder that what we went through is part of our story now. It doesn't define us, but it's changed us in certain ways. We will likely always always struggle in certain ways that we will have to work (with the gracious help and power of the Holy Spirit within us) to manage. Praise God that that reality does not extend beyond this life (I heard someone say once that "this life is the closest to hell we will ever get as believers, but also the closest to heaven for those who don't know the Lord." Let that sink in). For those whom God has adopted as his beloved children, we can echo the song "There is a King" in saying, "It won't be long, we will behold Him. And every tear, He'll wipe away. We'll be at home, the war will be over. Soon we will meet our Savior face to face."

There's so much more I could say, and so much more I hope to say someday about similar/related topics. But for now, this feels like a good stopping point. I hope this encourages you, whatever it is you're healing from and wherever you are on your healing journey. God sees you (Genesis 16:13), God loves you (the whole Bible, really), and God and your brothers and sisters in the faith are pulling for you and pulling with you until you cross the finish line in this long-distance, obstacle course, endurance race called life.