True Healing

**After a long conversation with a new friend, I have felt the desire to share some of the things we opened up to each other about. So after getting her permission to do so, this post was created.

This week I got a chance to talk to a new friend, who had attended the conference, this past weekend. The conversation soon turned to this, “So what about those of us who God doesn’t love—or people like me who don’t even believe there is a God . . . anymore—how are we supposed to heal. You guys stood on the stage telling everyone how your faith in Him got you through, I am calling bull shit. He has his favorites . . . and I am not one of them. So how am I supposed to make it through this hell? How are the rest of us—the forgotten ones—supposed to heal?”

Her words caught me off guard. I had never thought that maybe God had favorites—and I can promise her, looking back on my life I would never consider myself one of them if He did. I didn’t even know how to respond. I asked for clarification, “ So tell me again what you are asking? You don’t believe in God . . . but you are afraid you are not one of His favorites?”

She responded with a stern voice, “Ya. If He loved me, I wouldn’t be here right now. He would have made things right by now. I wouldn’t be ten years down the road still fighting to make it every day. So how do I heal, without Him?”

I took a deep breath, and with a love for my new friend and my faith in our Father responded, “You don’t. We all want an easy answer, and can’t look past needing to know all the whys. There is no easy fix for the messes we find ourselves in. There isn’t always an answer to the why’s that we ask over and over . . . but that God you don’t believe in—but are dying to know that He still believes in you—He is the answer. You need Him. You need His Son. You need grace, and love . . . but first you have to remember your faith. He loves you. He loves me, and the best part is . . . He has the capacity to love us all. You are a parent, you know that your heart is big enough to love each of them, hurt for each of them, but genuinely work to protect each one of them. He feels that way about you. No matter how many days you spend mad at a Being you say does not exist . . . He is spending those same days loving you right where you are. So, you ask me how you can heal without Him. I want you to know—deep in my soul, I know—you cannot.”

It was very silent; when my friend finally spoke I had begun to think I might have lost her with my sincere honesty. The next few minutes she talked about a Being—her Creator—that was greater than us all. She shared her journey with me. It was full of trauma, pain, abuse, neglect, and death. Her life story—full of darkness and secrets and pain—and she shared with  me her journey to believe that she had always been—and always would be—forgotten.

We talked for some time and shared our hearts with each other.

Today I got a message that my new friend had said her first prayer in 10 years. “And I felt His love for me.”

She was willing to let me share this story with you guys, and she wants you to know . . . God is there. He is real. We need His Son, and with His grace we have the power to heal even the darkest of moments in our lives.  You are one of His favorites, not because of anything you have done, or haven’t done . . . but because of who you are and who you were created to be. His child. A child of God.





My favorite talk on this subject. His grace is sufficient by Brad Wilcox.