Author | Speaker | Encourager

Sherri'sBlog

My Story

pickup-truck-392744_640How do we find freedom and healing?

I was broken and lost. Hurting so much. Though I smiled and conversed, I felt isolated and alone.

I hungered for love to find me, connect with me and rescue me from the anger and depression I often experienced.

For years, my only peace and joy came through spending time with God. My kids knew my closet was where I met with Him. Many times after I’d lost it and raged at those precious gifts, they’d gently push me toward my room, saying, “Go spend time with Jesus.”

But my closet wasn’t always a place of peace. Sometimes I’d rail at God, “I’m here, where are You?” I needed His comfort and I felt betrayed when that comfort didn’t come.

I lived by my emotions. Hating the roller coaster of ups and downs. I wanted to stay on those peaks because the valleys were so painful. Frustration. Stress. Anger. Fear. Depression.

One of the first pivotal lessons came through Graham Cooke. He said, “God is always with you and sometimes you feel Him.”

That realization made God real to my faith when He wasn’t to my emotions.

Belief is Key

Once I chose to believe God was with me (Heb. 13:5), I felt His presence more frequently. Belief always strengthens the foundation upon which we stand (Rom. 15:13,Mark 5:36).

Is God who He says He is? We have to make that decision apart from what we are experiencing. The Father of Lies is brilliant with his deceptions. Deception is like living in a house of mirrors, where everything is distorted and nothing is as it seems. And if we take what those mirrors are reflecting as reality and truth, then we will never trust in the goodness of God.

Doubt and unbelief are the enemy’s playground in our minds. They open so many doors for the enemy to steal from us. Hope. Joy. Peace. Fruitfulness. These all get ripped away.

Knowing God’s goodness wasn’t enough. It didn’t translate into freedom in my life. So I began a quest to find all the fruitfulness God promises us.

I was desperate. Beyond desperate.

It started when I lost track of my twelve-year-old son for forty minutes at an insanely crowded soccer fest—–I was convinced my friendly child had been lured off by a predator. And it culminated several weeks later when I couldn’t find my seven-year-old in my own house. Crazy-sounding, huh?

The door to fear had been thrown wide at the soccer fest and began plaguing me with thoughts that something horrible would happen to one of my kids.

Fear is a nasty, nasty beast. Unreasonable torment that the rationale side of your brain cannot turn off. Logic rarely (if ever) wrestles a negative emotion into submission.

I knew I needed to change, for my kids’ sake as well as my own. And so began my journey. And it will likely look much different than yours.

Some of us just need to get out of the rut of apathy. We need a fire ignited in our hearts for the Person of Jesus.

Some of us need healing from wounds that have clouded our view of Jesus and told us He is something different than He is.

volkswagen-569315_640And some of us need deliverance from the bondages in our thinking that compel behaviors we hate and are helpless to change. Shame rules us.

Usually we need a combination of all three.

Are the challenges and pain worth the journey?

Oh, yes! I am a radically different person than I was six years ago when I started searching for the wholeness that seemed a universe away from me.

Where I longed desperately to be loved, I now know this Love and the healing and freedom I yearned for.

And I’ll be your biggest cheerleader on this journey! If you have questions, feel free to comment below or email me privately.

Prayer

Father, I want to take this journey into the wholeness and freedom You have purchased for me. Show me the next step You have for me. And continue to reveal the steps You would have me take to walk more fully into who You designed me to be. I’m scared. There are so many things I’ve avoided. Please reveal Yourself to me as I step out in faith that You will never let me fall. Let me experience Your comfort and nearness through this process. Thank You for what You’ve planned in my freedom journey. In Jesus’ name, amen.


Photos via Pixabay

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