Rescuing People

I watch hopelessly quite often as various people flit from one “friend” to another, to another, looking for someone to satisfy their needs, only to come up unsatisfied and move onto the next. While that person moves on, the person who was just left is left standing there wondering, “What just happened?” The sad conclusion to this saga is that the unsatisfied person will remain unsatisfied. Not only that, but they will also continue to lay blame with every other person they proclaim to have had to sever ties to because they will ultimately and sincerely believe in their minds that the other person was to blame. It’s always someone elses fault, never their own.

While this is a sad tale, it is very true. I know. I lived it for many years. I flit from one friend to another, to another, always looking for approval, justification, pity, acceptance, whatever I could get to make me feel better, to make me feel that someone, anyone understood where I was coming from. Instead, what I got was at first friendship, then impatience, then it always seemed as if my friends turned against me and sought new friends. And in my mind, something must have been wrong with THEM because sure I didn’t do anything wrong! They just didn’t understand me. But it was a little of both and mostly me. What I needed was to go to the Lord with my issues instead of going to everyone else and bombarding them with all my troubles.

I’m not saying talking to a friend isn’t wise. If you have a friend who is a good listener and encourages you, then by all means, confide in them. But don’t expect them to “fix” you, because they can’t. Only God can do that. And that brings me to my lowest of lows and my rock bottom epiphany that ultimately led me to where I am today.

I was so beat down by my past and intimidated by the people in my surroundings that I could not get past the hurt long enough to find a real friend, nor could I allow myself to trust them. I just lumped them all into the same category and expected them to eventually turn on me and hurt me. Not all of them were like that. Hurting people hurt people…but rescued people rescue people!

When God healed me, He literally fixed me from the inside out! I didn’t have to rely on someone else to pour out my troubles to, to give me justification, pity, acceptance, or anything else to make me feel better. Because when God healed me, He gave me justification. He gave me acceptance. He gave me everything I needed, fixed my brokenness, sanctified me, and then turned me around and gently nudged me in this direction and said, “Now, go give your sisters hope. Tell them what I’ve done for you. Tell them I can heal them too, and then send them My way.” So here I am!

I am on a new path. Since being on this path, I have encountered many “sisters” along the way. Some of them receptive…some of them not so much. And what breaks my heart is when one of them sees me as anything but a positive influence. My heart hurts so bad to watch them flit from one “friend” to another, to another, seeking approval, acceptance, justification, and that “please feel sorry for me” that I myself once portrayed. Because I know that within a few short weeks, she will throw that friendship away and move on to another new friend, seeking the same things once again.

This is how the enemy blindsides us into believing that people can fix our problems. We hesitate to go to the Lord for our heart surgery, instead talking things out with friends because our friends get us, they approve of us, they accept us how we are. In essence, they enable us to continue on our path of destruction. All the while, God is waiting to take us in. He doesn’t leave us in the same place we are. He makes us move out of our comfort zone and into the life that He has had planned for us.

Sometimes though, we get so comfortable in our misery that we would just rather stay there and wallow because we’re getting more attention there than if we were to move out to where the Lord wants to use us. We want what WE want, justifying ourselves by saying, “I’m waiting for God to answer me.” Well honey, God IS answering you! He’s saying, “Hey, come over here! I have something wonderful for you.” Yet we won’t move. 

Let me encourage you today. Had I not moved from where I was and stepped out in faith, determined to get my mind healed, you would not be reading this right now. No, it’s not arrogance. It isn’t pride. This is healing. This is what happens when God steps in and changes your life! What you see and read here is the result of the healing hand of God in my life. I no longer go from one friend to another to another seeking approval, justification, and all those other things. I got all of that and more the night I asked God to heal me and received everything He had waiting for me.

And whatever things you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive. ~Matthew 21:22

You have a mighty big present waiting for you, too. Will you step out and go for it? Or stand back and watch from the sidelines?