I don’t know who needs to hear this, but healing is messy, and the mess is necessary to move from death into life.
“…healing is messy, and the mess is necessary…
Tenay Benes, tenaybenes.com
Before healing, we had carefully crafted masks that hid our hearts. Before healing, we had perfect performance to earn our right to be loved. Before healing, we had everything figured out in the black and white of religion and the letter of the law. Before healing, we knew what was good and what was bad—or so we thought. Before healing, we were a tightly wound up ball of string, looking perfectly put-together from the outside looking in.
When healing came, we unmasked our hearts and found them hurting. When healing came, we didn’t have it in us to be perfect anymore; and we lost those whose love was conditional on our performance. When healing came, we discovered that the spirit gives life but the law brings death. When healing came, we had to unlearn all that we thought we knew, everything upon which we had built our foundation, so that we could become like a child—willing to learn anew—once again. When healing came, we came unraveled into a messy pile of yarn so that we could find the knots within and clear them.
A Pearl of Great Price
Healing happened to us when the Kingdom came over us; and the Kingdom was worth giving up everything we had.
“If, however, by the Spirit of God, I cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.”
Yeshua, Matthew 12:28
“…the kingdom of Heaven is like… a very precious pearl… [for which a merchant] sold all that he had and bought it.”
Yeshua, Matthew 13:45-46
My Losses and Gains
Healing has cost me my career.
It has cost me my religious foundation.
It has cost me my family of origin.
It has cost me a command.
Healing has cost me over $400,000 in doctors, therapists, coaches, vitamins, whole organic food, conferences, retreats, books, furniture, clothes, household goods.
It has cost me almost all of my friends.
It has cost me two houses I owned, and five cross-country moves.
And it has cost me almost everything I ever thought I knew about life.
But what healing has gained me is worth all of that, and more.
Healing gained me truth—about myself, my past, my present, and my future.
It introduced me to the real living God, not just a set of principles from a history.
It gave me God’s voice, direct from Heaven into my heart.
It gained me wholeness and integration of all my parts.
It taught me what real love was like.
It got me friends who love me for my presence, not my performance.
It led me to my loving husband, and my adorable baby.
Healing gave me courage, faith, hope, and joy.
It got me God-power so that I can heal others as God healed me.
And there’s no stopping me now.
Count the Cost
“For which of you, if you desire to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost so that you have enough to finish the build?”
Yeshua, Luke 14:28
The journey has been super messy! It has also been super isolating. That’s one aspect of the cost I didn’t anticipate having to pay at first.
Almost everyone who knew me when I seemed perfectly put-together distanced themselves from me either because of the mess of healing or because of the resultant transformation after healing. (What attracted them back then is no longer how I am now.) At the same time, most people who meet me now cannot relate to how I am because I’m more healed than most people they will ever know or even hear about. (I’m not even on their grid, so they avoid meaningful interactions with me.) So finding community with whom to connect in this new state is hard—super hard.
Yet, the cost—all that I’ve lost—is totally worth the gain, any day.
Be encouraged, and keep unraveling for the right reasons. One day, you’ll look back and see how God has been weaving you into a beautiful new tapestry.
Amen.
Featured image is Creative Commons license from pxhere.com.
