Tonight I am incredibly grateful. I feel loved. Hmmm. That is incredibly weird that I just said that because my conversation over the last few days has been realizing I still believe I am just an object to people. I have made it past thinking of people as objects. I really do love them. But I still think people think of me as an object.
In my past I often moved away from states and places with no feelings at all for the people left behind. Even if I missed them (though I was really living with a wall around my heart), I had no comprehension that I had the ability to hurt someone because I didn’t understand anyone could have feelings for me. It is one of the ways I have left an incredible amount of selfishness rule my life. I had no self-worth or identity in Christ back in the day. So with my “I am an island” attitude, I hurt a lot of people.
I am thinking right now about how experiencing love forces me to process pain. Experiencing relationships that are healthy makes me realize how unhealthy the abuse in my life was. How sick my sick, sick secrets were. Babysitting has truly changed my life. As I have loved children of multiple ages, I sometimes as I care for them will think, “This is the age when…” It makes me realize how unokay things were. It makes me realize what actually was taken from me, which is why I actually have to process the pain.
Praise God that I can write “none” for all that injustice and abuse I suffered in the “What is my part?” column of my inventory. I am innocent. There is so much I am guilty for before the blood of Jesus cleansed me, but for that I am innocent. Now to finish my journey of forgiveness. I suppose I will have to forgive a million times over, especially as I step into marriage someday. All that pain to work through again as I experience love in a whole new way. Satan tried to steal my life, but God will use it for good. God’s redeeming love is beautiful.
For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place, when I was woven together in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. How precious to me are your thoughts,a God! How vast is the sum of them! Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand— when I awake, I am still with you.
Psalm 139:13-18