Our family was camping and we were getting ready to go swimming. I
was 13 and in the tent changing into my bikini. I started to pull up the straps
of my top when my dad opened the flap.
“Get out!” I screamed. He snapped back, “You haven’t got anything
anyway.” I was devastated. How could he say such a thing? I had a pretty nice
body for a thirteen year old, but his degrading comeback hit me like a hammer.
He dropped the flap down quickly and left. The End. For him maybe,
but not for me.
The words cut deep. “You haven’t got anything” is what I heard and
what I believed about myself for years. I felt like I could never be good
enough, that my dad thought I was ugly and unworthy of love. So I saw myself
that way. My teenage years were horrible. The seeds of rejection and self
hatred had developed deep roots in my young soul.
The most hurtful problems in our adult lives often come because we
have experienced evil in our childhood days and the results have rooted themselves
deeply within us. They make us think, speak, and act in ways that aren’t even
appropriate to the current situations. But something triggers a connection to
the past and we react in the way we did as a child, to protect ourselves. We need
to get free of these old hurts and deep wounds.
Jesus said, “And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall
make you free” (John 8:32). The Greek word for “know” in this scripture is ginosko and it means to “know
absolutely, to be sure of, to understand and be resolved.” These past horrific
experiences and their results need to be once and for all resolved and put in
their proper place, where they no longer are a part of our present day life. So
how does that happen?
To annihilate the clinging noose of past evils is going to take
the supernatural touch of Jesus Christ. It was Satan working in in the past who
worked through people to bring the evil on in the first place, so the effects
can’t be taken care of completely and thoroughly without the supernatural help
of the one who “came to destroy the works of the devil” (1 John 3:8).
Only Jesus can get to the root of any problem. He’s alive now and real
and still doing the same things He did when He was in the flesh on earth:
honing in on the sources of our anxieties, fears, hatreds, etc., exposing them for
what they really are and giving us the clear deliverance we so desperately need.
He said, “Every plant, which my heavenly Father hath not planted, shall be
rooted up” (Matt 15:13). When the word “shall” is used, it is absolute, in
contrast to the word “will,” which is less emphatic.
A great example of the type of freedom Jesus came to bring is in
John 4. Jesus came to a well and asked the woman there for a drink. She asked
him why He was talking to her since she was a Samaritan and Jews weren’t
supposed to have dealings with Samaritans.
He totally ignored her question. He came with deliverance for
everyone. It didn’t matter if she was Jew or Samaritan. Everyone has hidden
hurts. He didn’t care what she thought of herself or the boundaries she’d set
up to guard herself. He was there to set her free.
He told her that instead of her giving Him a cup of physical
water, he could give her a different kind of water that would change her life. She was hesitant and replied, “The
well is deep,” and she wasn’t talking about the physical well.
Jesus had the power to go into that deep well of her soul, uproot
the source of the problem and give her complete and lasting freedom. Psalm 42:7
tells us: “Deep calleth
unto deep.” There is nothing deeper than the insight, understanding and love of
Jesus Christ.
As it turned out, the woman was broken. Her self worth was shot to
hell. She had gone from man to man looking for true love, but something was
wrong. She couldn’t find what she was looking for no matter what she did. How
many people are stuck in that trap?
Jesus explained to her what was happening with her. He uprooted
the cause and He showed her what true love was. She received it. I don’t know
how long it took, but she was so excited about being free of her bondage to the past that she ran out to tell the
men of the city and they came out to see.
Jesus ministered to them for two more days and they had the same
types of things happen to them. “And they told the woman, Now we no longer
believe (trust, have faith) just because of what you said; for we have heard
Him ourselves [personally], and we know that He truly is the Savior of the
world, the Christ” (John 4:42 AMP). Why
did they say “savior?” Because
they were saved—rescued—from the effects of whatever past evil experiences were
still playing havoc in their lives too.
Jesus is real, a person, alive now and able to work in many
different ways to get to the bottom of our wells, or to the deepest sources of
hurt in us. He is the answer to getting rid of them once and for all.
One key that worked for me was this. I prayed and asked Jesus to
go back with me to the incident with my dad in the tent. I needed to see it
through the eyes of the Lord Jesus. The Lord showed me the truth:
My dad’s angry words had nothing to do with me. Lashing out in
anger was a defense he learned as a child when he was so often accused of being
wrong. It was an automatic trigger reaction. When he opened the tent flap
without asking, he did something wrong. When I called him on it, he lashed out
at me just like he always did when he was accused of being wrong. I finally
understood and I could let go of my own hurt and anger. I was totally set free.
This method worked for me and it will work for many of you too.
But I know that other issues may be involved and need addressing too.
Some people won’t be able to take the Lord back to the incident
because they’re angry with Him for allowing it in the first place! Perfectly
understandable. I have adult friends who have not yet forgiven God for things
in the past. It’s more common than you might think—secretly blaming God for
abandoning them in the past and not answering their childhood prayers.
But we have to forgive Him too, whether or not we understand it, we
still have to just do it, to release our minds and hearts from all
unforgiveness.
How to accomplish these feats starts with a decision to be willing
to learn. Then Jesus takes our willingness and leads us to complete freedom.
I’ve shown you one way that worked for me but there are others. I pray that if
you are a person looking to be free from past wounds that are still popping up
in your life, the Lord guide you on your personal freedom path to cut away the
hurts of the past forever. I know He will.
Love, Carolyn
