“God Is Not Sick of Your Struggle” by Jennifer Arimborgo

“Good Shepherd” by Bernhard Plockhorst (c. 1889), Source allposters.com, (PD-Art, PD-old-100)

As abuse survivors dealing with the scars of our experience, we tend to repeat certain mistakes and despise ourselves for that fact…as if will power alone could overcome trauma.

Often, we imagine that God despises us, as well.  God does not, however, view our efforts with contempt.  Far from it.

Author Jennifer Arimborgo who blogs at Feeding on Jesus https://feedingonjesus.com explores this topic in a post titled “God Is Not Sick of Your Struggle” (excerpted below).

Jennifer’s books are available at Amazon.com.

“…We sometimes live under the false impression that God is repelled by our imperfections and brokenness…Scripture teaches us that the opposite is true…His heart does not despise it when we lay bare our worst failures before Him.  He is not disgusted with us.  On the contrary, He gets stirred up with deep compassion and a desire to restore us to a place of wholeness.

After all, that’s what He gave His life for.  Our gentle Shepherd submitted Himself to torture to redeem us.  If He was willing to pour out his life unto death, what wouldn’t He do for us?…”

“Sometimes we humans have a long struggle with a given area of weakness.  We battle a particular area that seems to get us down again and again.  Our spirits are longing to live right in His sight, to conquer that thing once and for all.  God must be so sick of this, we think to ourselves.

We are wrong.  This is His tender heart toward us:

‘A bruised reed he will not break, and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out‘ (Matt.12:20, NIV)

…So He picks us up again.  Instantly and continually, His blood makes us clean. He pulls us close and whispers to our hearts, ‘I’m not mad.  Just be with Me and get to know Me better.  As you do, My own character and nature are going to rub off on you more and more.  Lean into Me, precious one.  Receive an infusion of My power that makes you free [1]!”

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[1]  The full text of this post can be found at:  https://feedingonjesus.com/author/consumingjesus/.

Wishing you all a Happy Easter!

A report issued this week by the Maryland Attorney General details “staggering” sexual abuse in the Archdiocese of Baltimore.  More than 600 children were victimized.  Roman Catholic Church leadership consistently ignored  complaints or failed to investigate them adequately, then conspired to hide the abuse from the public — shielding over 150 predator priests for decades.

See, https://apnews.com/article/baltimore-archdiocese-sex-abuse-report-7d5d3af098da59a1c9313a246566638c.

FOR MORE OF MY ARTICLES ON POVERTY, POLITICS, AND MATTERS OF CONSCIENCE CHECK OUT MY BLOG A LAWYER’S PRAYERS AT:  https://alawyersprayers.com