When You're Not in a Healthy Place – Part II

Today’s topic is not one that most Christians like to deal with, and yet much of our ineffectiveness as Christians is because we are not dealing with heart issues. One of the major reasons that we began this website was to deal with the kind of heart issues that over my forty years as a Christian I have heard, experienced, and seen in the body of Christ. We all know that the world is living in a place where fear and doubt and anxiety are running rampant – but what we often don’t want to address is that those subtle yet powerful forces also bring defeat and despair to many Christians.

In the church where I became a Christian, even though it was an independent, spirit-filled church, its’ roots were very much denominational and the order of service was very traditional. One of the structures of the denomination was to provide a “Class Leader” system. Each time a person was converted and joined the church they were assigned to a class leader who would (theoretically at least) give them guidance and support. Though this system did not always work out as designed, it nonetheless was a good system. How many of us would leave a brand new baby alone to fend for themselves?

Over the years, the growth and sophistication of the church placed less emphasis on these kind of supports – even in the church we feel that education solves all problems for people – and we leave new Christians (and older ones as well) to figure out how to navigate through the storms of life. My intention is not to bash common practices and programs in the church, rather to say, that in the pews of “any church”, “any Sunday” there are hurting people who don’t have a clue where to turn to find the help they need.

The good news is there are places, there are resources, there is God! If we pray to our Father, He has a way of “leading us into green pastures” and “restoring our soul.” I can give testimony after testimony of ways that the Holy Spirit would put me in a place where I would meet someone, or establish relationship with someone, that I needed in my life, at just the right time! Relationships are so important. We all need at least one person in our life to be accountable to – to be able to share our heart, to be able to trust with our struggles, to be able to ask them to pray with us and for us. I can hear someone saying back to me, “this is obvious, you aren’t sharing anything significant.”

Proverbs 17:17a says: ” A friend loveth at all times,”
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Do you have that kind of friend, who you can trust with the dark and dirty places that sometimes enter your heart and they will love you enough to join you in the kind of prayer that will bring you out?

There is victory in Jesus! Every struggle, every test, every heartache, every pain, every sorrow – God will bring us through – and when there is no one we can touch around, remember,

“…there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother(Pr. 18:24b” – his name is Jesus!

God Bless You,
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