Rebuilding After Loss, Part Two - Assessment

"I set out during the night with a few men. I had not told anyone what my God had put in my heart to do for Jerusalem. There were no mounts with me except the one I was riding on" (Nehemiah 2: 12) NIV

The Wisdom of Assessment

A fellow pastor I know enjoys rock climbing with his son.  After getting valuable experience, they decided to tackle a particularly difficult climb -- their biggest challenge yet.  They decided to obtain an expert guide to assist them.  

Before they actually attempted the climb, the guide took them to a nearby vantage point so they could assess their challenge one piece at a time before engaging it. "The first segment of the climb will be hard", the expert told them as he drew their attention to the lower parts of the mountain.  "But we'll rest there and get ready for the next part", he added as he identified a small resting place.

The guide then pointed out the next segment of the climb. It would be much more difficult.  He went through it with them bit-by-bit until they all understood the strategy they would use to complete it.  Another resting point was identified. 

The third segment was very, very hard.  My friend later reported that he was pretty sure he would not be able to complete it.  Their guide assured them that they were up to the task but it would take everything they had.  Once again, they reviewed each part of that final climb in detail before they struck out to begin.

Taking Time to Assess

In our hurry to escape the pain, anxiety, or discouragement that follows grief, loss and major reversals; we may be tempted to skip the assessment phase of the rebuilding process. This can actually delay our progress.  Both Nehemiah and the rock climbing expert model the importance of first making a good assessment of the challenges we are facing before diving in.

A good assessment is holistic and includes the spiritual, emotional, physical and relational aspects of rebuilding after loss.  We need to look carefully at what it will take to restore our sense of spiritual balance.  Nothing is more fundamental to a good recovery than a clear sense of the presence of God and His promises to us in Christ.

A thorough assessment of our emotions is also in order. Are we emotionally over or under reacting?  Are we managing stress, anxiety and grief reasonably well?

Physically, we need to pay attention to our sleeping and eating habits.  If these have changed much in either direction (noticeably more eating or sleeping or noticeably less), we would do well to take note.  We will need our best physical resources to manage the overall task ahead.

Finally, we must properly assess our relationships.  Who do we have who can be present to our process with us in a helpful way? Who do we need to add to that list?

Once we have undergone a good assessment of the rebuilding process, the overall advances will be much greater than if we rush to rebuild too quickly.  

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"Then I said to them, “You see the trouble we are in: Jerusalem lies in ruins, and its gates have been burned with fire. Come, let us rebuild the wall of Jerusalem, and we will no longer be in disgrace.  I also told them about the gracious hand of my God upon me and what the king had said to me. They replied, “Let us start rebuilding.” So they began this good work” (Nehemiah 2:17, 18)

A Hidden Healing, Part Two

This is from my weekly newsletter "Gracelets". Enjoy!

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In Part One, I introduced the story of one of the most remarkable healings I have ever witnessed - even though I was not aware of it at the time it was taking place. The entire story can be found in my book, How Healed Do You Want to Be?

On the day this hidden healing took place, I was in charge of hosting a conference of Christian singles at our church. During the opening worship time, I had asked all of the conference participants to join me on the large step area in front of the platform on which the worship band was playing so that we could make up an ad hoc worship choir singing directly to the Lord as our only "audience".

After hearing one young woman's outstanding voice nearby me on the steps, I arranged to have her join the band and sing into the microphone. Tapping her on the shoulder, I made the invitation while the band played on. Confused at first, she eventually understood that she was being invited to join in and she did. It was beautiful.

After the morning session, she came to me and expressed deep appreciation for what I had asked her to do. At first, I did not understand that something powerful had taken place for her. As her eyes filled with tears, she told me the "story behind the story".

What I learned continues here:

"A few years ago," she said, "I was a worship leader in my church back home. At the time I was married and had a family. But I made a huge mistake. I had an affair with a married man who led worship at another church." She paused to regain her composure. "Once everything came to light, it broke up both of our families. Of course, we were each asked to step down from our roles by the leaders of our churches. From there things just got worse."

She paused again, then continued:

"I felt like my whole world was falling apart," she told me. "We soon broke off our relationship for good, and I tried to go back and make things right with God and with the people I had hurt. But it's been really hard. I haven't been able to forgive myself for what I did with all the blessings and gifts God has given me. I have pretty much
hated myself ever since."

As I listened, my heart went out to her. I wanted to respond but before I could she said something I will never forget:

"When you tapped me on the shoulder this morning, my first thought was that someone had told you about me and that you were going to ask me to sit down..."

I couldn't believe what I was hearing. Is that what she thought of me? Is that what she thought of herself -- a candidate for public shaming?

"Before today, I had concluded that God never wanted to hear my voice in church again," she sobbed. "But when you got my attention this morning, you didn't ask me to sit down. You told me my voice was beautiful and that I should go up and sing with the band into the microphone. You'll never know what you did for me today. God
used you to let me know I am truly forgiven. Now I know I can be restored. I will never be able to thank you enough"...

I am humbled when I recall how God used me (without my knowing it) to accomplish a "hidden healing". I wonder how many hidden healings you have been a part of?

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Perhaps you need a safe place where you can invite God's healing life and light to transform you and turn your heartaches into hope? If I can help you as a counselor, don't hesitate to contact me by phone or email.

A Hidden Healing, part one

A "Hidden Healing" Part One

By William T "Bill" Faris, MPC"
Reprinted from my “Gracelets” Newsletter

One of the most unforgettable healing experiences I ever witnessed happened without my knowing it - until it was revealed to me in a surprising interaction after the fact. I describe this healing event as a "hidden healing" in my book, How Healed Do You Want to Be?

On the day this hidden healing took place, I was in charge of hosting a conference of Christian singles at our church. About 100 of us
had come together to begin the first morning of the conference with a time of praise and worship. As the music swelled, I was soon
caught up in the atmosphere of music, devotion and celebration. There was liberty and joy in that room and, before long, it seemed
as if the line between heaven and earth had somehow blurred.

Suddenly, I was struck with an inspiration to try something I had never tried before. Between songs, I went to the microphone and
asked everyone in the room to please come to the front platform and stand on the steps that led up to the area where the band was
playing their instruments. In only a moment, we had moved from our seats "in the audience" to joining the band as a sort of ad hoc one hundred voice worship choir. We resumed with hearty praise as we sang to the Lord -- our "audience of One". It was awesome!

It wasn't long before I noticed a particularly wonderful female voice coming from somewhere nearby me. It was beautiful, strong
and striking indeed. "That voice needs to be on a microphone", I said to myself as I slipped over to quickly consult with the worship
leader. He pointed to the open mic and I returned to where I had been standing while the band continued playing and the voices
joined together on another song. I gently tapped the young woman with the outstanding voice on the shoulder and she turned to see
that it was me who wanted her attention. .

I pointed to the open mic and urged her to please sing into it. She looked a bit stunned at first. When I assured her that I was truly
urging her to go up and sing into the mic she made her way there and joined in with the band. As I expected, her rich voice added
even more to the beauty and power of that morning's experience.

After the morning session concluded, I was surprised to see the young lady singer making a bee line for me. "You'll never know
what this morning meant to me", she said. "Great", I replied in my best pastoral tone. "I'm glad to hear it.".

She looked at me again as tears filled up her eyes. "No, you don't understand.... A few years ago I was a worship leader in my church
back home. At the time I was married and had a family. But I made a huge mistake. I had an affair with a married man who led worship
at another church." She paused to regain her composure...

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If the Church Hurt You, Let the Church Heal You (Part Two)

By William T "Bill" Faris, MPC"

NOTE: I'm reprinting this from my weekly "Gracelets" email newsletter. If you do not yet receive Gracelets and would like to, simply email me at: Bill@mypastoralcounselor.com
In the meantime, enjoy! ---
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I recently met up with old friends who shared with me their disappointments and hurts regarding their various church experiences. They confessed that they were now "mad at God". One of them told me that they had no immediate plans to seek further church involvement.

Only Option?

It's not that I don't understand my friend's inclination to back away from the church altogether. There are a host of people who have made the choice to stay away from the church rather that to risk further personal, emotional or spiritual injury. But is a church boycott the only option? I think not. In fact, I believe it is important for those who have experienced hurt in the church to find their healing there. The best case scenario for my friends would be for them to find a healthy, life-giving and wholesome connection to the Body of Christ.

If you, or someone you know, has experienced deep hurt in the church, I would like to offer a couple of pointers to help the restoration and recovery process move through the pain to a stronger, healthier, more fruitful place.

* Look at your own contribution to the hurt you have experienced

It is likely that you made at least some contribution to the wounding you have experienced. Personal immaturity, carryover from family issues, personal agendas for recognition, leftover pain from previous church hurts, idealistic expectations, unscriptural notions of church life and other factors may have set you up for the hurt you have known. Debriefing your church hurts with a trusted friend or counselor can help you to uncover some of these "setups". You probably won't see them on your own.

There was a time in my life when my own craving for affirmation and recognition made me blind to the serious brokenness of the leader I was following at the time (he was our church's founding pastor). When his downfall came, I was shocked and scandalized. Looking back, I can see that there were plenty of signs that he was nurturing unhealthy attitudes and behaviors. I had ignored them, however, for my own reasons. While his contribution to my pain was plain enough, I have to also admit that I had set myself up to be hurt. Recognizing our "setups" can help us grow from the painful experiences we undergo.

* Separate church hurt from God hurt.

"If you've been burned, here's what I've learned - the Lord's not the One to blame". These lyrics from CCM pioneer Keith Green point out the fact that we can sometimes confuse the church with the kingdom of God or even God Himself. However, the church is NOT the kingdom and the kingdom is NOT the church. And neither God's kingdom nor His church are Him. Separating these entities is more important than we might think.

God is the Master of the Universe and the Savior of our souls. He is the Perfect Lord of Life and the Head of the Church which stands apart from Him as His bride. Although blessed beyond measure with God's gifts, His graces, and His promises, the church is nevertheless a human institution. It does not exist as the Kingdom of God, but as the stewards of His kingdom. Therefore there will always be failures, shortcomings and even outright abuses within the context of church life (the New Testament epistles are filled with examples and warnings). This is because of the human factor.

I have often said that the greatest people I have every known, the ones who mean the most to me and who inspire me most are Christians. But it is also true that the people who have most hurt, disappointed and offended me are also Christians - church people! This is a sometimes confusing paradox.

I have most profoundly experienced the reality of God's kingdom - His rule, His reign and His manifested presence in His people - in the context of the church. But I have also experienced some of my deepest heartaches in the context of the church as well. It helps to be honest about these things!

It also helps to note that the sense of God's power and presence in a given church or church system is not necessarily God's wholesale endorsement of that church, leader, or church system. Nor can the power and presence of God be assumed to be a divine endorsement of the various methods, doctrines or church organization as such. Recognizing these things can help us avoid our tendency to confuse "church hurt" with "God hurt". .

* Keep it real.

Some of our church hurts are fueled by the more unfortunate aspects of the typical church subculture. For example, a church's efforts to be highly attractive to newcomers can sometimes result in a tendency to emphasize "window dressing" while avoiding or sugarcoating the nitty-gritty issues or needs that lie unaddressed behind the scenes.

A "powerhouse" church culture may wind up ignoring or devaluing some of the more mundane factors which will ultimately determine the emotional and spiritual health of both leaders and congregation. "Touchy-feely" churches, legalistic churches, personality-driven churches and other types of faith communities have their down sides. One way to minimize the downsides of each system is to strive to "keep it real" as believers.

I admire author Larry Crabbe's vision for the church as a "real" environment where tough issues can be worked out in an engaging atmosphere of grace and truth. He writes that "a central task of community is to create a place that is safe enough for the walls to be torn down, safe enough for each of us to own and reveal our brokenness. Only then can the power of connecting do it job. Only then can community be used of God to restore our souls." (Larry Crabbe, The Safest Place on Earth).

Bottom line: The more that a church can be both Spirit-filled and "real", the less it is likely to have painful booby-traps.
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One more installment in this series will be posted soon.

Keys to Healing a Marriage, Part Three

Key #3 - Envision Your Future Marriage Now

When you are driving a car to the store, you "see" two differnt things at the same time. You "see" the road just in front of the car and the myriad other things in your immediate environment. But you also "see" the store you intend to visit. You do this in your mind or imagination. That's why you take the roads you take. You can envison in your mind's eye exactly where you are going even though that destination is not available to your immediate view as you navigate the roads.

Now apply this to marriage. When Robin and I became engaged, I was still in my teens (19 to be exact). I could "see" Robin before me and I knew that she was the woman for me. We were young with our entire adulthood and its many mysteries before us. But we would not remain in that uniquely youthful phase of our lives forever.
Knowing this, we made vows on our wedding day. These vows included language about what we could "see" in our future. Our vows were the things that bound us to it come what may: "for better, or for worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health...until God shall separate us by death..." Those words expressed a vision of life far beyond where we were living it.

When healing a marriage, we must reaffirm the ultimate destination that was first described by the vows we made on our wedding day. That day, before God and our loved ones, we bound ourselves to what someone has described as a "lifelong commitment to an imperfect person". To lose this destination on the map is to throw away the map altogether. Two people who no longer "see" this vision must reclaim and recover that end point if they are to weather life's storms and finish well. If they stop living with the end in mind, the marriage will suffer and perhaps even die.

It's not a matter of whether or not other visions will present themselves to the partners in a marriage. Life will conspire to overturn what we have vowed with tantalizing imaginations of life lived with other partners and other pleasures. There is no doubt that we will miss out on these things if we maintain our foundational commitment to one man, one woman, one lifetime. But as I mentioned in an earlier blog post, that is the very nature of decision making. To make any decision is to slay some of our options so that others may live.

It is no secret that this is what God asks from us in our marriages -- to slay all other options, hold fast to our commitment, and fight to the finish: "forsaking all others, I will keep myself to her, and to her only...". This is why the marital relationship is imbued with so much meaning in Scripture. It is the very vow our God has takin upon Himself. He has bound Himself to our brokeness and imperfection despite our ups and downs: "if we are faithless, He remains faithful". It is also why we need grace (and not just human willpower) to fulfill our vows and arrive at the destination of a life lived faithfully together. It is, you might say, a God-sized commitment.

In healing a suffering marriage, we admit this, ask for help, and recall to heart what we have vowed in the hopes that our partner will do the same.

Keys to Healing A Marriage, Part One

Healing a hurting or broken marriage is not as hard as we may think...or as easy! Although a million, million words have been written on this topic, there is no doubt that a million more will be. In what follows, I humbly offer a few words of my own on a subject that really matters. They come from my experience as a pastoral counselor, pastor and my own 33 years of married life with Robin.

KEY #1: No Change, No Healing

"When an irresistible force such as you
Meets an old immovable object like me
You can bet just as sure as you live
Somethin's gotta give
Somethin's gotta give
Somethin's gotta give"

Johnny Mercer's classic lyrics describe a law of both physics and human relationships: "somethin's gotta give". When a marriage is hurting or in trouble, "same old same old" is no longer an option. Even so, a true appetite for change is not always present in those situations -- and marriages -- that are desperate for change. Sometimes the first response to marital crisis is to fall back into a deeper commitment to the familiar patterns, attitudes and behaviors that have fed the breakdown because they are already an ingrained part of our routine and identity. "Don't ask me to change", we assert. "I am what I am".

Dissect that statement a little further, and it reveals itself to be more of a values statement than an actual fact. In effect, we are saying: "I value staying with what works for me more than I value learning what works for us". The fact is, we learn how to radically change "who we are" all the time -- if we believe the change is worth the trouble to do so. When the economy shifts, we may immerse ourselves into totally new careers. When children come, we immerse ourselves in learning how to parent. When our health is threatened, we may radically change our diet, our exercise routine and, possibly, our entire lifestyle in order to avoid issues that will destroy our health or our functioning. That's why, when a marriage is in need of healing, change is the best friend we need to invite over to stay, not an enemy we need to keep locked outside.

If we value our marriage then we need do whatever it takes to heal it, build it up and renew its vitality. This means change -- often HUGE change. It can sometimes takes a gargantuan effort to UNlearn some things and LEARN others. The learning curve can feel daunting, indeed. Perhaps this is why so many marital partners seem to look for the minimum tweak to stop the squeek (in their marriage) instead of embracing the opportunity to experience transformative change. In sports lingo they refer to this as "playing not-to-lose" rather than "playing to win".