Restore
By Contributor Regina Sanchez
Andrea Fortenberry
What's Inside
from my heart to yours
Hi Friends!
Don’t you just love fall? I sure do! I’m an October baby and my birthday month is just my favorite. Not only because of birthday fun, but it’s when the weather starts to change and we pull out our fall decor and pumpkin-scented candles. While we don’t get a true fall in Arizona, the mornings and evenings become a little cooler. Football season is in full swing, and I enjoy lazy Sundays on the couch watching the game and napping off and on throughout the afternoon. (Go Cardinals!)
In New Mexico where I’m originally from, the International Balloon Fiesta happens every October and there’s nothing like it! It should be on everyone’s bucket list, it’s such a sight!
This issue of Restore is about grace and healing. While that might not seem very fall-like, I actually think it aligns perfectly. Just as fall leaves let go of their branches, perhaps we too need to let go of some things so we can move forward into the next season well.
It’s a great time for all of us to ask: What do I need to let go of? Where do I need grace and healing?
As you ponder those questions, I encourage you to grab your favorite fall beverage, cozy up, and talk to God about it. (I’ll take a chai latte, no PSL for me!)
May we all be brave enough to pursue grace and healing this fall.
xoxo,
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Does Your Trauma Own You?
Does your trauma own you? That might seem like a very bizarre question but stay with me here. Trauma affects each of us differently. What may affect one person adversely can be no big deal to another. But for those times when trauma adversely affects us and it goes unhealed, it is left to percolate in our body or mind like the old, percolated coffee pots. It can bring much harm to our bodies.
Studies show that 85 – 90% of diseases are because of emotional imbalances. One type of emotional imbalance can be unhealed trauma. Sadly, what happens is that unhealed trauma will just get stuffed down in our heart and soul and we hold onto the lie that “time heals all wounds.” That is not necessarily true. Time doesn’t always heal all wounds. Time just causes the wounds to settle or fade somewhere in your body to only get triggered and begin to bleed again at some unexpected provocation.
This became apparent to me years ago when I was married to my now ex-husband. We would have a fight, and it wasn’t necessarily a biggie but I noticed there were times when I would get overtly angry over a small issue. You know, angrier than the fight warranted. I finally got to a point where I would ask the Lord what was going on. Why was I giving my husband 115% of my anger when the issue only deserved perhaps 50% of my anger?
As faithful as God is and always answers prayer, He began to show me that particular fight was triggering something inside of me that was unhealed. I got quiet and asked the Lord to heal that issue and He did. I immediately began to feel the weight lifted off me and the angst in my heart was gone toward my husband. I was then able to approach him to resolve that minor issue. There was one time where I got overly angry over something minor and asked the Lord what it was about. He showed me the specific issue it was triggering. I asked the Lord to heal that issue and within a few minutes my husband came into the room and apologized.
If I didn’t have the wisdom to seek a reason why I was feeling such anger the way I did, that old trauma would have continued to own me. I would have let that new issue take residence in me and it would have compounded the pain inside to then get triggered again when another issue arose.
Years ago, when I was a young believer, I was walking in tremendous anger. Again, more than any situation deserved. I knew this wasn’t good nor was it healthy. I had three beautiful believing friends who offered to pray over me.
What a beautiful time it was. Beautiful because I was finally able to get to the root of my anger, but the process was anything but beautiful. I had questioned for years as to whether I was sexually abused, and this was the time the Lord believed I could handle the truth. At one point, I was lying on the coach in a fetal position feeling like I was going out of my mind as the truth flooded me. I thought they were going to have to call an ambulance to take me away because I was an emotional mess.
But my friends were not worried (at least they didn’t show it) and they continued in prayer. God is faithful and He did not want to leave me in that place. He wanted me free and free I became. That trauma does not own me any longer.
How about you? Is there something that keeps popping up in your life and it’s not really making sense why? Could it be a past trauma that is settled deep inside that stays quiet until it doesn’t? Don’t stay there. Don’t let your past trauma own you. The Father wants you free.
Remember “who the Son sets free is free indeed!” - John 8:36.
Be free. That’s my heart for you.
Regina Sanchez
Your Spiritual Life and Health Coach … believing in you!
Regina’s heart is to help “revive” what needs to be sparked to life. Her journey of healing gave her a heart to understand, to love and support women and provide tools to bring healing to your heart and your soul.
www.ReginaSanchez.com info@ReginaSanchez.com
Finding God’ s Grace in the Past
By Andrea Fortenberry
For the past several months I had been planning my 25 class reunion. We didn’t get to have a 20 because of covid and it was such a bummer. I was the class president junior and senior year, and I really felt compelled to throw us a great 25 reunion. th th th
The reunion was in early August and it was SO much fun! My heart is still so full from the great weekend we had! I’m so grateful!
In preparation for the reunion, I spent a lot of time with my yearbooks and photo albums and thinking back on my high school years. I had so many great times with great friends. There was a lot of good about that time of my life.
There were some surprises too. My family moved to Israel my freshman year for six months and while it was not what I wanted at the time, God had other plans. I had known Him since I was a little girl, but my Israel experience truly began my personal relationship with Him.
There are also a lot of things I wish I would have done differently in high school. Unfortunately, we can’t go back and change the past. The me now can see clearly
how different decisions would have saved me some heartache, but that’s with an extra 25 years of life and wisdom under my belt.
I was young back then and didn’t know what I didn’t know. The me then was living off feelings and insecurity, as many teenagers do. I sought my value based on other people’s opinions of me. The me now knows that was shifting sand.
Here are some million-dollar questions I’ve been thinking about lately: How do we not let the past affect us in the present and future? What do we do with our wounds? What do we do with regret and shame?
Here are my answers:
We learn from it. To say the past doesn’t affect us is to deny reality, because our choices, past and present, do affect us in the future. Let’s acknowledge that things from the past have affected us, I think that’s the starting point. When we realize this, we can begin to analyze why and how. Unpacking that will help us move forward in a healthy way. Our past does affect us, but it doesn’t have to hold us prisoner.
We give ourselves grace. We sometimes hold our past selves accountable for what we know now versus what we knew then. In high school, I was 13-17 years old. My children are now in that age range and while they are maturing, they are still so young! My mom always says, “With age comes wisdom,” and she is right. Let’s look back on ourselves with eyes of kindness for what we didn’t know in our youth. I think that’s what we’d do with our kids or another young person in our life.
We surrender it to Jesus. I wish this were a one and done, but often we have to surrender our hurts and regret over and over again. Sometimes we receive healing immediately, but sometimes the healing is incrementally snail-pace slow. When we feel the hurt or regret of a past choice or wound, it’s important to turn to Jesus with the pain. It’s so easy to turn to other coping mechanisms, but they only provide temporary relief. Jesus can heal us and change us from the inside out.
We focus on Truth. It’s easy to believe lies about ourselves and our choices.
I’ll never get over this. I am a horrible person. I should have known better.
Do you ever think things like that? I think we all do.
Here are some verses that remind us of the truth: that we can move past the past, that we are all sinners saved by grace, and that God can redeem and restore.
“It is by grace you have been saved, through faith and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast.” –Ephesians 2:8-9 NIV
“I will give you back what you lost to the swarming locusts.” – Joel 2:25 NLT
“Praise be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God.” - 2 Corinthians 1:3-4 NIV
“He has sent Me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the LORD’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, to provide for those who grieve in Zion—to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planning of the LORD for the display of his splendor.” - Isaiah 61: 1-3 NIV
We forgive and we move forward. We think forgiving means that we condone a hurt or offense. It doesn’t. It means we choose to let it go. Forgiving ourselves and others is key to walking in freedom in the here and now and the future. It is not easy, but it is freeing.
Our past does not have to define us. It’s part of what we’ve lived, but we don’t have to dwell there. We can move forward because time is always moving forward. We can accept what was and look forward to the future with hope.
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