Harpooned

This morning I woke up to a dream. It was strange. In my dream, I was walking alongside a friend who had a harpoon going straight through her body. For a bit, I walked alongside her, taking in the whole image and then, I reached out a hand onto her shoulder and began to pray for God to heal her.

I woke up.

As I woke, my thoughts swiftly turned sarcastic. “Praying for a harpoon healing? She needed a doctor!” But rather quickly I began to think about a time several years ago when I had been deeply hurt by other Christians. It was a hurt that consumed my thoughts. I woke with it on my mind and I went to sleep troubled. I allowed the pain of the situation to cripple my daily life. I thought about it throughout my day, and I let the hurt fester in my heart. I was becoming bitter.

One day I realized the effect that I had allowed these people’s hurtful actions to have in my life. I was stuck. I didn’t want to give them that power. I didn’t want to let them win. I didn’t want to go on feeling depleted. I knew I didn’t want to be controlled by my emotional hurts. I needed to get out of the emotional pit.

I thought, “If God can heal a blind man, he can heal my hurt.” The Scripture Isaiah 53:5 went through my thoughts, “But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed.”

I had emotional wounds. I had been hurt by others’ hurtful actions, but it became my wrong action when I harbored the hurt and allowed it to grow bitterness. I needed an emotional healing.

From that moment on, each time I had a negative thought I would say, “By his stripes I am healed.” I said it a lot the first few days. A week went by, and I could feel and see an upturn in my demeanor. God was healing my heart and turning my focus off of the negative and onto him. “During that time I wrote a song and often sang the chorus to myself for encouragement, reinforcing the power of Isaiah 53:5 in my thoughts.” It’s now played on independently owned radio stations on the west coast. The song is called “By Your Wounds.”   

I came out of the pit, but as life goes, there is always opportunity to be injured again. Are you harpooned with a hurt? If Christ can heal a blind man, make a lame man walk, and bring a dead man to life again, he can heal your hurt too.