Stronger

“To all the people in my life that didn’t understand how bad they were hurting me, and didn’t know that they would actually cause me to run into the arms of God, …. Because of his faithfulness, not because of how strong I was”

This note was pinned on the wall in the building where one of my favorite Christian groups, Building 429, was performing one of their songs called Stronger, and I saw it on their Instagram page.

I started this with this piece, because it sums it all. A couple of weeks ago, I shared a couple of lines of this piece on Instagram. I call it The forgiveness test. Over twenty years plus years ago, I was really humiliated publicly and hurt and betrayed by some of the people closest to me. You do expect little tiffs over time with relatives and those close to you, but not what I had to face. Over and over again, the betrayals, the hurt and pain, yet I turned a blind eye, thinking and expecting them to change. I was a sucker for punishment.

What I did not know at that time, that I had been blessed with the hospitality anointing. I would give the shirt off my back to help someone else and put the feelings of others before me. Well to say the least, they looked at me as if I was weak and insecure. Things got worse, very personal information that I had entrusted to a couple of them was revealed to complete strangers and work colleagues, further humiliating me.

I became so insecure, suffered anxiety and panic attacks and depression. I withdrew into a shell, built a personal barrier around me, became overprotective of my children and literally stopped trusting anyone whatsoever. My life was just focused on raising my kids, going to school and work.

At this point, these siblings just withdrew from me and literally shut me out, at one point when I asked why I was excluded from a very important family event, I was told that technically I was not a full blown sister, see, we had the same mother but not the same dad and they shared the same mom and dad. I was devastated. Over the years, it got worse. It did not really matter what I had done for them over the years. It was at this point that I made a decision to start a new life, and moved to the USA (I had lived there some years back, and I loved it). My son wanted to stay in London, so I made the move with my daughter. Even after the move, the poisoned darts and arrows kept on coming, my life was shattered, broken, until I joined my church The Living Hope Christian Center in Pennsauken, New Jersey.

During the eight years that we spent over there, our Pastor now Bishop Ronald King Sr, prayed for us, ministered to us, taught us The word, helped us to understand life’s ups and downs, how to pray, praise and worship, and not to focus on the past and what should have or could have been. The ministry was awesome. I will never what he said one Sunday when he brought the word, and I am just paraphrasing “stop hurting, stop being angry and defeated, let it go, because the ones who have hurt you and caused you so much pain, are probably not even thinking about you! Lose their numbers, delete their emails/Facebook etc. stop just existing and start living again! Forgive and forget!”

That was my breakthrough! I decided to do just that, and God started to rebuild my life. I moved on even though it wasn’t easy, and life took on a new meaning for me. Eighteen months ago, God moved my daughter and me back to London. It was a miracle, we moved into the same neighbourhood, same house. Because God had shut down all the old doors and cut off all old contacts, the only person we had contact with was my son. I was fine with that. Never once did we think about old contacts or even crossed paths with them. God kept us, sheltered us, and protected us and so much more in so many ways!

Then about three to four weeks ago, the Forgive and forget test came! Our Bishop and some of our Pastors and ministers had previously taught us that God will put you through tests to see whether you have learnt some life’s lessons and to see your progression. You can’t expect to be promoted if you fail! We came home one day and met two notes stuck to our door, addressed to my daughter and me. In them were numbers of one of my siblings asking me to contact them. I had no thoughts or feelings about that, but I had no intention of contacting anyone. They then contacted my son asking him for our numbers. After that they tried to be clueless about why we have not established contact.

It was at that point that I finally realised that God had really healed me! The walls were down! Chains broken! I did not have to have anyone determine who I am or what I am worth.

I hold no ill feelings about them, don’t even think about them. Jesus told Peter in Mathew 18:21-22, to forgive seventy times seven. He also taught his disciples’ that if your brother offends you, go as far as you can to make peace. I did all that and was rejected. Jesus also said to his disciples’ that if you take the word to people and you are rejected, dust your feet and take your peace with you.

At the end of the day, when Paul was beaten and left for dead, our Lord raised him and he re-entered the city from where he was once kicked out and excelled.

I am finally at peace, I am healed, I am no longer broken. I am stronger, I have moved on and I am not and will not look back or turn back. I have God and he is all I need! I pray that those who tried to destroy me and my kids in the past will find peace within themselves and move on too.

There seems to be a lot of hurts and pain in our world these days. Somehow, a lot of people are finding it hard to let go. Take it from me, you are only hurting yourself. I know it is not easy, but it is a whole lot better to forgive and forget, than you ending up with bitterness, stress and a host of other mental illnesses that are out there. Look around and see what not forgiving is doing to our world today! People are destroying each other and are virtually self-destructing.

There is one way, “Let go and let God”. There is nothing that God cannot do. You don’t need validation from man to be who God has called you to be. I leave you with one of the songs that helped me through those trying times.