Are you so comfortable with your old wounds and hurts that you prefer to keep them close while you push healing away? Does the thought of letting those wounds go scare you enough to allow them to keep you prisoner for the rest of your life? Read on to hear how I, after being a prisoner of my hurts for many years, am now walking healed and free.

This blog is one in a journey of a Getting to Know God series. The names and attributes of God are adapted from a guide on the Navigators website called 30 Days of Praying the Names and Attributes of God. Today’s blog corresponds with Day 13 – God is Jehovah-rophe.

Today the Navigators’ Guide says: God is Jehovah-rophe. This name means “Jehovah heals.” God alone provides the remedy for mankind’s brokenness through His Son, Jesus Christ. The Gospel is the physical, moral and spiritual remedy for all people.”

Our verses today are:
Exodus 15:22-26 (NIV)

Then Moses led Israel from the Red Sea and they went into the Desert of Shur. For three days they traveled in the desert without finding water. When they came to Marah, they could not drink its water because it was bitter. (That is why the place is called Marah.) So the people grumbled against Moses, saying, “What are we to drink?” Then Moses cried out to the Lord, and the Lord showed him a piece of wood. He threw it into the water, and the water became fit to drink. There the Lord issued a ruling and instruction for them and put them to the test. He said, “If you listen carefully to the Lord your God and do what is right in his eyes, if you pay attention to his commands and keep all his decrees, I will not bring on you any of the diseases I brought on the Egyptians, for I am the Lord, who heals you.”

Here in this story from the Israelites’ desert days we see God providing for them and reminding them that He is their healer. It seems to me that I should read these verses on a daily basis. I need constant reminding of God’s provision and His healing. Let me encourage you that if you feel the same, you are not alone.

God is our healer and He has the power to heal us on every level, emotionally, physically and spiritually. Often healing of the three parts goes hand in hand or has a domino effect through each level. I know for me, personally, God has done some amazing healing on an emotional level over my life. With the healing of my deepest heart wounds, I am now free to grow closer to God in my spirit and hear His voice more clearly.

Let me be clear, it was not God that was blocking my closeness but my own habit of holding on SO tightly to past hurts that I had built a wall around my heart and would not let God in. Once I was aware of the wall I had built I enlisted the help of an amazing prayer partner to start tearing the wall down.

Do you know how my healing came? It came through an exercise of forgiveness of the offenders. I was actually led, during prayer, through a visualization of me forgiving my offenders and then asking Jesus (as He hung on the cross) to forgive them as well. Then, I left my offenders there and walked away, signifying my leaving them with Jesus, where they belong. Then I envisioned, closing the door on the old hurts and breaking down the walls I had built. Once that door closed, in my mind I watched the blood of Jesus seal that door of my heart-hurts forever.

This was a deeply emotionally exhausting experience and I immediately felt the difference in my spirit. I encourage you to bring any part of your life in which you need healing and leave it at the foot of the cross. Jesus died on that cross to bring forgiveness to our souls and that allows for all sorts of healing through His Spirit. You need only to ask and seek Him to receive.

Blessings and Love,
Pamela