CHAPTER 5 RESCUED BY LOVE

RESCUED BY LOVE
If you are a person who has been abused, by
now you have probably
identified some problem areas in your life. To
point out problems
without offering a solution to them would be
disastrous. If I did
that, you would end up more frustrated than
you were before you began
reading this book.
I intend to outline the major truths that brought
healing in my own
life. As I do so, I would like to remind you that
God is no respecter
of persons (see Acts 10:34). What He does for
one person, He will do
for another, if it is a promise found in His Word.
The My first husband did not know how to love, so I
received no love at
all from our relationship. Although my
wonderful second husband, Dave,
did truly love me, I knew no more than I ever
had about how to receive
love. I bounced back and forth between: (1)
rejecting his love and
closing him out of my life by building walls
around myself to ensure
that I would not get hurt (or so I thought), and,
(2) trying to get
him to love me with a kind of perfect and
complete love that was
humanly impossible for him to achieve. In 1
John 4:18 we read that
perfect love casts out fear. Only God can love
perfectly and
without fault. No matter how much anyone may
love another person, he
is still human. As our Lord said, "The spirit
indeed is willing, but
the flesh is weak" (Matthew 26:41). People
always disappoint other
people -they always love somewhat imperfectly,
simply because that is
part of human nature.
I was trying to get Dave to give me something
that only God could give
me, which was a sense of my own value and
worth. I wanted my husband
to love me totally and to treat me perfectly so I
could finally feel
good about myself. Whenever he failed me,
disappointed me, or hurt me,
I would put up walls between us and not allow
him in at all for days
or even weeks.
Many people who come from abusive,
dysfunctional backgrounds cannot
maintain healthy, lasting relationships because
either they do not
know how to receive love or they place an
unbalanced demand on their
marriage partners to give them what only God
can give. The resulting
frustration often ruins the marriage.
This same principle can be applied to
friendships. One time a woman
came up to me in a prayer line and said: "Joyce,
help me. I am so
lonely. Every time I get a friend, I suffocate
her." This lady was so
love-starved that if she found anyone who
would pay any attention to
her at all, she tried to collect all her past
emotional debts from
that individual, who owed her nothing. Her new
friend was usually
frightened
away.
God's Boundless, Unconditional, Perfect Love
One day as I was reading the Bible, I noticed
this statement in 2
Corinthians 5:7: "For we walk by faith [we
regulate our lives and
conduct ourselves by our conviction or belief
respecting man's
relationship to God and divine things, with trust
and holy fervor;
thus we walk] not by sight or appearance."
The Holy Spirit stopped me and asked, "What do
you believe, Joyce,
about your relationship with God? Do you
believe He loves you?"
As I honestly began to search my heart and to
study the Word of God on
this subject, I came to the conclusion that I did
believe that God
loved me, but conditionally.
The Bible teaches us that God loves us perfectly
or unconditionally.
His perfect love for us is not based on our
perfection. It is not
based on anything except Himself. God is love
(see 1 John 4:8). Love
is not His occupation; it is Who He is. God
always loves us, but often
we stop receiving His love, especially if our
behavior is not good.
I would like to stop here and present several
passages of scripture
that have come to mean a lot to me. Please
take time to read them
slowly. Digest them and allow them to become
apart of you:
And we know (understand, recognize, are
conscious of, by observation
and by experience) and believe (adhere to and
put faith in and rely
on) the love God cherishes for us. God is love,
and he who dwells and
continues in love dwells and continues in God,
and God dwells and
continues in him.
In this [union and communion with Him] love is
brought to completion
and attains perfection with us, that we may
have confidence for the
day of judgment [with assurance and boldness
to face Him], because as
He is, so are we in this world. There is no fear
in love [dread does
not exist], but full-grown (complete, perfect)
love turns fear out of
doors and expels every trace of terror! For fear
brings with it the
thought of punishment, and [so] he who is
afraid has not reached the
full maturity of love [is not yet grown into love's
complete
perfection].
We love Him, because He first loved us. (1 John 4:16-19)
In this the love of God was made manifest
(displayed) where we are
concerned: in that God sent His Son, the only
begotten or unique
[Son], into the world so that we might live
through Him.
In this is love: not that we loved God, but that
He loved us and sent
His Son to be the propitiation (the atoning
sacrifice) for our sins.
Beloved, if God loved us so [very much], we also
ought to love one
another. (1 John 4:9-11)
Who shall ever separate us from Christ's love?
Shall suffering and
affliction and tribulation? Or calamity and
distress? Or persecution
or hunger or destitution or peril or sword?
(Romans 8:35)
For I am persuaded beyond doubt (am sure)
that neither death nor life,
nor angels nor principalities, nor things
impending and threatening
nor things to come, nor powers,
Nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all
creation will be able
to separate us from the love of God which is in
Christ Jesus our Lord.
(Romans 8:38-39)
May Christ through your faith [actually] dwell
(settle down, abide,
make His permanent home) in your hearts! May
you be rooted deep in
love and founded securely on love,That you may
have the power and be
strong to apprehend and grasp with all the
saints God's devoted
people, the experience of that love] what is the
breadth and length
and height and depth [of it];
[That you may really come] to know [practically,
through experience
for yourselves] the love of Christ, which far
surpasses mere knowledge
[without experience]; that you may be filled
[through all your being]
unto all the fullness of God [may have the
richest measure of the divine Presence, and
become a body wholly
filled and flooded with God Himself]! (Ephesians
3:17-19)
Such hope never disappoints or deludes or
shames us, for God's love
has been poured out in our hearts through the
Holy Spirit Who has been
given to us.
(Romans 5:5)
Behold, I have indelibly imprinted (tattooed a
picture of) you on the
palm of each of My hands. (Isaiah 49:16)
First John 4:16 is a key scripture for me because it says that we
should be conscious and aware of God's love
and put faith in it. I was
unconscious and unaware of God's love;
therefore, I was not putting
faith in His love for me.*
When the devil condemned me, I did not know
how to say, "Yes, I made a
mistake," then go to God, ask for His
forgiveness, receive His love,
and press on. Instead, I would spend hours and
even days feeling
guilty about each little thing I did wrong. I was
literally tormented!
John tells us that fear has torment, but that the
perfect love of God
casts out fear (see 1 John 4:18) . God's love for
me was perfect
because it was based on Him, not on me. So
even when I failed, He kept
loving me. God's love for you is perfect-and
unconditional. When you
fail, He keeps on loving you, because His love is
not based on you but
on Him. When you fail, do you stop receiving
God's love and start punishing yourself by
feeling guilty and
condemned? I felt guilty and bad about myself
for the first forty
years of my life. I faithfully carried my sack of
guilt on my back
everywhere I went. It was a heavy burden, and
it was always with me. I
made mistakes regularly, and I felt guilty about
each one of them.
In Romans 8:33-35 the apostle Paul says:
Who shall bring any charge against God's elect
[when it is] God Who
justifies [that is, Who puts us in right relation to
Himself? Who
shall come forward and accuse or impeach those
whom God has chosen?
Will God, Who acquits us?]
Who is there to condemn [us]? Will Christ Jesus
(the Messiah), Who
died, or rather Who was raised from the dead,
Who is at the right hand
of God actually pleading as He intercedes for
us?
Who shall ever separate us from Christ's love?
The devil's goal is to separate us from God's
love, because God's love
is the main factor in our emotional healing.
We are created for love. In Ephesians 2:4-6 Paul
says that God is so
rich in mercy that He saved us and gave us
what we do not deserve, in
order to satisfy the demands of His intense love
for us. Think about
it. God intends to love us. He has to love us-He is
love!
You and I are created for love! Sin separated us
from God, but He
loved us so much that He sent His only Son,
Jesus, to die for us, to
redeem us, to purchase us back, so that He
could lavish His great love
upon us. All we need to do is believe what the
Bible says about our
relationship with God. Once we do that, the
healing process can begin.
During the first year that my husband Dave and
I began our ministry
called Life In The Word, the Holy Spirit worked
with me to teach me
about God's love. I kept a book of
remembrance of special things the
Lord did for me during that time -little things
mostly, personal
things that showed me that God cared. By this
method I began to become
more conscious of His unconditional love. It
helped me to remember
that God loved me.
If you can believe that God, Who is so perfect,
loves you, then you
can believe that you are worth loving.
Once you believe that you are accepted and
loved by God, then you can
begin accepting and loving yourself. Then not
only will you start
loving God in return, you will also start loving
other people.
You Can't Give Away What You Don't Have!
Many people receive Jesus and then
immediately start trying to love
everybody. Too often they end up feeling
condemned because they find
that they just
cannot do it. It is impossible to truly love others
without first
receiving the love of God, because there is no
love there to give.
In 1 Corinthians, chapter 13, often called "the
love chapter," Paul
emphasizes this truth quite clearly. In the first
verse he defines
love as "(that reasoning, intentional, spiritual
devotion such as is
inspired by God's love for and in us)." This
entire chapter is focused
on teaching us how to walk in love, yet it clearly
says that love must
first be in us.
Most people can believe that God loves them
when they can feel that
they deserve it. Problems arise when they feel
that they do not
deserve God's love, and yet desperately need it.
The following charts
illustrate The ongoing effects of receiving or not receiving the
love
of God. Notice that the belief that God's love
for us depends on our
worthiness is a deception that causes many
problems in our lives. On
the other hand, believing that God loves us
unconditionally brings
much joy and blessedness.
Receiving God's Love
Determine in your heart that you will receive
God's love. Here are
some practical suggestions to help you do that.
These are all things
that I believe the Lord led me to do, and I
believe they will be of
help to you too. However, remember that we
are all special and unique
and that God has an individual, personalized
plan for each of us.
Don't get lost in methods.
THE TRICKLE-DOWN THEORY
OF CONDITIONAL LOVE
Jesus Loves Me, BUT. . .He loves me
conditionally.
• therefore: His love is based on my
performance.
• therefore: I have to earn His love by
pleasing Him.
• therefore: When I please Him, I feel loved.
• When I do not please Him, I feel rejected.
• therefore: If God, Who is "all-loving," does
not always love,
accept, and value me,
• how can I be expected to believe that I
am valuable and lovable?
• therefore: I do not believe that I am
basically a lovable, valuable person.
• therefore, I am not able to trust other
people who say they love me.
I suspect their motives or figure that they just
do not know the
"real" me yet.
• therefore, I cannot accept love from other
people. I deflect it. I
try to prove that I am
right-that I am NOT lovable, and that they will
eventually reject me.
therefore, they usually do.
• therefore, since I do not love who I AM, I
do not expect that others
will love me either. Why would anyone want
something that has no real
value?
• therefore, I try to earn their love by what
I DO. I do not give out
of a desire to love, but to BE LOVED. Most of
what I do is tied up in
"self," so the people I profess to love do not
really feel loved. They
feel manipulated. I am trying to avoid rejection
rather than trying to
build a loving relationship.
• therefore, I use The world's standards (money, status, clothes,
etc.) to prove to others and myself that I am
VALUABLE. I need strokes
and feedback from other people to prove to
myself and to others that I
am LOVABLE.
• therefore, I need a "fresh fix" of strokes
every day just to get
through the day feeling good about myself.
• therefore, I look to others to give me
something that only God can
give me-a sense of my own SELF-WORTH.
• therefore, I place impossible demands on
people who love me. I frustrate"them. I am
never satisfied with what
they are giving me. I do not allow them to be
honest with me or
confront me. I am focused on me, and I expect
them to be focused on me
too.
• Therefore, I am not able to sustain a
healthy, loving, lasting relationship.
THE TRICKLE-DOWN THEORY
OF UNCONDITIONAL LOVE
Jesus Loves Me This I Know .
He loves me unconditionally.
• Therefore: His love for me is based on
who He is.
• Therefore: I have not earned His love, nor
can I earn His love
• Therefore: I can not be separated from His
love.
• When I obey Him He will bless me.
• When I disobey Him there maybe
consequences for my behavior.
• He may not like my behavior, but He
always loves me.
• Therefore: Since I have experienced God's
love, I know that I am lovable.
• Therefore since I know that God loves me,
I am able to believe that
there are people who could love me too.
• Therefore: I am able to trust people who
genuinely love me.
• Therefore: I am able to accept the love
that those people give me.
• Therefore: Since I know that I am God's
special and unique creation,
I know that the love I have to give is valuable.
• Therefore: I do not fret that I “have to”
perform for other people.
Either they will love me for who I am or they
won't. It is important
for me to be loved for who I am.
• Therefore: I am able to get my mind off of
what others are thinking
about me and focus on other people and their
needs.
• Therefore: since my most basic need for
love and sense of self-worth
has been met by God, I don't need to be “fixed”
by other people.
• Therefore: although I have need that I
look to other people to meet
(i.e. companionship, affection, fun), I believed
those needs are
balanced and God-given. I try to be honest in
assessing those needs
and in asking for what I need.
• Therefore: I expect other people to be
honest with me. I can handle
criticism or confrontation, when it's done in
love.
• Therefore: I am able to sustain a healthy
loving , lasting relationship.
These are things I suggest you do to help you
receive revelation
concerning God's love for you:
• Tell yourself, in your mind and out loud,
"God loves me." Say it,
and let it sink in. Repeat it often: when you
awake in the morning,
when you go to bed at night, and throughout
the entire day. Look at
yourself in the mirror, point to yourself, call
yourself by name, and
say, " , God loves you."
• Keep a diary, a book of remembrance, of
special things that God does
for you. Include little things as well as major
things. Read over your
list at least once a week, and you will be
encouraged. Let this become
a Holy Ghost project. I think you will have fun
with it, as I did.
• Learn, and even commit to memory,
several scriptures about the love
of God for you.
• Read some good books about God's love. I
recommend that you start
with the ones I have written called Tell Them I
Love Them, and
Reduce Me to Love.5
• Pray for the Holy Spirit, Who is the
Teacher, to give you a
revelation of God's love.