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Chasity L.
Battleboro, NC
Beauty for Ashes
God used your book Beauty for Ashes to bring healing to my broken heart and change to my life. I was not physically or sexually abused, but I was emotionally abused. I grew up in an unsaved family with a father who was very demanding. He did not express love, kindness or affirmation toward his children. An emotion that was often expressed, however, was anger and disapproval. As a result, I grew up very angry, strong-willed and determined, yet emotionally vulnerable. The man who should have loved me most in the world was mean, cold and distant, and I was never anything he wanted me to be.
In 1994, during my second year in college, I accepted Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior. I told God the only thing I wanted was for Him to fix my relationship with my dad. I asked Him to fix me, change me and give me the strength to endure until it happened. A few days later a Christian friend took me to a Christian bookstore and I saw your book. The subtitle, How to Receive Emotional Healing, is what caught my attention. I purchased the book and immediately began reading. As I read, it was as though my life was being unfolded on the pages. Although I was not sexually abused, the hurt, the bitterness and the feelings were all the same. I could so deeply identify with your personality because it was like mine. Your book led me into deep prayer for my father. That time of prayer was a significant experience with the Holy Spirit!
The phrase in your book “hurting people hurt people” prompted me to investigate my dad’s childhood because I knew very little about his life. I learned some pretty terrible things. Although it did not justify my dad’s behavior and how he treated us, it helped me to have compassion for him. Knowing about his pain helped me to take myself out of the role of victim. I realized that he really did love me; he was just trapped in his own hurt and couldn’t get out of it to show me his love. I grieved deeply for the man I had hated so much of my life. How awful it must be to hurt your entire life, have your own children, try to love them, and wind up with them hating you because they don’t understand your pain. It was then that I understood that he was passing on the pain of his childhood and that I would pass this on to my children if I held on to the hurt and refused to forgive him.
That’s how God changed me! He replaced the hate in my heart with a new love that gets deeper each year. Now thirteen years later, I enjoy a new and loving relationship with my father. The love God restored is so pure it’s as though our relationship and my heart were never marred by hatred and bitterness. What’s even greater is that I am now the mother of three wonderful little boys whom I am FREE to love. My dad is learning to express love to my boys and it is reaching his children too. Most importantly, my boys are the first generation in my family to be born into a saved family! Your book and life not only affected my dad and me, but it affected the lives of my children and will affect their children.
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