I was first called to consciously share the world of childhood trauma in 1992.[1] It continues to stand as the beginning of the most painful journey I have ever faced.
Along
the way, I learned a lot of helpful things about what trauma does to us, the
effects of our self-protective strategies, and how wonderfully the word of God
addresses every imaginable wound a child (of any age) could ever experience.[2]
One
of the most helpful acronyms for understanding what childhood trauma does to us
is in the letters WLVS,[3]
which our home church has expanded as WoLVeS to help make the point all the
clearer.
WoLVeS
stands for the Wounds, Lies, Vows and Strongholds that harass us at every turn
when we have never experienced healing and freedom in Jesus Christ. In short,
it simply refers to what happens when we are Wounded as children (or any
age) and the devil comes in and Lies to us about who God is to us and
who we are to him. If we take those Lies to heart, we then make self-protective
Vows to never let ourselves get hurt again (even though that never
works). This sarky/fleshly pattern becomes so ingrained into us that it creates
a Stronghold of always shutting down when we are triggered (often
preceded with an explosion of some sort).
The
last two days, my time with God in his word brought my mind to consider how I
would express an acronym to stand against our WoLVeS. It is one thing to
identify what is wrong with us, but we need some expression of the “good
news of great joy” that comes to us in the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.[4]
I
had just asked Father if there was anything from my past he wanted me to
remember that would give me opportunity to renew my mind with his truth about
those things. His answer was not to lead me to remember anything that happened
to me, but to remember things about him and my relationship to him, things that
are easily forgotten when the WoLVeS attack.
This
brought me to the WoLVeS acronym where I remembered that the one part of this
imagery that does not change in our freedom work is the “W”, the “Wounds”.
There is nothing wrong with wounds. They happen. Jesus was wounded and it
didn’t cause WoLVeS (it actually gave us our salvation). Paul was wounded, and
no WoLVeS (it actually gave us most of his letters to the churches!).
Why
did Jesus, Paul, and others, not have WoLVeS?
Because
they did not believe the devil’s Lies, they did not make self-protective Vows,
and they did not give the devil Strongholds from which to work.
The
message is not that we ourselves, especially as children, knew how to do this.
The good news I am sharing is not primarily focused at making churches where
everybody gets this right all the way from childhood and never needs help.
Jesus did not come to seek and to save the well, but to seek and to save
the LOST![5]
He came into the world to save SINNERS, of whom Paul saw himself as the best
(or worst) example.[6]
God
gives his children something that no worldling will ever experience, something
called being transformed through the renewal of our minds.[7]
When someone receives new life in Jesus, and becomes a new creature in him,
part of this newness includes a new mind and a new heart.[8]
This means that we can think in new ways, believe new and wonderful things, and
walk in “newness of life”![9]
As
I have only begun considering an acronym to contrast with our WoLVeS imagery,
what came to mind is quite fitting, that our WoRTH defeats the WoLVeS.
|
WoLVeS |
WoRTH |
|
Wounds: they happen, not the problem. |
Wounds: they happen, not the problem. |
|
Lies: filling our minds with falsehoods
about God that immediately steal our thoughts of running to Father for help. |
Reality: filling our minds with what is
real about God and ourselves so that we want to run to him for help. |
|
Vows: setting up self-protective walls
to make sure we never get wounded again. |
Truth: letting ourselves bond with the
Truth in mind, heart and soul so that our wounds always increase our
attachment with the Triune God. |
|
Strongholds: accepting
bondage-strategies as both necessary and normal so that we are unable to walk
in the light or in the truth no matter how brightly or truthfully it is
presented. |
Hope: attaching to every promise of who
we are to God, what he is doing in us, where he is taking us, and what he
will complete in us, knowing they all will be fulfilled no matter how wounded
we have ever been. |
This is not, for me,
about how well I have matched the WoLVeS acronym with something of my own. It
is about the realization that, when we ask God what he wants us to “remember”
about our pasts, don’t be surprised if he skips memories of things that were
done to us and takes us to realities about our relationship with him that we
have forgotten (or never knew) because we have believed the devil’s lies.
Jesus
said, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will
know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”[10]
Abiding
doesn’t merely mean spending time; it means attaching. In other words, when the
lies inside us are replaced by the realities of attachment to Jesus, that is
when we truly become his disciples (followers), and in that attachment to him,
that is when we really come to know the truth (since Jesus IS the truth), and
in our attachment to Jesus as the Truth, Jesus sets us free in himself.
While
1992 is the year I was thrown into thoughts and feelings of childhood trauma
like I had never known before, that is not where my journey started. My
testimony begins earlier that year when God opened my ears to how he speaks
through his word, opened my eyes to how he shows us what he is doing, and
opened my will to how we join him in his work.[11]
The
wonderfully gracious thing is that our Father in heaven was leading me into
what was Real about walking with him every day of my life before showing me how
much damage the Devil’s lies had done to me and people I love. He was already
opening my heart, soul and mind to his Truth to give me the weapons that “destroy
strongholds… arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of
God” and lead us to “take every thought captive to obey Christ…”[12]
And he was already flooding my inner being with Hope that all his children can
experience everything he promises for our healing, freedom and maturing in Christ
in this lifetime, and the perfection of our eternal life at the return of our
Savior.
What do we do with this?
We
ask our heavenly Father to show us any Wounds that haven’t been healed, any
Lies we have believed, any Vows we have made and any Strongholds we have
created so that we can come into his presence with our Wounds, attach to the Realities
of who we are in Christ, bond with the Truth that sets us free, and “hold
fast to the Hope set before us… a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul…”[13]
And, if you are one of those rare people who has experienced no hindrances
in your walk with God because of childhood or other trauma, ask Father who needs
the kind of help we are exploring here and go join him in his work of healing
the brokenhearted and binding up their wounds.[14]
© 2020 Monte Vigh ~ Box 517, Merritt, BC, V1K 1B8
Email: in2freedom@gmail.com
Unless otherwise noted, Scriptures are from the
English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text
Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of
Good News Publishers.)
[1] I was obviously living
in the effects of childhood trauma for most of my life but had not had to face
it head on as began that year.
[2] I share this with the
belief that, contemporary problems and understandings of the human condition do
not need to be mentioned in the Bible to be considered valid, but our
understanding of what God will do to help us with anything at all in life does
come from God’s word and is promised to us in the new covenant in Jesus’ blood.
We seek to know what God has given to us in our justification by grace through
faith that makes us right with him, what he is doing now in our sanctification
by grace through faith in which we keep growing up to maturity in Christ, and
what he will complete in our glorification by grace through faith when we
finally become fully like Jesus when we see him as he is.
[3] This was introduced to
us by Marcus Warner in his resource, Understanding the Wounded Heart.
Marcus is the leader of Deeper Walk International (https://deeperwalkinternational.org/). Just a reminder to not assume that someone
sharing something they have learned from a ministry means they endorse
everything about that ministry! I’m just giving credit where credit is due.
[4] Luke 2:10-11 (context:
Luke 2:1-20)
[5] Luke 19:10
[6] I Timothy 1:15 (Note:
Paul was not saying that he was living a life so sinful that he was always the “foremost”
of sinners. Rather, in a similar way to how Wayne Gretzky, at time of writing,
holds the highest points record in the NHL even long after he retired from
playing, Paul saw himself as the chief example of a sinner even long after he
was no longer living a life of sin).
[7] Romans 12:2
[8] II Corinthians 5:17; I
Corinthians 2:16; Ezekiel 36:26
[9] Romans 6:4
[10] John 8:31-32
[11] One of the most
helpful Scriptures in this regard is Philippians 2:12-13 where I considered
what it looks like for God to work in us to will and to work for his good
pleasure resulting in us working out our own salvation with fear and trembling.
Such serious realities require sincere attachments.
[12] II Corinthians 10:4-5
(context: II Corinthians 10:1-18)
[13] Hebrews 6:19 (context:
Hebrews 6:13-20)
[14] Psalm 147:3
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