On This Day: Stephen’s Prayer for Saul’s Forgiveness

   Then they cast him out of the city and stoned him. And the witnesses laid down their garments at the feet of a young man named Saul. And as they were stoning Stephen, he called out, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” And falling to his knees he cried out with a loud voice, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” And when he had said this, he fell asleep. And Saul approved of his execution. (Acts 7:58-8:1)

   Sometime in the past couple of weeks, someone posted another stereotypical post about Christians only having two options in dealing with how we relate to those who wrong us. One option is always presented as forgiveness (even if the person hasn’t repented), the other option is always presented as anger or bitterness. Since we all know we shouldn’t give room for sinful anger or bitterness, we are tricked into thinking we must then choose to forgive people who have never repented of what they have done.

   When I ask people who believe this where in the Bible do we have an example of God, the prophets, Jesus, or the apostles forgiving someone who is clearly unrepentant, I am never given a text where this is shown. I can show multiple examples of unrepentant people not being forgiven, but there isn’t one example where a person is unrepentant about their sin but is forgiven anyway.

   However, there are two Scriptures that are claimed as proof that we are to forgive unrepentant people. One is when Jesus from the cross prayed, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” The other is when Stephen was dying and he prayed, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” I am told that this was them forgiving their enemies. And, because I just came to Stephen’s prayer this morning, it seems timely to once again share some very liberating insights.

   My response to the claim that Jesus and Stephen were forgiving their enemies is always something to the effect of, “Read it again.” If the texts were telling us that Jesus and Stephen were forgiving their persecutors, the wording would need to be from Jesus, “Father, I forgive them…”, and from Stephen, “Lord, I do not hold this sin against them.”

   The wording by both Jesus and Stephen is prayer. They are both talking to “our Father in heaven”, and they are both praying for their persecutors. When we realize Jesus DID instruct us to pray for our persecutors, and we see that this is what Jesus was doing, we can back up a bit and ask ourselves what it would look like for us to pray for our enemies like that.

   Back in 1993, I was introduced to the concept of “freedom in Christ”. I was on the verge of heading through one of the most painful valleys of my life as childhood trauma and abuse came leaking out of my people. I began to see how many Scriptures spoke of God doing things for us that I had not seen him doing in me or others, and I felt a longing to experience God the way I was learning in his word.

   In the 3+ decades since then, it has become clear to me why it is so important to show people the difference between praying that God would forgive someone (like Jesus and Stephen did) and just forgiving them even if they haven’t repented (which can’t be found in Scripture). When we know that God never forgives people until they repent, then our prayer for their forgiveness is with the understanding that people “presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance”.

   Why do we need God’s kindness leading us to repentance if we are forgiven without repenting? If all our sins are cancelled without repenting, why did Jesus say that “repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem” (Luke 24:7)? There is no forgiveness anywhere in the Bible without repentance.

   It is very liberating for abused and traumatized people to understand that no one is forgiven until they repent. Their abusers, their persecutors, their enemies, will not be forgiven unless they repent. If we pray for God to bless them, he won’t answer that prayer without humbling them to repentance first.

   So, instead of these victims cringing at the feeling of injustice with the “just forgive” mantra that can’t be found in the Bible, they can let God lead them into his grace where they truly want God to reach those people with his love and mercy because they have no hope until they repent and are forgiven.

   And when we can truly pray for these people that God would forgive them, and we know this can only happen if they repent, we are able to accept God’s will in this because we can allow ourselves to want these people to experience God’s kindness leading them to repentance just as we experienced for ourselves.

   I know I am in the minority when I show these things from God’s word. If you’re not convinced, I’m still waiting for someone to show me a scene in Scripture where someone is clearly unrepentant and either Yahweh or his prophets in the Old Testament, or Jesus and his apostles in the New Testament, forgave the unrepentant person who was continuing in sin. In all my times through the Bible, I have not come across one instance of this.

   To encourage me in this viewpoint of Stephen’s prayer for his persecutors (not him forgiving his enemies), I found this comment from William Hendriksen in his commentary on Acts 7. He wrote,

Reflecting on the death of Stephen and Paul’s consent, Augustine made this penetrating comment:
    “If Stephen had not prayed,
    the church would not have had Paul.”[1]

Augustine (and William Hendriksen with him) saw that Stephen’s prayer, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them,” is linked to our introduction to sinful Saul, who became the beloved apostle Paul. When we continue down the road and see how God’s kindness brought Paul to repentance, we can see how Stephen’s prayer was answered in God’s gift to Paul of repentance and faith.

   For me, this hit the bull’s eye of my heart today, not as a way to win a debate on the topic of “to forgive or not to forgive”, but to realize that I have “Sauls” in my life who need me to pray for their forgiveness. I know God will only answer that prayer by leading them to repentance (I have lots of Beatitudinal Valley illustrations to go along with this), and I know I want them to experience that mercy from God as I have on so many occasions.

  Ultimately, we do not pray to make God do something our way. Our praying is to line us up with God’s will. God leading me to pray this way is his will, and it is up to him if I ever see the answer. Stephen did not see his prayer answered that day because he died just seconds later. But seeing Paul’s arrival in eternity some decades later (whatever that feels like in the spiritual realm) would have been an experience of joy filled with praise to God.

   Today, I will pray in hope and praise in confidence. God will work it for good, and I might live long enough to see some of my Sauls reconcile with both God and his people. In the meantime, praying the way Jesus and Stephen did keeps my heart free, and that’s what the people in my life need from me each day. 

 

© 2025 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.)

 

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[1] Kistemaker, S. J., & Hendriksen, W. (1953–2001). Exposition of the Acts of the Apostles (Vol. 17, pp. 281–282). Baker Book House.

On This Day: To Rest in What is Revealed

   In that same hour he rejoiced in the Holy Spirit and said, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. 
   All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows who the Son is except the Father, or who the Father is except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.” (Luke 10:21-22)

   One of the biggest things I want people to know is that eternal life is to KNOW God. Jesus said, “And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent” (John 17:3). 

   Yes, that is the essence of what it means to receive eternal life through faith in Jesus Christ. Jesus has secured the salvation by which we can return to the God who created us and know him as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. 

   This means that our daily interest should be in how well we know God. And, for some of us (at least people like me), how well I know God rests completely on how he feels about knowing me. 

   The stage on which Jesus has made his heart known to me over the years has been one littered by broken relationships. I grew up in a family that was broken. My attachment-light got stuck in the “always on” position because I was desperate to not miss the hope-springs-eternal time that someone might actually want to attach to me. When I learned that the term “hyper-vigilant” describes a mindstate that has been trained to be on guard against danger, I wanted to know how to bring that into my relationship with God.

   Or, how God was shining his spotlight onto my broken radar system so he could heal what was wounded and bring me to peace in my relationship with him.

   Since I had my first conscious awareness of God’s interest in me almost 6 decades ago, and then learned how to listen to him in his word in the most real and personal of ways almost 33 years ago, I can chart a relationship with God that has been growing because I am God’s child. My security with him doesn’t rest on how well I hang on to him, but on how settled his love is for me. My significance to him doesn’t depend on what I do for good, but what his goodness has delighted in for me before I was even created. My acceptance with God doesn’t rest on my good behavior that must always be that 1 ounce more than anything I do wrong. Rather, my acceptance with the Triune God rests on him accepting me in his beloved Son.

   No matter who I talk with, and no matter who I imagine might read this, my supreme interest is in how they know God. I regularly remind people to see the grace and peace of God in the Beatitudinal Valley because the way God blesses us is typically so different than religious (and irreligious) life has taught us. We need to attach to God in our poverty of spirit in order to know what it means to truly have peace with God. 

   Today it feels like God is comforting me in some of the most painful losses I have experienced as he shows me the reality of his desire to find me and have me as his own. Yes, the Creator of the heavens and the earth. Yes, the judge of all creation. Yes, the eternal Father, the glorious Son, the comforting Holy Spirit. They have a personal desire for me to know them and have gone through hell (so to speak) to have me. 

   If no one has told you this, stop pretending, and meet with God as you are. Tell “our Father in heaven” how you are doing. Be the child. Lay your complaints before him. Tell him what you don’t understand. Be honest. Be real. 

   And then listen. 

   Yes, open God’s word and listen to him. He is speaking. His Holy Spirit is with us to teach us all things and bring to our remembrance things we have already known. Whatever stands out, talk to him like that is what he is saying to you. Converse. Dialogue. Meditate on what he says. Cling to it with all your heart. 

   And today, let my testimony that learning “the Son CHOOSES (desires) to reveal” the Father to his beloved brothers encourage you that he will do the same for you as much as for me. Why? Because the level ground at the throne of grace is faith. Not necessarily great faith. Not even mature faith. Just faith that comes like a child and wants to get to know God. Yes, get to KNOW him!

   Eternal life comes through believing in Jesus Christ. And Jesus gives eternal life to us because we must be alive to know the Triune God. As John wrote, “In him (Jesus) was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it” (John 1:4-5).

   The darkness has not overcome Jesus’ work to pour the love of God into my heart by the Holy Spirit he has given us. Come to Jesus as you are and let him overcome the darkness in your life so he can lead you to know God better than you have ever known him before. 

© 2025 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.)

On This Day: When Desire to Follow Jesus is Broken

   And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it. For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself? For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words, of him will the Son of Man be ashamed when he comes in his glory and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels. But I tell you truly, there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the kingdom of God.” (Luke 9:23-27)

   I not only believe that all scriptures must be understood in the context of all Scripture, but I also expect that whatever God speaks to me about through his word each day will relate to the context of my life’s journey and my present circumstances.

   So, when I came to another familiar section of Luke’s gospel, I had to consider it from this dual context of what Jesus meant then, and how he intends to apply it in my life now. 

   As I looked up words and meanings, I discovered that Jesus’ choice of words in “would” had the distinctive meaning of desire. This is talking about someone who hears about Jesus and feels a desire to “come after” him, or to follow him. What Jesus is then clarifying is what it looks like to do so.

   My personal context is a few decades of living by the focus of “leading people to freedom in Christ so they can experience God in a real and personal way.” And what I have discovered during those decades is that Larry Crabb was right, more people in churches are committed to self-protection than to knowing and doing the will of God.

   So, how do we deal with such a clear description of what it means to follow Jesus when most church folks have no desire to be free of their self-protection? Answer: we show people that even the most broken person can desire to follow Jesus as described and then be honest about who is following Christ and who is not.

   I recall two ladies in one of our churches who were facing broken soul-condition stuff at the same time. Both had buried trauma under their preferred system of self-protection. Both had a role in the church that was seen by everyone. To deny themselves would mean to deny the right to continue relying on self-protection to bury their wounds and to follow Jesus into their journey of healing and freedom in Christ. 

   One of these women decided she would not trust Jesus to heal her and set her free and so she refortified her self-protection and began destroying anyone who threatened to expose her. She idolized the role she had created for herself in the church and would not let anyone take that away from her. The other woman began addressing what was broken in her with a sense that she could submit to Jesus for her freedom and healing because she really wanted to be free to follow him in life. 

   What stood out so clearly was that the one devoted to self-protection maintained a role in the church that made her look like a strong and devoted Christian while the other appeared to be really struggling in her walk with God but was actually submitting to him in one painful step after another of facing trauma I had never even heard of. 

   It is no accident that I so recently saw the difference between a “sinful” woman who came into a house worshiping and loving Jesus with all her heart, and the religious hypocrite who hosted the meal harboring a narcissistic heart under a cloak of self-protective pride. It was the woman who loved Jesus for forgiving all her sins who was truly denying herself to follow him, while the religious elite had no love for Jesus because his role portrayed him as righteous, and he got applause for his acting. 

   We cannot obey this calling to deny ourselves and follow Jesus grudgingly just to ensure we have our fire insurance policy from hell and some hope of a RIP in heaven. It begins with a desire to follow Jesus that then applies itself in self-denying ways throughout the day, throughout conflicts, throughout facing trauma, throughout falling into sin, so that whatever messes and successes we face, our desire to follow our Savior is applied in real life for God’s glory and the good of his people. 

© 2025 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.)

On This Day: My Story of What God Has Done for Me

   The man from whom the demons had gone begged that he might be with him, but Jesus sent him away, saying, “Return to your home, and declare how much God has done for you.” And he went away, proclaiming throughout the whole city how much Jesus had done for him. (Luke 8:38-39)

   First, we now need to clarify that “story” is an account of something that happened. It would be considered true unless otherwise stated. The need to clarify this is because the world wants us to think that if someone is “just telling stories” it means things that are not true, when a story is an account that could just as well be a true story as someone telling fables. 

   All that to say that my “story” is a true account of God’s work in my life, including my story of telling you how God focused on my story today!

   This morning’s story of meeting with God began with my usual keeping short accounts with God about anything sarky or sinful I had not confessed to him, telling him how I was doing, and then wondering to him what I was supposed to “get” out of the amazing (but familiar) account of Jesus delivering a spiritually-traumatized man from demonization (Luke 8:26-39). 

   However, it was when I got to Jesus’ final words to the man that I knew what God was addressing with me, that my focus in life is to tell people what God has done for me, and that did NOT include an amazing immediate deliverance event. 

   My story of what God has done for me includes these scenes:

1. I grew up in a home where an angry agnostic dad was always in conflict with a quiet Christian mom. The stage was set for me to test everything I heard to know the truth. 

2. At seven years old I looked up from my front yard in Sandspit, BC, and knew God was watching me. It was a good feeling.

3. At twelve years old I heard a gospel presentation at the end of a boy’s Sunday School class that triggered a clear response of faith. Without telling anyone, I inwardly asked Jesus to please be my Lord and Savior because I wanted to experience what he had done for me on the cross.

4. After struggling for a couple of years always feeling like I needed to receive Jesus again because I was still such a sinner (my dad made sure I knew this was what I should think of myself) I went forward at a Barry Moore Crusade in Abbotsford BC (early 70’s) to affirm that I “got it”. Jesus died once for all, and I only had to receive him once for all. 

5. Soon after this I knew I was to declare Jesus as my Lord and Savior through baptism. However, after the pastor had visited to talk with me and my sisters about it, I was again traumatized by such a tirade about what a horrible specimen of a Christian I was that I caved and failed to honor Jesus. 

6. When I was around 18, I had grown stronger in my faith and knew that it was time to confess Jesus as my Lord through baptism no matter what anyone else thought of it, and so I did. I was not aware of any celebration of the event, only that I was obeying my Savior in faith, and that was all that mattered. 

7. From there, I could go on about the ways God was leading me to get to know him better through Bible college, my early years of marriage, moving to Merritt to pastor a Baptist church, and how he used Larry Crabb, Henry Blackaby, and Neil Anderson, to give me the life purpose, “Leading people to freedom in Christ so they can experience God in a real and personal way.”  

   What God did this morning was assure me that he only required me to tell my own story of what he has done for me, not someone else’s. And one of the delightful things is that he used a demonized man whose story was totally different from mine to encourage me to tell my story today that is totally different from his. 

   I simply trust that my place in God’s work is to tell of things that some people need to hear today. And if you are one of those people, what is your story of what God is doing for you right now, and how are you joining him in that work?

© 2025 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.)

On This Day: When ‘God is love’ Gets Angry

   And they were bringing children to him that he might touch them, and the disciples rebuked them. But when Jesus saw it, he was indignant and said to them, “Let the children come to me; do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God. Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it.” And he took them in his arms and blessed them, laying his hands on them. (Mark 10:13-16)

   Today was the third time in the past couple of weeks that it has stood out what Jesus said about children. 

   First, Jesus said that whoever receives a child in his name is receiving both him and the Father at the same time (as unthinkably wonderful as that is!).

   Second, Jesus warned that anyone who would cause one of his little ones who believe in him to sin would be better off tossed into the sea with a millstone around his neck than face Jesus’ judgment on such evil. 

   Third, today’s reference shows Jesus responding with indignation to his disciples trying to prevent children from coming to him. And it is this expression of pure and genuine emotion from Jesus I found so captivating this morning. 

   The first thing that came to mind was some heartbreaking scenes of watching parents literally traumatizing their children to keep them from trusting Jesus in “the obedience of faith”. This morning, God made very clear how he feels about such abuse!

   The second focus was a journey down the heartbreaking memory lane of adults who were traumatized as children simply because they believed in God and wanted to know Jesus as their Lord and Savior. Today this was made clear as well, that God’s response to those childhood traumas was one of indignation against anyone who deliberately hindered us from coming to Jesus Christ.

   The reason anyone tries to stop children (or the child-hearted) from coming to Jesus is because that is Satan’s will and work. Paul said it like this, “In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God” (II Corinthians 4:4). Satan will do anything, and he will use anyone, to keep people from seeing God’s glory in Jesus Christ.

   But when Paul continues, “For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (II Corinthians 4:6), we now need to include Jesus’ “indignation” as God’s glory shining out through the face of his Son. 

   In this past year, I have discovered a strong movement of false teachers telling people that God, the Bible, and the way of God’s kingdom need to be rewritten to be “more Christlike”. But today I see Jesus himself showing God’s love for children in his indignation against those who hinder them from coming to him. There is no such thing as a loving God who tolerates sin against his Little Ones. 

   I was amazed this morning at how God touched my own wounded heart in this area. He brought to the surface my heartache about seeing beloved children deliberately turned away from the Savior. And he took me back to my childhood trauma and showed me his indignation about what was done to me. 

   Since I know that what comes next is Jesus’ affirming that we must be like little children to enter his kingdom, it amazes me that he would address childhood trauma head-on with an expression of the most loving response a child could ever see, the indignation of God himself standing against anyone who would keep them from his Son. 

   I hope this encourages you to deal with any part of this that applies to you so that you are coming to Jesus yourself and helping others to do so as well. Whether he shows you something he is doing in his Little Ones that you can join, or brings to mind the children and child-hearted who need your prayers, come to Jesus with all your heart and ask him to help you help others to join you.

© 2024 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.)

On This Day: The ‘Again he began to teach’ of Jesus

Again he began to teach beside the sea. And a very large crowd gathered about him, so that he got into a boat and sat in it on the sea, and the whole crowd was beside the sea on the land. And he was teaching them many things in parables, and in his teaching he said to them: (Mark 4:1-2)

 

   Before I looked at the next section of God’s word in the gospel of Mark, I was already wondering how God would break through my familiarity with the gospels to teach me what I needed to walk with him today. Some days that thought leans more toward despondency, and other days more toward excited expectation. But it is always there, that I am dependent on God to make known to me whatever he pleases through his word.

   As a bit of background, I learned a few years ago that our brains process information from the right-side to the left-side. The right-hemisphere is focused on bonding (who or what we are attached to) and the left-hemisphere on believing. 

   This is fascinating and explains so much of why people in churches struggle to attach to truth. It isn’t because the truth of God’s word doesn’t make sense, it’s because they have bonded to someone or something that is restricting their ability to believe the good news.

   For example, I have had many professing Christians in churches struggle to believe God loves them. For a long time, I didn’t understand why such obvious truths in Scripture as God’s love for his beloved children had virtually no impact on some people. When I heard that anything I taught was processed on the right side of the brain before it got to the left side, and that it was the deepest bonds that were filtering what a person could believe, I realized that these people needed help with their relationship with God (bonding) more than their instruction about God (believing). 

   I don’t have room to say more in this short post, but ever since I learned how our brains process the intel of our five senses, I have also helped myself by watching for signs of bonding issues that need ministry so my believing issues are free to “delight in truth in the inward being,” so God can “teach me wisdom in the secret heart” (Psalm 51:6). 

   For today, I simply loved the “inward being” feeling of my “secret heart” that delighted in the attachment I felt to Jesus “again” beginning “to teach beside the sea”. Aside from the fact that I grew up in Sandspit, BC, with the “sea” right outside my bedroom window, knowing that God has given me everything I need to meet with Jesus Christ my Creator, Savior, and Lord every morning and day of my life is awesome in the real sense. And knowing that through the word of God in the Bible, I can hear Jesus teaching me by his Spirit today as clearly as those people heard him then fills me with so much wonder and awe that I do not want to miss anything “the Spirit is saying to the churches”. 

   Part of the application for me is to “again” pass on to you those “wonderful words of life”, as the old hymn expressed it. And the verse that just came up with Psalm 51:6 seems like such a beautiful way to conclude, “The Preacher sought to find words of delight, and uprightly he wrote words of truth” (Ecclesiastes 12:10). 

   I’m going to head out on a prayer walk shortly. I will be praying for whoever reads this, that any right-brain bonding issues will be met and comforted and healed by the God who “heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds” (Psalm 147:3). This will include praying that anyone who needs help and healing for their bonding issues will find it through the body of Christ expressing the love of Christ by serving one another in love just as our Savior does “again” and “again”.   

© 2024 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.)

A Personal Journey from Shame to Honor

LONG AGO, when God first showed me the “Deeper” of my orphan-mindedness, he began leading me on a journey of getting to know the Triune as the “first” of my family. Each “higher” that followed revealed to my orphan-mind what it meant to have a Father in heaven, a Firstborn Brother as Savior and Lord, and a Helper in the Holy Spirit who would be Jesus with me always. 

HOWEVER, in one memorable Deeper I discovered that, of the three persons of the Triune, it was Jesus who triggered the most negative-emotion reaction in me. I realized that I had a “fear-based identity”, and the fear reactions seemed to come from a stronghold of shame that was free to do whatever it wanted in my life. I also learned that the shame felt strongest when I pictured Jesus looking at me. 

THIS MORNING, I was traveling through a deeper layer of the familiar orphan-minded territory. I was facing how my life has been affected by the reviling and harsh criticism Jesus is talking about in his Beatitudes. And God totally surprised me with one word of his word: “HE”. 

I HAD BEEN praying through the first chapter of John’s gospel in a surprising journey of statements I was affirming as true in themselves, but also very real to me personally. I acknowledged that Jesus was the true light who came into the world, that he was the Creator who made all things, that the world did not know him and his own people did not receive him, but that there was this glorious contrast in God’s gift of grace to those who did receive him, and who did believe in his name. 

AND THEN it hit me: “HE gave the right to become children of God”, and that “HE” is talking about JESUS!!! 

WHEN I REPLAYED my life, starting with my first awareness of God at age seven, and knowing that I had been one of those in the world who did not know him or receive him, God was adding Jesus to the picture in a way I had never seen him before. What I have always thought of as “God” letting me know he was watching over me even from an early age now had this distinctive addition, that it was JESUS who was giving me “the right” to become a child of God! 

THE POINT is not that I have been a dufus all these years and had never noticed the left-brain-obvious. 

RATHER, the point is that today was the day God chose to expose a “deeper” of woundedness infected with shame that needs to be healed for me to rejoice in the persecutions of the past, present, and future. His love, grace, and mercy chose this for today because it was the only way I would notice the “higher” of “HE” (Jesus) gave me the right to become a child of GOD! 

WHICH MEANS THAT, in the most real and personal of ways, Jesus Christ my Lord was granting to me, a seven-year-old boy, the divinely-given right to become a child of God right then and there (1965). And, because Jesus did this, personally giving me the right to become a child of God, I was “born, not of blood (my human lineage) nor of the will of the flesh (me trying to be born) nor of the will of man (my parents wanting to have children), but of God (by God foreknowing me, and predestining me to the adoption of sonship, and calling me to himself by the gospel, and justifying me by grace through faith, and glorifying me in his presence when I will be just like Jesus when I see him as he is).” 

AT PRAYER MEETING last night we were just talking about how, when we pray about things, we do not decide what to look for that will match our expectation of how God will answer our prayers. Instead, we pour out our hearts to God like children, and then watch what happens in the coming days to see how God is working everything together for good in our lives. We know that whatever he does next will come from his thoughts and ways that are so much higher than our own that we can’t possibly imagine we can tell him how to answer our prayers! 

WHICH MEANS THAT, noticing the beautiful pronoun “HE” is like a one-word answer to my prayers from last night. It serves as the first domino falling into every truth and reality about Jesus Christ my Lord that God wants to be far more real and personal to me than ever before. 

AND, it is knowing Jesus Christ as the Savior who personally granted me the right to believe in him, and to receive him, and to become a child of God by grace through faith, that shines in direct contradiction of all the shameful things this orphan-minded child has ever felt, and all the fear-based-identity reactions that have hindered my walk with God, so I could feel the attachment to my Savior that he was not merely doing what his Father told him to do, but he was doing for me what his own love delighted to do! 

AND SO, I “consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that I may not grow weary or fainthearted” in the hostilities that have come against me because of knowing him. HE granted me the gift of the new-birth into the adoption of sonship. And HE is worthy to be worshiped by me rejoicing in the reviling and harsh criticism that is now a badge of honor instead of a bruise of shame. 

I HAVE heard what God is speaking to me about this morning. I can see what he is doing in me to prepare me for things he is doing around me. And I am joining him in his work by praising Jesus for personally granting me the right to become a child of God by grace through faith, and by practicing joy in response to any form of persecution that may come today, and in every memory of harsh criticism and reviling that plucks at the heart-strings. 

AND I HOPE that facing these things in my walk with God this morning is as helpful to you as it has been to me!

 

© 2023 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.)

For Men Only: Men Unashamed of Their Shame

SHAME IS a healthy emotion. It is there to tell us when we have screwed up. It calls us to apologize and reconcile with people we have wronged. And it always calls us to make things right with God in both repentance and faith.

HOWEVER, shame is a horribly debilitating emotion because we hate feeling that way. We learn early on in life that shame can feel like the worst attachment-pain ever because it is often partnered with rejection and demoralizing criticism.[1]

THIS MORNING, God got me up early, so I asked him what he wanted me to pray about and who he wanted me to pray for. It wasn’t long before I found myself praying for all kinds of men in my life, some close and some distant, that God would deal with our shame so we would be healed and free to fully join his work as beloved sons of the Almighty.

IN A BOOK I recently started reading, I was confronted with this quote: “Boys and men need to know that the foundation of life is to be able to receive what we have not earned without shame."[2] I am one of the many men who have never been given such a foundation, so what do we do?

THAT’S WHERE prayer comes in. I was led to begin praying through this verse again, not only for me, but especially for all the men who were coming to mind: “Fear not, for you will not be ashamed; be not confounded, for you will not be disgraced; for you will forget the shame of your youth, and the reproach of your widowhood you will remember no more.”[3]

YES, I KNOW that the imagery is a simile of God as a husband relating to his sinful people as an abandoned wife, a widow who has shamed herself. But we can just as much make this a real-life picture of God as Father speaking to his boys who have screwed up in life and left a trail of shameful sins and relationships. The promises definitely apply in the New Covenant we have with Jesus Christ our Lord.

SO HOW do we pray this comforting expression from God our Father (and, yes, this easily applies to any women who carry a shame-based reaction to God as Father)?

FIRST, we ask that God would speak his “fear not” into the hearts of every shame-filled heart we are praying for. We pray that God would speak an end to fear into our storms of shame as obviously as he spoke his peace into the storm that had stirred his disciples to hopeless despair.

SECOND, we pray that God would fulfill in all these men we are praying for (and more) his promise that we “will not be ashamed” after all. We are not asking God to make it so we haven’t done shameful things. It is far too late for that! In Isaiah’s time, God was not saying that the people would not do anything shameful. Rather, he was promising that after their horribly shameful sin and rebellion, the end of the matter was that they would not be ashamed. They would be so restored to him that their shame would be gone.

AND THAT is what so many men need, not Good-Boy Christianity that says we can only be free of shame if we act like good Christians and don’t do anything wrong, but Good-God Christianity that says that every instance of shameful sin in our lives will be cleansed by the blood of Jesus Christ so that, when we repent and return to God, we will not be ashamed any longer because all our sins are forgiven in Jesus Christ.

THIRD, we ask God to proclaim over all these men his, “be not confounded, for you will not be disgraced.” Some men have abused their children and need to be called to Jesus with this promise of cleansing that, even if they must bear the disgrace of what they have done in one way, they will not be disgraced before the throne of grace where they will receive the help they need to walk through reconciliation and healing with those they have wronged.

BUT WE ALSO have men who are simply carrying so many shame-wounds, perhaps because of what was done to them instead of what they have done, and they need to know that if they open their hearts to Jesus about it, and surrender the cesspools of secret-hearted shame to him, they will not be left in a state of confoundedness, and nor will they live a life of disgrace with God and his Spirit-filled boys.

FOURTH, we pray that God would speak into the hearts of all these men his promise, “you will forget the shame of your youth”. In fact, David gives us help in how to pray about this with a ready-made prayer request when he says, “Remember not the sins of my youth or my transgressions; according to your steadfast love remember me, for the sake of your goodness, O LORD!”[4] We join him by praying that God would assure men that their repentance and faith and reconciliation will result in everyone forgetting the sins of our youth, or whatever sins are in focus, because they are forgiven and covered by the blood of Jesus Christ our Lord.

FIFTH, while the last phrase speaks of “widowhood” as a simile of what things were like for the disciplined people of God, we can pray it specifically for men something like, “Father, assure all these men that the reproach of their disconnect from you will be remembered no more.” We are asking God to do such a work on attachment-pain, abandonment issues, hidden worlds of self-protection, even the painful self-justifying of narcissism, so that men will face their reproach, the sins they have committed against others, and bring them so honestly before God and whoever they have wronged that the reproach of anything shameful at all would be forgiven and cleansed and washed away into the sea of God’s forgetfulness, as they say.[5]

I KNOW it would be easy to expand this verse into even more in-depth prayer for specific situations, for both men and women, based on the real-life stories of what has happened in our lives. I share this as an example of how God ministered it to me this morning, even getting me up quite early to direct me into this kind of prayer. And when I go out on my prayer walk in a bit, I will pour my heart out all the more for all the men (and women) God brings to mind.

AND YES, for any women who have read this far, men need you praying for them like this as well. And pray for women who have been shamed by men to experience all these things so they can forgive the men who repent of their shameful acts and seek to reconcile with the people of God.

THE BOTTOM LINE is that God has revealed his heart in his word with scriptures like this one from Isaiah, and we can pray his word back to him in confidence that he will guide us into his will as we do so, and then will answer the prayers we pray.

FOR ME, this has been a morning of prayer that almost demanded that I share this to try and get others to join me, or to join with others where you are, so the horrible wounds of shame would be healed, and all the ground we have surrendered to the evil one by hiding our shame from God would be restored to the Lordship of Jesus Christ and life-after-life, and generation-after-generation, would experience the powerful and wonderful work of Jesus setting the prisoners free.

 

© 2023 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.)

 

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[1] No, I don’t believe little boys are as resilient as the experts claim.

[2] Jim Wilder, the Stages of a Man’s Life

[3] Isaiah 54:8

[4] Psalm 25:7

[5] https://www.gotquestions.org/sea-of-forgetfulness.html

From WoLVeS to WoRTH

  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.)

 

 

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[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