It’s Not Your Job
“They tried to break you but they couldn’t because you have someone bigger on your side.” -Unknown
When I was betrayed and hurt and feeling pain like I’ve never felt before, I wanted my revenge. Honestly, I wanted to make him feel like he had made me feel but worse. Especially since he didn’t have remorse of any kind. He was living his everyday life like he was the good guy and had done nothing wrong. It made it so much more infuriating. It made it so unbelievable that someone could do that and not feel the need to correct themselves or apologize or anything. I’m being completely honest here. The urge to hurt them was strong. It came through in my anger and my sadness and my hurt. I would think, I don’t want to go to jail God but if there was some way I could hurt them that would be great. Obviously not the way we are supposed to think. Not the move we are supposed to make. As we begin our healing journey, there are 3 things that it is not our job to do.
It is not our job to make them pay.
In fact we are to do the opposite at some point in our lives. We are to bless them. They hurt us but the Bible says “Dear friends, never take revenge. Leave that to the righteous anger of God. For the Scriptures say, “I will take revenge; I will pay them back,” says the Lord.” (Romans 12:19 NLT). Focusing on them getting their payback takes the focus away from you getting your strength back. You miss out on your healing and recovery and especially your blessings. You can’t spot the blessings coming your way if you’re not looking or paying attention. Often in my journey, God would remind me to look at ‘Him’ and not at ‘him’. The reason is that the anger and pain would not have a chance to leave because I would be replaying the story in my mind and focusing on the source of my anger. It makes it harder to forgive and get your peace back. I’m not saying you should therefore only keep your eyes to the sky or in the Bible. Focus on what makes you happy. Focus on letting go of everything that happened. Focus on getting your healing, self loving, and strength back.
It is not our job to fight them.
Removing yourself from a situation and placing yourself in a safe place in life requires your effort and courage. But in the end God is fighting your battle. “The Lord your God is going ahead of you. He will fight for you, just as you saw him do in Egypt.” (Deuteronomy 1:30). He is leading you where to go and bringing help to you. He is placing people in your life that will help with what you’re going through. Our job in this battle is to pray and worship but we are not to lead the troops anywhere. Leave that to God. We fight for our sanity and peace but God does the ultimate work of giving you those things back.
It is not our job to protect ourselves alone.
I am not saying don’t take the steps to protect you and yours. Absolutely do that with all your might. As a child protects themselves from danger, the mom in the end is responsible and swoops in to grab the child. You are that child and you must protect yourself at all costs. But in the end the Father will swoop in to save you from it all. “In my desperation I prayed, and the Lord listened; he saved me from all my troubles.” (Psalms 34:6). Once again you have a part to do but in the big picture you have a protector. Someone who is looking out for you. You might be wondering why he didn’t protect you from certain things happening. Certain hurts and attacks. I wish I could tell you why with a list of reasons. I am sorry. However I don’t want you to think that you should have done more to protect yourself or that you failed in keeping safe. You didn’t. You did what you thought was best. You are limited by what you know. Now in this moment I pray encouraging love and healing will find you and that your new beginning arrives.
You are a beautiful being that deserves all good things. This pain does not define you nor will it last forever. As you continue in your healing journey God will fight for you and protect you. He will handle the person that hurt you. Don’t add guilt or shame to your title. You did nothing wrong. There is purpose to this pain and soon you’ll find out what it is.
Healing is a process that can be different for everyone. So how do you know you are going through it?