The answer to the question, “Are you BLESSED,” is yes if Jesus Christ, the Son of the Most High God, is truly your Lord and Savior!  Then, you are blessed because you can look forward to spending eternity with Him and Father God in Heaven.  However, having a genuine, personal relationship with the Lord does not automatically heal all the pain and trauma in our hearts and spirits.  In spite of having accepted the Lord Jesus Christ into your heart and life, you may still be a mess emotionally and spiritually.

The Body of Christ is blessed… but it is a mess!

Please don’t take this the wrong way.  I love our brothers and sisters-in-the-Lord who are genuine followers of Jesus Christ.  However, it is time for us to acknowledge the pain and trauma that the Body of Christ—the true Church—is carrying.  In the same way that people who are not Christians do, sincere Christians have experienced and stuffed pain from past and current trauma. 

Addiction to alcohol, drugs—legal and illegal, pornography, and other forms of escape may be the result of a person trying to numb the emotional, spiritual, and sometimes the resulting physical pain.  Knowing that we experienced emotional or spiritual trauma is not an excuse to continue abusing addictive substances, nor is it an excuse to do other ungodly things to numb the pain.  For some people, addiction can be the result of their free wills, bad choices and evil hearts.  Once we realize that pain and trauma are at the root of an addiction, we must seek help to receive godly freedom.

Situations we experience during our lives that cause pain and trauma, including abuse—emotional, verbal, mental, spiritual, sexual and physical—the death of a loved one, divorce, broken relationships, domestic violence, accidents, natural disasters, rejection, betrayal, and rape, always lead to a broken heart.  There are also untold numbers of wolves in sheep’s clothing who pretend to be Christians and break the hearts of sincere followers of Jesus Christ.  Countless, genuine Christians have broken hearts!

Tragically, the end result of overwhelming pain and trauma can be suicide, or attempted suicide.  When a Christian takes his or her own life, people may think they were not really a believer, but that is unreasonable.  True Christians are just as susceptible to the devastating pain that results from trauma in their lives as are non-believers.  In addition, the devil wants nothing more than to destroy peoples’ lives, especially Christians’ lives.  If he can plant thoughts of committing suicide as a way to escape unimaginable emotional and spiritual pain, he will do just that. 

I have experienced dozens of extremely traumatic situations in my life.  I became a born-again Christian in 1986, but prior to that I was raised Catholic and taught about God and His Son, Jesus.  Sadly, I attempted suicide two times, once in 1972 and the second time in 1982.  When the circumstances occurred that caused crushing, intense emotional pain for me, I just wanted the pain to stop.  I thought that death was the only option.  I was very wrong.  I praise the Most High God that I survived those suicide attempts and became one of His children on October 16, 1986!

As a result of Healing the Brokenhearted prayer ministry that I received in 2008, I learned that emotional pain and trauma from the past that I had suppressed was at the root of those suicide attempts decades earlier. During prayer, Jesus Christ released that emotional pain and trauma!  I praise the Lord that I am now completely free of the emotional and spiritual pain that resulted in those suicide attempts.  Freedom from past pain and trauma through Jesus Christ is lasting freedom! 

Over the years, I have prayed with hundreds of men and women who had stuffed pain for years and often decades. They were a mess, emotionally, spiritually, and sometimes physically.  The emotional and spiritual pain they were carrying was often so overwhelming that the only way they could survive was to deny it even existed.  They were all blessed as followers of Jesus Christ, but they were absolutely brokenhearted.

This is the bottom line—please seek help if you are brokenhearted and feel stuck in the pain and trauma.  There is a HELPFUL RESOURCES page on this website (CLICK HERE).  Genuine Christians have the opportunity to be set free from devastating emotional and spiritual pain and trauma through the precious blood of Jesus Christ, but we must pursue inner healing to be able to fully live out our God-given destinies.

    “…He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives…”     Luke 4:18 (NKJV)

Luke 4:18 is a quote from Jesus Christ!  Jesus does not want us to go through our lives carrying deep, and often debilitating, emotional and spiritual pain.  The first step to freedom from pain and trauma is sincerely accepting Jesus Christ as our personal Lord and Savior.  Then, the healing can begin in our hearts, minds and spirits.  Jesus loves us very much and wants to set us free! 

Kathy Shelton