Our family was camping and we were getting ready to go swimming. I was in the tent changing into my bikini. I started to pull up the straps of my top when my dad opened the flap.
“Get out!” I screamed. He snapped back, “You haven’t got anything anyway.” I was devastated. How could he say such a thing? I had a pretty nice body for a thirteen year old, but his degrading comeback hit me like a hammer.
He dropped the flap down quickly and left. The End. For him maybe, but not for me.
The words cut deep. “You haven’t got anything” is what I heard and what I believed about myself for years. I felt like I could never be good enough, that my dad thought I was ugly and unworthy of love. So I became it. My teenage years were horrible. The seeds of rejection and self hatred had developed deep roots in my young soul.
The most hurtful problems in our lives come because we have strong seeds of destruction rooted deeply within us. They make us think, speak, and act in ways that aren’t good. Jesus said, “And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (John 8:32). But just knowing about something destructive in our lives doesn’t make us free. We must first believe that we really can be spiritually freed from it and then take the appropriate corresponding action. So how does that happen?
Through Jesus Christ. Jesus can get to the roots of any problem. He’s alive now and still doing the same things He did when He was in the flesh on earth: honing in on the roots, exposing them and giving deliverance. He said, “Every plant, which my heavenly Father hath not planted, shall be rooted up” (Matt 15:13).
That was the situation in John 4 with the woman at the well. Jesus came to the well and asked the woman for a drink. She asked him why He was talking to her since she was a Samaritan and Jews weren’t supposed to have dealings with Samaritans.
He totally ignored her question. He came with deliverance for everyone. It didn’t matter a bit if she was Jew or Samaritan or anything else. He didn’t care what she thought of herself or the rules she’d set up to guard herself. She had to yield to Him. He was there to deliver her.
He told her that instead of her giving Him a cup of physical water, he could give her a different kind of water that would change her life. She was hesitant and replied, “The well is deep.” But Jesus had the power to go into that deep well of her soul, uproot the problem and give her complete deliverance. Psalm 42:7 tells us: “Deep calleth unto deep.” There is nothing deeper than the insight, understanding and love of Jesus.
As it turned out, the woman had a problem with her self worth. She had gone from man to man looking for true love, but she was broken. Jesus pointed out what she was doing. He uprooted the cause and He showed her true love. She was so excited about her deliverance that she told the men of the city and they came out to see.
Jesus ministered to them for two more days and they had the same types of things happen to them. “And they told the woman, Now we no longer believe (trust, have faith) just because of what you said; for we have heard Him ourselves [personally], and we know that He truly is the Savior of the world, the Christ” (John 4:42 AMP). Why did they say “savior?” Because they were saved—rescued—from the effects of whatever roots were destroying their lives too.
Jesus is a person, still alive and real and able to work through people and the written Word, to get to the bottom of your wells, or to the deepest roots of hurt in you and help you get rid of those roots once and for all.
I just finished reading Mending Cracks in the Soul by Dr. Dale Sides. I went back to the incident with my father with new eyes and the Lord showed me the truth: My dad’s angry words had nothing to do with me. Lashing out in anger was a defense he learned as a child when he was so often accused of being wrong. It was an automatic trigger reaction. When he opened the tent flap without asking, he did something wrong and when I called him on it, he lashed out at me just like he always did when he was accused of being wrong. I finally understood and I could let go of my own hurt and anger. I was totally set free.
Jesus got to the roots of the problems for the Samaritan woman and many of the men in her city. He uprooted the destructive seed in me. And He can do it for you. I highly suggest getting Dale’s book and reading it. I think it will really help you get free faster. I know it helped me and I’ve waited quite a long time to finally get the answers I needed. Jesus can truly get to the deepest part of our souls and refresh our lives.
Love, Carolyn
(You can order the Mending Cracks book from lmci.org if you'd like to get a copy)
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