A single moment can, in fact, change everything.

Sounds like a line from a movie trailer or a cheesy motivational slogan, right? When we are living out a healing season in our life, it usually comes as more of a bit by bit process. It’s a string of “Aha” moments strewn together that creates the whole. But what if I told you that one single moment DID in fact change everything for me?

My therapist, Elaine, and I had spent a few intense sessions digging into why it was so hard for me to hold compassion for myself. Why was I so on the hook for all of the mistakes from the past – mine and everyone else’s? Why should I have ‘known better’? Why was there so much disgust and hostility towards myself? As we would talk, we’d get a little movement here, a little there as far as processing some of my pain. But when asked what I thought about myself amidst the mistakes and the hurts? I literally could not hold any compassion for myself. Zero. It was as if I had put myself on death row, considering myself guilty of every crime in the books. I was ready and willing to sacrifice myself on the alter of humanity. Looking back on this view point now, I can see I was operating from a place of not truly believing Christ’s sacrifice to be enough for me. And I needed to pay.

Elaine suggested we try a specific therapy method that would help me re-process my pain – hopefully leaving me with the emotions, understanding and perspective I needed to move towards health. Amidst her modern method, Elaine invited the Holy Spirit to guide us and meet us in our process. She asked me to close my eyes and sit with all of my past mistakes, hurts and pain. Then she directed me to ask God what He thought of me in regards to all of it.

As I closed my eyes, I saw myself as a small girl, around the age of eight years old. I was small, lanky and blonde, wearing a pale pink dress that hit my legs mid-calf. I was standing in a wide open field, as dry and as flat as one can imagine. I was all alone in the great expanse. Out of no-where, an enormous tidal wave of water swept over me in all it’s furry. It knocked me over and consumed me in an instant. I knew this picture represented me being up against our family struggles, my feeling not good enough, being lonely in my younger years, and the narcissistic/abusive treatment I had experienced.

The next imagery I saw was of Jesus, holding me like a sick child. His eyes were full of tenderness as He looked at me and gently said: It was all just too much for you. He set me down and knelt down to remove the impossibly heavy ball and chain around my ankle, which I hadn’t noticed was there. He stood up and let me touch the scars on His wrists. He said: I know what it is to be wounded… I understand your pain and fear, and I promise to help you heal. You don’t have to carry it any more.

When I opened my eyes, Elaine’s eyes held mine. We sat in silence together, honoring the enormity of the burden that had just been lifted. I whispered into the silent room, “It was all just too much for me.” Tears rolled freely down my cheeks. For nearly ten years I had been weighed down and had beat myself up for all the pain. I had to, because all I could see was God looking at me with eyes of anger and disappointment. But this?

This changed everything.

My God – who I usually experienced looking at me with eyes of judgement, anger and coldness – just met me in my desperate need with eyes of tenderness, understanding and love. He arrived to me, personally, in the midst of my brokenness and released me of the weight I had been bearing for so long.

I had experienced a personal paradigm shift in how I viewed God and how He viewed me.

And. This. Changed. Everything.

If you were to close your eyes and imagine Jesus sitting with you… What would His eyes look like? Do you believe, like me, that He’s looking at you with anger or disappointment? Or maybe you don’t imagine Him looking at you at all, as if He’s forgotten about you? Does this exercise give you any indication of what might need healing in your relationship with Him?