A friend of mine recently recommended that I read “Safe Haven”.  Well, that or she raved about it so much that I couldn’t resist.  Some of you have probably already read it, particularly the female readers, it’s a Nicholas Sparks novel.  (Don’t roll your eyes and brush it off.  It wasn’t your typical Nicholas Sparks book.  Trust me!)  Normally, I would not suggest that a fictional book can change your life, but to say that this book didn’t do just that would not be an accurate statement.  This book caused things in my world to surface that I thought were long gone; it affected my heart in more ways than I could have possibly seen coming.  Instead of ruining the plot of the book for those of you who have not read it yet, I’ll just share what I learned.

I don’t always do such a good job at being really honest about what I’ve been through.  I’m guessing that’s mainly a pride issue.  Sometimes, it’s because I don’t want to somehow let someone down because I didn’t get it right.  Whatever “it” is from case to case.  Katie had this problem, because she had trust issues.  Rightfully so.  She wouldn’t open up and just tell her story to people.  It wasn’t until she found someone she felt like she could truly trust that she began to tell them her story.  I understood those trust issues more than I would often like to admit.  I can count on one hand the number of people who I would say really know me, and even out of those few people there are some stories that aren’t shared with all of them.  I always thought that I was just really scarred from the experiences that helped push me to that point, but as I turned the pages of this book and identified with the story—I learned that I’m not so much scarred as I am somewhat wounded.  The difference?  Scars don’t still hurt!  If something touches me in places where I’ve been hurt and it still hurts—that’s not a scar, that’s a wound.  And wounds have to be dealt with in order to heal properly.

I cannot separate my history from my future, because that’s redemption.  Katie’s story wasn’t what I would call a pretty one, but she learned that giving voice to the truth of her past meant opening the door to the future.  She needed to be set free from that.  I tend to take the “let’s just move on” approach.  And, yes, let’s move on.  Absolutely!  Just, not without allowing the Lord to deal with where we’ve been or what we’ve gone through.  I don’t always want to do that, because that doesn’t always look like a barrel of monkeys, ya know?  It’s like C.S. Lewis said, “We are not necessarily doubting that God will do the best for us; we are wondering how painful the best will turn out to be.”  The thing is though, the purpose exceeds the pain.  God promises that “ALL things will work for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose” (Romans 8:28).  That does not imply that all things are good, just that He’ll bring good from all things.  Safe Haven reminded me of that in a really peculiar way.  Not everything that happened in that book was good, but if hadn’t been for all of those things fitting together—it wouldn’t have ended like it did.  (Trying really hard not to ruin the ending here!)

I’m finally to a place of being able to truly deal with where I’ve been.  Maybe that’s because I can finally see where I’m going.  It hasn’t been fun a week!  I’m convinced it’s going to be worth it though.

What about you?  What haven’t you allowed the Lord to deal with that’s keeping you from embracing what He’s leading you to?