eclectic personI had a dream last night – from God. Job 33:15 reminds us: “He speaks in dreams, in visions of the night, when deep sleep falls on people in their beds.”

As a child, I just tried to survive. Because I knew that I had no value. I knew I had no worth, no importance, nothing to give, no one to be. So I put who I was in a little box that I made. I locked it, but then I lost the key. I even forgot where I put my box.

But I did live. I always tried to please, tried to make others happy.

Praise God that I knew Him early or I surely would have died. I was always lonely. I knew that ultimately, I was bad and wrong and unworthy.

I married and we had three children. After 30 married years, my husband walked away and remarried. And all those years of trying to make others happy because I thought I should (even though I had no idea what happy really was) ended when kids were out on their own and hubby left.

I found myself without even myself. I was on the floor and had no idea of what to do with just me.

What colors did I like? What foods? Was I a cowgirl or a professional woman? Was I anything? Did I care? Should I die?

Many people helped me. My children were and are outstanding and supportive. They remember the good things I did for them and with them. They know my love for them.

Through counseling, emotional healing prayer at GateWay and wonderful praying friends I learned who I thought I was/am. But I still struggled with my child-like knowledge of who I really was/am.

My lost self was still inside the locked and lost box.

But in my dream, my box was found – it’s always been with me. The key was fear, paralyzing fear. Fear served me as a child when sexually and physically abused and worse – completely ignored.

In my dream, God said that everything that I felt about myself from childhood had been only according to how my family perceived me – worthless and unable and unwanted, unimportant and ugly.

Triangulated in the worst way. Mom and Dad against each other. Dad pulling brother in. Mother pulling brother in. Dad and brother against Mom. Mom and brother against Dad. Dad and Mom against brother.

And me. Alone and outside. Ignored and wrongly used. Picked on. Yet I should always smile. Or else. Always.

In my dream, God said that what I believed about myself because of what I felt about myself was absolutely NOT TRUE! Those beliefs were the lie.
I’ve known this through the self-help work that I’ve done, but in my dream God imparted this from His Spirit to my spirit.

Today I am different.

I had a dream last night. God told me who I was and who I am:

• aware
• insightful
• responsive
• tender
• loving
• willing
• smart
• understanding
• discerning
• not physically beautiful as in “stunning” but certainly beautiful enough
• beautiful inside through and through
• curious enough to figure things out
• sweet

The last and best part of my dream was a deep knowing that through it all, Jesus was there with me. I am mine now and I am His always.

2013 GateWay of Hope Ministries – used with permission of the author