By Susan Berry

Am I Still a Child?

As a person who was raised in a dysfunctional family and then, as a young adult, married a person from a dysfunctional family, I understand trauma.

I hesitate to use the word “abusive” as I feel it plays the victim card and leans on blame too much.

Dysfunction births dysfunction.

When I got saved at the age of 24, one of the first things God did in me was begin the healing process to free me of the damage caused by growing up in an unhealthy home. Seeing the damage childhood trauma had caused was painful. But not as painful as living in the midst of the trauma.

Before I knew my Lord Jesus Christ I ran from my dysfunctional family and married as an escape. My marriage was also dysfunctional and traumatic. My children were then raised in a very unhealthy environment that resulted in childhood trauma for them.

It took many years for me to allow God to heal me of the damage and deliver me to a healthy soul, emotions and thought patterns.

Now as I approach my senior years I see the growth God has graced me with. As we heal and mature in our soul we are able to mature in our walk with Christ and live not as children,  but as disciples.

Peter had to come to the revelation of his own insecurities and immaturity as we see by his life. The truth of the Lord brings healing. It brings us not to ourselves but to Himself and that in reality, is our maturity.

Think about all of the people who encountered Jesus in the Bible. I cannot think of one who in one way or another didn’t need healing to help them come to the revelation of who Jesus was. Whether it was physical blindness or spiritual blindness, once they received healing they received freedom.

Childhood trauma, relational trauma, marital trauma…seeing it, surrendering it to God and asking His healing love to cleanse us will bring deliverance. And deliverance brings freedom from chains that bind. And freedom brings maturity.

I pray for anyone who reads this and needs healing that Father God will touch your heart and soul to bring peace and fullness of healing to you.

“When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me.”

1 Corinthians 13:11 NIV