Hurting People Hurt People

We have recently had several painful encounters with people we hold dear. It has once again verified the statement "Hurting people hurt people." I am not trying to cast judgment on these dear people. We love them dearly. But since I have known them for a long time, I know the hurts and pains they have experienced. Many of these hurts have cut them deeply and they still carry them around as a great burden. Their hurt is justified, their pain is real, and many of their words, actions and reactions flow from this hurt place. Carrying hurts like this is not easy. It's like wearing my hoodie in the rain. The more rain, the heavier it gets. It weighs me down, hurts my shoulders, affects my posture. Hurts are the same way. They weary you and are tiresome.

The truth is that we are all hurt people, we are all damaged goods in some way. We all could stand a few good sessions with a counselor to help us sort through the pains of life. But there is a difference between "hurting" people and "hurt" people. "Hurting" people continue to wear their "wet hoodie" and allow it to dampen their lives. "Hurt" people have found that through acts of forgiveness and love made possible by the forgiveness in Christ, they can actually take off this heavy jacket and put on a "light wind breaker" that won't absorb the hurts and pains of life. Paul in Colossians 3 says it this way:

⁸But now you must rid yourselves of all such things as these (the list that follows is why hurting people hurt people): anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. ⁹Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices ¹⁰and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator. ¹¹Here there is no Greek or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all.

¹²Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. ¹³Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. ¹⁴And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.

It is a beautiful thing what God wants to do with our lives. May we all find the healing that God made possible through His Son and be "hurting" people no longer.

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I used to update all my activities on this blog but since joining Facebook, this blog has been reduced to my venting, ranting and sharing what God has been teaching me. Check in here periodically to see what God is doing in my life but it would be better if you became my friend on Facebook. There you can keep up with my day to day life and I will let you know when I have posted to my blog. My desire is to blog once a week but it seems that God has been teaching me so much recently that it has been difficult to put it in brief words. I will eventually figure out a way to communicate it all with you.