Healing
“The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, and provide for those who grieve in Zion – to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. ”
I had it all wrong for so long. I always thought Isaiah 61:1-3 was about me; I thought I was the healer. I thought the Spirit of God was on me to proclaim good news to the poor. I thought it was my job to bind up the brokenhearted, proclaim freedom for the captives, and release prisoners from darkness. I thought I bore the weight of comforting all who mourned and to provide for all who grieved — and I loved that. I loved the importance of it. The weight of it felt lonely, yet somehow it fit – I had been trying to hold everything together since I was little, so why not help hold it together for everyone else? I never noticed the ugly pride, the self-importance and self-righteousness, that snuck in as I wrapped myself in a calling that wasn’t mine. The lies wrapped themselves around me, ropes holding me fast and keeping me stuck, until they slowly began to choke the life out of me. It is hard to come to the realization that what you thought was your religion is actually killing you.
I have come to realize, over and over again, that God’s way is gentle. It doesn’t require us to be heroes, or to be perfect, or to muster up all of our will to do the hardest thing possible. God’s way for each of us is full of light, color, and joy. While I was clinging to a need to heal everyone, God was calling me into healing. I came to a slow and steady realization that I am not the savior – I am the one who is saved. The Spirit of the Lord is on Christ to proclaim good news to the poor – which is me. I am the brokenhearted, the captive, the prisoner. I am the one who mourns and grieves, and I am the one who receives beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. I am not the healer – I am the healed one.
In realizing this, I am freed of a debilitating pride, isolation, and darkness, and I am released from the pedestal I found myself on. The problem is that I loved that pedestal. I found a love for the debilitating darkness that my savior complex led me into, because, for the most part, it made me look good. There was a shine to it, and I attached my whole identity to the need to save people. The most painful, disorienting experience I have ever gone through in my life has been waking up to the fact that what I thought was my calling was actually my captivity. What I thought was the will of God was actually a prison. To be obsessed with saving people is it’s own kind of bondage, but it is difficult to see, because people will praise you for it. Of course, the people closest to you will see it for what it is – but it will be hard to listen, because everyone outside of your inner circle will be applauding. I know that any kind of deep sin and unhealed place leads to darkness and cold, depressing isolation – but I do wonder if hypocrisy and self-righteousness might be the worst. Jesus is cutthroat in pointing out hypocrisy in religious leaders. He is gentle and firm with those steeped in sin and pain, with the prostitutes and the tax collectors, but when he sees religious self-righteousness, he always names it as evil. There is a reason for this, and I have lived it. Pride is a poison, disguised as the elixir of life – and it will suffocate you if you let it.
“They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the Lord for the display of his splendor. They will rebuild the ancient ruins and restore the places long devastated; they will renew the ruined cities that have been devastated for generations.”
On the other side, though, I found that letting go of this darkness brings deep joy. When I don’t have to be a hero, I can belong to community, instead. When I don’t have to save the world, I can settle into what God has for me in the moment. If I don’t have to maintain control of my world, I can release my grip and allow God to handle it. But most of all, I can live in mutuality and solidarity with people that I once lived above. When I recognize that I am the poor, that I am the grief-stricken and the captive, then I no longer meet other people from a sense of superiority. Instead, I meet people as an equal, as a fellow traveler, as someone with the same deep brokenness who only wants people to experience the same healing I have found in the gentle hands of Christ. I lose the pretense, and can be myself, which means I can allow others to be themselves as well. I can let people be people.
The beauty of this is seen later on in Isaiah 61, in what we’re all called to be, together — oaks of righteousness, a planting of the Lord for the display of his splendor. This is our call, and this is the result of our healing. When we are made whole in Christ, we become planted, rooted in love and grace, standing side by side with each other to show God’s glory. And then there is our commission: to rebuild. When we all heal together – rich and poor, young and old, male and female – we then get to put our hands to the task of building together. In solidarity, mutuality, and grace, we get to be part of something so much bigger than ourselves. Healing takes us out of our tunnel-vision, our obsession with ourselves, and lets us see and feel something we never could have dreamed. Healing allows us the freedom to build a new world together, not as isolated individualists, but as a team.