Joyce Meyer - Receiving Emotional Healing

Please start to be more conscious and aware of the love that God has for you because it will heal your wounded soul. One morning on thanksgiving morning I was thanking God because it was thanksgiving. Not that that's the only day of the year I do it but I was making a special issue out of just thinking about the things that I could thank God for and I had a vision.

Now that's not something that happens to me often but before you get kind of freaked out, the Bible says: "Young men shall dream dreams and old men shall have visions". So I saw something in the spirit. It wasn't like you know, something I saw but I just saw this in the spirit. And I saw a trophy case full of these gold trophies like people would get for being great at sports or winning some kind of a championship. And suddenly I felt like the Lord said to me, "You're a trophy of my grace and you're helping me get other trophies". You know, when God is showing you something you get it by revelation. This doesn't come in words so when I say, "God told me," I don't even mean words. It was just like I knew what the interpretation of that vision was.

And so what God was showing me was that I had received the grace of God and walked through a healing process in my life and in large part, not that I've totally arrived, but in large part I had been restored. God had restored me from many years of abuse and abandonment. And what God was showing me was that he has a trophy case in heaven and there's all these trophies in there that represent the people who have let God completely heal them and restore them and make them what God wanted them to be to start with.

And it's my job to make sure you're in that trophy case. At least, I'll do my part. I can't do it all by myself but that's part of what I wanna do. You know, you walk in somebody's house and they've got a trophy case, I mean, full, you know, maybe a hundred trophies, you're like, "Man, this person must be really good at whatever this is". And if you go over to see, is this bowling, is it basketball, you know, what is this? Well, I don't know how big God's trophy case is but I can tell you one thing. God is really good at what he does. I mean really good.

And then, as God would have it, not long after that I came across this scripture in 2 Corinthians 2:14: "But thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us in triumph as trophies of Christ's victory and through us spreads and makes evident the fragrance of the knowledge of God everywhere".

So what does he do? He heals us and then he works through us and through our testimony to bring other people into the fullness and the wholeness of God's healing power. Give God a big praise.

Luke chapter 4, verse 18. Now Jesus is talking and he said: "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me, the anointed one, the Messiah to preach the good news, the gospel to the poor: he has sent me to announce release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to send forth as delivered those who are oppressed who are downtrodden, who are bruised, crushed, and broken down by calamity".

The king James says: "To heal the brokenhearted". I love that. "To send forth delivered". I wanna send you forth today delivered from being bruised and crushed and broken down by calamity and the things in your past that has hurt and wounded you. God is a champion. He's our champion and he's able to bring people from a place of destruction to a place of victory. God heals us inside and it always affects our outside. I feel better than I did when I was 35. I can honestly tell you that I feel much better than I did when I was a much younger woman because my soul was full of so much pain then. And when you have a soul full of pain, a mind full of worry, a heart that's broken, you have bitterness in your life, it shows up on your outer man and it ages you faster than it should.

Now, let's look in John chapter 5 just momentarily. This is a guy that I like to preach about and I'm not gonna do the long version but in John chapter 5 we find a guy that was in a terrible mess and he'd been that way for a terribly long time. And they had a certain thing back then that there was this pool called Bethesda and once a year an angel would come and stir up the waters and whoever got in the pool first got a miraculous healing. So all year there were crippled and blind and diseased people that lay around the pool waiting for a miracle. Now, if you're smart you already know where I'm going. Wonder how many of you have been laying by the pool, waiting for a miracle.

John 5, verse 5: "There was a certain man there who had suffered with a deep-seated and a lingering disorder for 38 years. And when Jesus noticed him lying there helpless, knowing that he had already been a long time in that condition, he said to the man, do you really wanna get well"?

So I'm saying to you today, "Do you really want to get well"? Because if you do I can tell you how to get there. I can't walk it out for you but I can point you in the right direction. It's not all gonna be easy. There will even be some pain involved in getting over your pain. How do you like that? But there's two kinds of pain: the pain of change and the pain of staying the way you are. And nothing should be more frightening to us than staying the way we are. Even if you're in pretty good shape, you should still wanna change and make progress.

"Are you really earnest about getting well?" So the invalid began to say some things to him that really reveals why he was in the condition he was in. "Well, sir, I have nobody when the water is moving to put me into the pool. I have nobody to do it for me. Nobody's helping me. And while I'm trying to come down myself, somebody else always gets ahead of me". And Jesus did not feel sorry for him. You would have thought that he might have but he didn't. He apparently, in a loud voice because there's a big exclamation mark, said, "Get up"!

And I specifically love this part: "And pick up your bed". In other words, "Clean up the mess you've made all these years". C'mon now, I'm talking to somebody. Clean up the mess you've made all these years and start living the kind of life that Jesus really wants you to live. Aren't I behaving? I'm staying in the chair pretty good.

Many people in here have been abused in some way, shape, or form. Verbal abuse, mental abuse, physical abuse, spiritual abuse, abandonment, rejection. It could have been from your peers, it could have been from friends. How many of you have had some deep hurt in your life somewhere along the way? All right, well, there's only a very few people that didn't have to put their hand up. And we're not jealous of you. We're happy for you. Just so you know, we're not the least bit jealous of you 'cause I'm sure somewhere along the line you may have helped some of us when we were falling apart. But most people need beauty for ashes and I know there's a lot of guys here today and you may think, "This beauty thing is kind of getting on my nerves".

Well, you know, like I said Thursday night, you men could use some beautiful once in a while too so when you've been abused, you usually end up fearful in many ways. And there's only one thing that will eliminate fear and that's mega doses of the love of God. Mega doses of the love of God.

I grew up rooted in fear. My father worked nights and I was very glad for that 'cause I didn't have to put up with him in the evenings and he would get home from work about 11 or 12 o'clock at night and when I would hear his key, I remember laying in bed and when I would hear his key turn in the lock, fear would grip my heart because I didn't know if he was gonna come into my room and put his hands on me or come in in a raging fit, get my mother out of bed and beat her up or what was gonna happen.

If it was the weekend, I knew we were probably in for a real bout because he always came home drunk on the weekends and that was really bad times. My father was very volatile. You never knew what he was gonna do from one day to the next and I know many of you grew up with parents that were not peaceful in what we now call dysfunctional home. We didn't have that word back then. I just thought it was crazy but now it's dysfunctional.

And so I became very afraid. My gosh, the fear that I had in my life. And it wasn't so much that I was afraid of everything but I just had a lot of fear. And the Bible teaches us that we do not have to live in fear. I was afraid to have any friends. Fear was my constant companion. I was afraid somebody would find out what my father was doing to me: then, on the other hand, I was afraid nobody ever would find out. I wanted to be rescued but I was afraid somebody would find out. I was afraid my mother would find out. I was afraid my mother wouldn't find out and I'd never get any help. I was afraid that maybe it was my fault.

So the fear just bounced around in my brain all over the place. And then I was very afraid of my father's anger and that's one of the fears that I've had to really stand against in my life is I just don't do real well around angry people, especially not if it's somebody that I'm close to, like anger in families, we don't keep none of that in our family very long. We get over it, get rid of it, and get it settled 'cause I grew up with that mess and I'm not living with it now, amen? So I'm addicted to peace and that's what I want. The Bible says that "God has not given us a spirit of fear but of power and love and of a sound mind".

1 John 4:16. Now these are actually some of the scriptures that really, really, really helped me in my journey. This one in particular I remember. The first message that I spoke publicly, not in, like, a home Bible study but at the church I was working at when I started that women's ministry I told you about, I was praying so hard for God to show me what he wanted me to teach and he said, "Tell them I love them". And I thought, "Well, I don't wanna go in there with some little Sunday school message. People know you love 'em". And the thought that came to me is, "No, they don't. If they did they'd act a lot different than what they do". You know why? Because love, perfect love, the love of God, casts out fear.

So if we still have fear in our life then we know that we still need another dose of the love of God in our lives. So many people today are afraid of what's gonna happen in the times that we're living in. You don't need to be afraid of what's gonna happen in the times that we're living in. If you're alive in this time-frame and you belong to God, God is gonna take care of you because God takes care of his own. Don't live in fear. Know that God loves you. He knows exactly what your address is. He knows what year this is. He knows when he's coming back. And God will take care of us. We need to be more conscious and aware of God's love.

1 John 4:16: "And we know (we understand, we recognize, and we are conscious of, by observation and by experience) and we believe (adhere to, put faith in and rely on) the love that God has for us".

Now I know that's a lot of words in the amplified but they're very valuable if you really take the time to look at 'em 'cause he's saying, "Okay, I'm conscious and aware of God's love. I believe in God's love. I have observed God's love. I know that God loves me because I see his love in action in my life". Well, when I read that many years ago in this amplified translation, I thought, "You know what? I, like, I vaguely know that God loves me but I don't really go around on a regular basis being conscious and aware that God loves me".

So I've started doing something that I recommend. I started keeping a book of remembrance and every time God did something really special for me that I felt like was a wink from God or God just giving me a hug or showing me that he loved me, I wrote it down. It helps us to do those kind of things because then, when you're having one of those icky, ucky days where you think, "Nobody loves me," you can go back and get that book out and say, "Well, wait, I remember when God did this and I remember when God did that and I remember when God did this and, whoa, I remember when God did that".

And now all of a sudden you're feeling better again. Let me tell you something, God does all kinds of things for every one of us all the time and we take it as coincidence. Even if a person does something for you, yes, thank them but don't just stop at them. Realize that God worked through them. God does very little in this earth that he doesn't do through somebody. And we have to stop giving people the credit. Yes, be appreciative but know that it's God working through them. And a good way to say it to people is, "Thank you for letting God work through you. Thank you for letting God work through you to be a blessing to me". Please start to be more conscious and aware of the love that God has for you because it will heal your wounded soul.

Verse 18. It says: "There's no fear in love, dread does not exist, full-grown (complete, perfect) love turns fear out of doors and expels every trace of terror! For fear brings with it the thought of punishment".

God is not mad at you, you imperfect little thing, you. God is not mad at you. I want people to come up to their rights as sons and daughters of the Most High God and stop acting like they're just the tail end of everything. Amen. You're welcome. You need to start expecting blessings in your life. "Well, I can't do that. I don't deserve to be blessed". That's right, you don't. You got that part right. But David said, "What would have become of me had I not believed to see the Lord's goodness in the land of the living"?

I don't know what God's gonna do for me but, you know, I work hard in these conferences and I kind of got a thing with God. About Saturday morning, I'm like, "Okay, God, I need something". I used to go to Dave for it and then get mad at him because he wasn't giving it to me. "Well, you need to do this and you need to do that". You know, sometimes I'd work real hard all weekend, go home, and he'd go play golf and I'm, like, "Well, what about me? Nobody's doing anything for me". Well, if you start going to God instead of going to people, you'll be amazed what you'll get.

So I told God this morning, "I'm expecting something. I'm expecting something good". I don't know what it'll be but just something. God's got a lot of good ideas. Just surprise me. Don't make your relationship with God such a chore. "I'm just trying so hard to be good". Well, just give it up. It ain't gonna work. Just love God and let him love you and hang out with him and, all of a sudden, that good fruit in you is just gonna pop out and it's not gonna happen because you're trying to keep the rules and trying to keep the laws and feeling so bad about yourself every time you fail. Have you ever seen a peach tree trying to make peaches? "I need to try harder, okay". No, what do they do? The little branches just hang on the vine. The roots are rooted deep in the ground. The sap comes up, goes out into the branches. The sun shines and at the right time, boop, boop, boop, peaches.