Forgiven, Fearless and Free

Wholeness can be defined as an undivided or unbroken completeness or totality with nothing wanting.
For the first time in my life, I feel “whole”.
How did this happen? I remember vividly when I began my search for wholeness. It was in the summer of 1992. It was at that time that I began to question the foundations of my “religion”. Please understand, I am not saying that I questioned my faith or my God … I just began to question how my faith was being lived out in the real world.
I encountered true worship for the first time that summer. I began to hear about others who were experiencing God in a new, more intimate way. It was something I wanted – something I longed for – to experience God in a more personal and vital relationship. And so began my journey to wholeness …
As I became increasingly dissatisfied with my “religious routine” I also became disillusioned with the way that the church was dealing with hurting broken people. It seemed like church, as I knew it, was more like a social club than a hospital for sick people. I felt alone and isolated because of my “questioning”.
At the same time, I grew more and more miserable on the inside. Something was missing. Something had always been missing. I see now that I had been defining my worth by what I did.

When I was a child, I thought I’d be happy as long as I had a best friend. I wasn’t.
As I grew older, I thought I’d be happy as long as I had a best friend and a boyfriend. I wasn’t.
In high school, I just knew that I would be happy once I got my driver’s license and a job. I wasn’t.
At age 14, I accepted Jesus Christ as my Savior. I was assured of my salvation and going to heaven. But to me, my relationship with God was based upon what I did (or didn’t do). There was still something missing.
At some time during my junior year in high school, I thought that if I could just graduate high school and get married … THEN I would be happy. I still wasn’t.
I graduated in November of my senior year and got married in December of that same year. As you have heard me say, I wasn’t pregnant … just stupid. I was happy … for a while. But that happiness didn’t last.
Shortly after we married, I lost 60 pounds – I was SURE that would make me happy! But it didn’t.
I got involved in ministry at the church. Still not happy.
Then … I thought if I could just have a baby – I would be happy. And happy I was! The birth of my children were two of the most happy events of my life. But that happiness didn’t last either.
I continued a vicious cycle of trying to earn approval from both people and God through what I did or did not do. My life was a constant striving to be better … to change … to finally be content with my life. But I wasn’t!
In 1997, after a period of illness and a serious bout with depression, I became convinced that the problem was ME. I thought I would finally be happy if I divorced my husband of almost 19 years. So I did … and I wasn’t.
At some point during the time I was going through my divorce, it is if I divided into two pieced. Just lovely – here I was, not a “whole” person to begin with … separating in to two different pieces. Now – I don’t mean that I had a split personality. What I mean is that it is like I was two different people – the person I was the first 36 years of my life (pre-divorce) and the person I became after my divorce. Neither person was whole.
Over the past 11 years, I have continued my quest for happiness .. for wholeness.
My quest included a second, brief marriage that ended in divorce; multiple relationships with men that I just knew were “the one” (including sexually relationships) … an endless search for love and acceptance.
Still not happy … still not whole.
I was bound by fear, guilt, and shame.
In 2004 I found myself at an all time low and found myself attending something called “Celebrate Recovery.” This was definitely a step in the right direction. Over the last 4 years I have been working through the 12 steps of Christian recovery to help me gain victory over depression, co-dependency, love & relationship addiction, food addiction, grief and guilt. I found out that one of my core problems is not that I needed a man to love me – but I needed to love myself!
It’s funny … a dear friend had told me that about 10 years earlier. But I didn’t think it was true!
And so … I discovered a lot about myself, formed some incredible close friendships with women in CR and found victory in the area of sexual purity.
But guess what? I was still miserable inside. I still continued to seek out love in all the wrong places.
Over the past 3 weeks I have been going through a program called “The Road Adventure”. This past Saturday, while attending Part 2, I experienced something that was life-changing. I finally became whole again. It was truly a miraculous moment that I cannot begin to explain here. All I can say is that, somehow, through God’s mercy and grace, the “old” Suzanne and the present Suzanne merged into one complete whole woman. I know who I am. I am learning to love myself. I look at myself in a whole different light when I look in the mirror. I ask God daily to help me see myself through His eyes.
I realize that all these years, I wasn’t seeking happiness after all. I was seeking WHOLENESS.
I am finally at peace with God and with myself. My past is in the past and it’s there to stay.
I am forgiven, fearless and free.