Author: David Means

Trauma Healing

Trauma happens. But when it occurs in our formative years, 0-6, or 6-10, it can be especially damaging to our soul. In many cases, we will not remember the trauma until many years later. When the memories do return, we’re thrust into a period of self-reflection and self-discovery of a new person. But one of the most fearful things of all is learning new coping mechanisms that do not involve the ways we learned during the trauma, the way we approached the world for the entirety of our life.

When our brain blocks the memory of a traumatic event, we are spared the damage of something we’re not cognitively able to process. But that doesn’t mean we don’t remember: the memory is simply, for a while, hidden1.

Not only that, but as those events lurk under the surface of our consciousness, they play a significant role in building our worldviews and coping mechanisms. While those mechanisms do not accurately reflect reality, they help keep us safe from a certain point of view.

Healing

Trauma healing can be compared to the parable of plowing a field – but with a small exception: we MUST look backward for a time2. We must acknowledge that what happened was a sin against us and allow the pain to escape and move forward in time and space. When we bring it forward, we step into and through the manure of the bulls, pulling our plow and moving us forward in life under our guidance.

Similarly, we must recognize that the now unhidden pain is a personal sin against our soul, an insult against ourselves towards our ability to thrive and survive.

When we “confess our sins to one another3,” it is not about attributing blame or self-condemnation. It is not about presenting our misdeeds to God or others for reconciliation.

Instead, we seek a trustworthy individual prepared to lend an ear and assist us in navigating the anguish and tribulation that readily ensnares us. It takes a particular type of person possessing the right character to understand that repressed and hidden wounds need a voice, and sometimes, that voice is ugly.

Those who don’t leave your side during the process are your true friends. The others are either too bamboozled to comprehend what is happening or too broken to help. Or perhaps your current state is useless to them – so they don’t care for your failure to bring sunshine to their world.

Summary

Look back and remember. But recognize these things: it is a painful process; learning new non-trauma coping mechanisms is scary; be sure you have a trained professional to guide you through the process; make sure that person has used their techniques on themselves, that they’re not practicing from a place of non-experiential theory.

  1. van der Kolk, Bessel. The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma. Penguin Publishing Group, 2014. Kindle. (FILLING IN THE HOLES: CREATING STRUCTURES > Page 302 · Location 5782) ↩︎
  2. Luke 9:62 (Complete Jewish Bible) ↩︎
  3. James 5:16 (Complete Jewish Bible) ↩︎

Stones: Pavement or Walls

Go on through, go on through the gates,
clear the way for the people!
Build up a highway, build it up!
Clear away the stones!
Raise a banner for the peoples!

Isaiah 62:10 CJB

When we study the Bible and apply judgments as a King sitting at his gate (2 Samuel 18:1-4; 2 Samuel 19:1-8; Genesis 22:17) we do one of two things. Either we build walls of exclusivity, or we build pavements of access.

Walls of Religion

In this modality, we take the Word of God, puffing ourselves up in religion, and build a wall. We assert, saying, “This is what I believe; don’t come in unless you believe the same thing: don’t penetrate my wall.”

Bridges and Highways of Pavement

Otherwise, we take the Word of God and make it a useful pavement for highways and bridges so that others can come to experience what we have seen and experienced ourselves.

The Alter Ego: Saying Goodbye

de Vasconcellos, Josefina; The Peace Monument; Northern Ireland Civil Service; http://www.artuk.org/artworks/the-peace-monument-250899

Those of us who have or are in the process of healing trauma will reach a point wherein we must address that fractured bit of ourselves (created when we were so very young) to protect us from the assaults we suffered.

That alter ego served a vital purpose in our lives. It protected us from the emotional and psychological damage we would have otherwise suffered. It helped shape us, mold us into who we became, whether for good or for bad.

When that day comes, to say goodbye, we are then able to see the part our alter ego played, and continues to play, in shaping our outlook, our visions of others and ourselves, and the walls it has erected to keep us safe. Most importantly, we are able to see that perhaps it was a good design, after all.

But it is not the best design our Father God has for us. The best is yet to come. The best is the person we will become after our protective alter ego has said goodbye.

We cannot condemn our alter ego for the part it played in helping us become who we ultimately did not what want to be. We can’t look at our younger self and apply death, disdain, or condemnation. We can’t kill our alter ego.

Rather we must reform Dylan Thomas’ words, saying:

Do go gentle into that good night. Though you are old of age, sleep and rest at your close of day. Be at peace with the dying of the light.

https://poets.org/poem/do-not-go-gentle-good-night

Scripture teaches us that we are to die to self, but it also teaches us that there is no condemnation for those of us who are in Christ Jesus. Therefore, we are forbidden to condemn ourselves, and especially those parts of us God allowed to be created for the purpose of protecting our soul and spirit.

Give your fractured self a peaceful and respectful wake. Look forward to the renewing of the mind, the new creation that God has designed us to ever be evolving into.

Psalm 91 – Words to Live By

This is Psalm 91 written in first person and present tense.

This is Psalm 91 written in first person and present tense.

He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow Of the Almighty.

I will say to the Lord, “My refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust!”

For it is He who delivers me from the snare of the trapper and from the deadly pestilence. He will cover me with His pinions, and under His wings, I seek refuge; His faithfulness is a shield and bulwark.

I will not be afraid of the terror by night, nor of the arrow that flies by day; or of the pestilence that stalks in darkness, or of the destruction that lays waste at noon. A thousand may fall at my side and ten thousand at my right hand, but it shall not approach me. I will only look on with my eyes and see the recompense of the wicked. For I have made the Lord, my refuge, even the Most High, my dwelling place.

No evil will befall me, nor will any plague come near my tent. For He will give His angels charge concerning me, to guard me in all my ways. They will bear me up in their hands, that I do not strike my foot against a stone. I will tread upon the lion and cobra; the young lion and the serpent I will trample down.

“Because he has loved Me, therefore I will deliver him; I will set him securely on high, because he has known My name. “He will call upon Me, and I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble; I will rescue him and honor him. “With a long life I will satisfy him and let him see My salvation.”

The Freedoms We’ve Lost

We have no idea how much liberty and freedom we don’t have. Before the end of this decade, we will learn exactly what we lost.

Psalm 94:3-7 ESV
O LORD, how long shall the wicked, how long shall the wicked exult? hey pour out their arrogant words; all the evildoers boast. They crush your people, O LORD, and afflict your heritage. They kill the widow and the sojourner, and murder the fatherless; and they say, “The LORD does not see; the God of Jacob does not perceive.”

Psalm 94:12-15 ESV
Blessed is the man whom you discipline, O LORD, and whom you teach out of your law, to give him rest from days of trouble, until a pit is dug for the wicked. For the LORD will not forsake his people; he will not abandon his heritage; for justice will return to the righteous, and all the upright in heart will follow it.

Psalm 94:20-23 ESV
Can wicked rulers be allied with you, those who frame injustice by statute? They band together against the life of the righteous and condemn the innocent to death. But the LORD has become my stronghold, and my God the rock of my refuge. He will bring back on them their iniquity and wipe them out for their wickedness; the LORD our God will wipe them out.

The Parable of the Sower

Mark 4

In many churches, especially like the ones I attended, the Parable of the Sower is throw-away scripture. Once one has learned the necessary doctrine and understood it’s no longer about them, the scripture and its lesson are discarded to the “only for the lost” heap – never to be revisited. That is until the preacher needs some easy material and feels a bit more evangelistic than normal. Otherwise, life conveniently continues without looking back.

But here’s the actual truth:

There is only one sower, and it’s never the preacher: Jesus is the sower. You are forever the field.

God the Father wants you to know this: you have the potential to be any element of the field. You can be the rocks, the soil by the road, the thorny soil where the word is choked out. Or you can be the good soil that bears fruit.

This parable isn’t about salvation: it’s about your life and your perception of yourself. The parable certainly has utility for the evangelical, but it mustn’t be discarded to the useless heap we so often manage.

Father’s heart is this: He wants you to understand that you have the potential to be anything you choose to be in this field where the sower casts His word. How you receive His Word, His Heart, is up to you.

The parable of the talents teaches us that the currency of Heaven is Faith. And each of us has been given a measure accordingly. What we do with it is up to us. We can invest our faith or hide it. But the measure or quantity we have been given is irrelevant.

When the Word arrives in your field, is it

  • Snatched away because of unbelief?
  • Choked out because of the cares of the world?
  • Withered away because of persecution against it?
  • Or multiplied because of careful application of faith?

Don’t Study the Bible

If there is one word, one idea that I could promulgate to your soul, it would be this:

Don’t study the bible: comprehend it with your heart.

It’s like being married and watching your spouse cook you dinner for 30 years. You’ve learned every recipe, every ingredient, and every mixing and combining process. You understand when to mix, when to fold, and when to cut. You’ve learned so much you can cook better than your spouse with one hand tied behind your back.

But you never comprehended the why of baking pies and cakes, the purpose of sumptuous dinners, and tasteful picnics.

You never comprehended your spouse’s purpose or character.

In other words, you studied the wrong thing. You understood with your mind, but you never comprehended with your heart.

The Halloween Dream

There is a calling upon our lives, and a warning for those who refuse to listen.

Occasionally I’ll listen to a Dana Coverstone dream. And since like the interpretation of dreams, I will practice using his dreams.

Here’s the Halloween Dream and my interpretation. Listen to the dream first, then the following will make more sense.

The Halloween Dream – Brace Yourself – YouTube

Preface: there is a spirit behind Wokeism that has been working in our culture and churches for a long time. The spirit behind those who would teach that scripture is not absolute is the same spirit behind Wokeism. Please do not presume that the spirit of Wokeism is new: it has been moving in our culture and churches for a long time.

Bob, The builder = the people who parrot and build what leadership says and promulgate their words.

Scare Crow – Doesn’t have a brain.  You don’t need to think for yourself; just do as we say.

Fifteen minutes late is a double-sided coin; it is two ideas. First, we’re late to the game, late in fulfilling our purpose. We – the Body of Christ – should have been doing this all along, not letting a myriad of stagnant ministries (parked cars) do the work of Jesus for us. 

Fifteen implies salvation, healing, and redemption. It means stepping up and ascending. The number fifteen also represents the elevation from the physical to the spiritual. There are fifteen Psalms of Ascent (Psalms 120-134) and fifteen steps to enter the temple; the Priestly Blessing consists of fifteen Hebrew words; Hosea redeemed his wife with fifteen shekels of silver.  We are ministers of reconciliation. 

The 15th letter in the Hebrew alphabet is Samech which has a numerical value of 60  (seconds in a minute).  It means to surround, support, and protect.

15 is 5 three times.  5 means power, strength, alertness or wake-up, Torah, grace, ministry, service, gospel, fruitfulness, going forth, fast movement, anointed, prayers, and protection.

The costumed: there are those in some churches and congregations who are pretenders who want to have their ears tickled with cultural morality.

The un-costumed: Others in those churches know that Wokeism is wrong, but they’re committed to something within the organization which necessitates that they remain quiet and non-confrontational toward the truth.

When a masquerader removes their mask, everyone knows who they are regardless of their costume – even those outside the Court of the King and Queen. 

Seeing that the sun was setting at the end of the encounter, we know that circumstances spoke of will arise soon.  They will come from outside the Church to cause the removal of masks.  This will be a negative, anti-Christian cultural pressure.

Those who refuse to heed God’s word will find themselves in a double jeopardy judgment. First, their mask will be removed, exposing their association with the Church and their offense to the surrounding culture. Secondly, they will no longer be able to repent towards the truth they refused to heed and accept.  

Revelation 9:21; 16:9

ESG and Wokeism

Wokeism is a neo-fascist religion, and ESG functions as is its social contract circumventing constitutional teeth.

ESG is a global soft introduction to social credit scores for commerce control.

Wokeism is a neo-fascist religion, and ESG functions as is its social contract circumventing constitutional teeth.

Folks, the core ingredients are all here:

– Digital currency
– Wearable Near Fied Communication devices (RFID)
– A fashionable, irrational, and emotion-driven religion
– A deployable mechanism to force obedience (disease & financial pressure)

Expect continued coalescence of these things driven downwards towards your personal sovereignty.

The Beast of Revelation isn’t just a leader. He’s a leader that emerges from the “sea” of people. The Beast is just as much a way of thinking and governance as a person.

The False Prophet is the voice that proclaims societal salvation through the ways of the Beast.

The EPOCHTimes: Christians and ESG

What Is Wrong With “ESG” Wokeism