The Healing We Cannot Manufacture
Probably our journey of forgiveness will be impossible unless we realize we cannot do it alone. We are not the source of our healing. Truly the kingdom of God is within us as Jesus told us. But that kingdom is God’s presence, and we need God’s help to experience that inner glory.
As with any deep healing and release, the empowered mercy of God within and around us is ours to claim. We must face the facts: we are vulnerable (woundable); we have been hurt; we need to name our hurt and our deep needs as clearly and fully as we can.
It is Brother Lawrence taking his turn in the kitchen, and Saint Francis de Sales taking the burden of a difficult diocese and saying, “I have now little time for prayer but I do what is the same.”
Little can change until we have faced where we actually are.
—Flora Slosson Wuellner,
Forgiveness
Forgiveness often feels like a mountain too steep to climb, especially when the wounds go deep and the pain still lingers. Flora Wuellner reminds us that we cannot will our way into healing—we need help. The Kingdom within us is not our own strength but God’s presence, patiently waiting to be received. Like Brother Lawrence scrubbing pots or Francis de Sales carrying burdens without ceasing in prayer, we invite God into the ordinary places of our pain. True forgiveness begins not with forgetting or moving on, but with naming our hurt honestly, and trusting that the mercy of God—within and all around—will do what we cannot. Start there. Healing is not something we manufacture; it’s something we allow. —DH
—David Hoskins, Founder & Care Guide, Sanctuary Clinics