Content Warning: This post discusses sensitive topics, including childhood trauma, abuse, and chronic illness. Reader discretion is advised.
Surrendering Control to Embrace the Light
I’ll be honest: healing the core wounds that have shaped me on a cellular level since infancy has felt impossible, even with years of counseling, prayer, and reflection. I’ve wrestled with the question of how to reconcile the tangible evidence of trauma with the truth of God’s promises.
My body tells a story of betrayal: the bone protruding from my shoulder is just one example of a permanent reminder I’ve had since I was a baby. How do I embrace God’s promise of renewal when the physical evidence seems so real and unyielding?
And yet, I am reminded of God’s truth: true healing doesn’t come from striving. It comes from surrendering.
Bridging the Chasm
While I still experience triggered, non-verbal memories and the pain embedded in my body, I’ve come to understand that these experiences don’t define me. Therapy and other healing modalities have been tools in my journey, but they alone cannot bridge the chasm between the brokenness I feel and the healing promised in Christ.
This makes sense, doesn’t it? If you’ve come from a history of extreme abuse—if it has shaped you in ways that scream, The body is real!—you’ll understand what I mean.
Bridging the gap requires something radical: surrender. It requires trusting God’s ability to do what we cannot.
The Body’s Betrayal
I’ve struggled with autoimmune issues my entire life: stroke-like hemiplegic migraines, rheumatoid arthritis, joint dislocations, food allergies, and Raynaud’s syndrome. By my mid-20s, the arthritis had nearly crippled me, but I refused pharmaceuticals and chose naturopathic treatments instead.
For 20 years, I managed my symptoms reasonably well. Then, four years ago, my health began to decline. My bones and joints steadily lost integrity, and I became weaker. I couldn’t ski or mountain bike anymore—the activities that once brought me joy and a sense of freedom.
Why did this happen?
Even mainstream medicine acknowledges the connection between childhood trauma and autoimmune disease. My body’s self-destruction mirrors beliefs formed in infancy: that my needs won’t be met, that I must take care of myself, that expressing pain is forbidden, and that I must give beyond my capacity without receiving care in return.
And yet, God’s word reminds me:
“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come” (2 Corinthians 5:17).
The cure I seek will not come from my own efforts but from surrendering to the truth of God’s power and grace.
Surrendering to Truth
Despite my faith and mystical experiences—seeing the hand of God at work in my life since childhood—my human nature still clings to control. I’ve forgiven my parents and worked hard to rewrite my relationships with them, but my body seems to tell a different story.
Jesus said, “Come to me, all who labour and are heavily laden, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28).
I am learning that healing doesn’t come from trying harder or searching for the next best solution. Healing comes from rest—resting in God’s promises, trusting in His timing, and surrendering my pain to Him.
For years, my ego’s strategy has been, If I just work harder, practice more, and try more modalities, I’ll achieve healing. But at 50 years old, with a body that continues to betray me, I now understand that the healing I seek cannot come from me.
“Be Still and Know”
God’s Word challenges me to step back from striving:
“Be still, and know that I am God. I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth!” (Psalm 46:10).
This truth feels both simple and revolutionary.
But my human nature resists. It screams, You can’t just sit by and do nothing! Yet Jesus reminds me:
“Bring your burdens to Me, for My yoke is easy and My burden is light” (Matthew 11:30).
Just as darkness vanishes in the presence of light, my fears and doubts can melt away when I allow God’s truth to illuminate my heart.
Harnessing the Light
Jesus speaks again:
“My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Corinthians 12:9).
And so, I come to a place of surrender. I admit that I know nothing. Despite decades of effort, I cannot heal myself. But God can.
“I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh” (Ezekiel 36:26).
I just need to let Him.
An Invitation
Have you struggled to heal from the deep wounds of childhood abuse, neglect, or chronic illness? What has your journey with God taught you about surrender and healing?
Let’s walk together on this path of faith and renewal. Join me as we move forward, surrendering to the truth and allowing God to do what only He can do.
Spiral Up! 
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