A new friend asked me about this a little while back as I was working on a computer.
The memories are still there. They just don’t have the same effect.
When I hear certain country songs or smell beer, especially Coors, I have little recollections like this one:
2am or thereabouts:
It’s pitch black.
The floor creaks, waking me.
Dare not make a sound.
Eyes squeezed shut.
Teeth clenched.
Fists balled.
The rancid vapor of consumed alcohol escapes his pores and breath, announcing his arrival.
The smell of cigars, cigarettes, cheap cologne, and perspiration betray his coming from the bar.
He places his hand over my mouth, its callouses are cracked and abrasive as sandpaper.
He strikes me in the diaphragm.
I can’t breathe.
My eyes water.
I fight the panic.
It does no good.
Fear envelops me.
“Men don’t cry,” he slurs.
“Stop crying.”
I wish I could.
“Stop crying!” he rasps, trying not to wake anyone else.
He lifts his hand from my mouth only enough to strike me with it.
The coppery taste of blood finds its way between my clenched teeth.
Though I can’t see him, I feel his glaring, drunken, yellow eyes.
…
“Our faces, then, are not covered. We all show the Lord’s glory, and we are being changed to be like him. This change in us brings ever greater glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.” – 2 Corinthians 3:18
“…being changed…”
It is a process.
I still mostly avoid situations involving Country music and alcohol because of the flashbacks they evoke but it seems with the salve of His Word and presence, they slowly become no more than history, an history from which I was rescued by the One who truly saved one needing saving.
His presence, thick and sweet like honey, courses over the jagged edges of shattered places in the heart, healing, reshaping, restoring.
When you allow the Lord to heal you, those memories become a little like those fine white scars.
You have them.
They ARE there, but now the skin is a little tougher and it doesn’t feel as much as the skin around it.
Because of His amazingly, surgically, precise touch, there is no more pain.
Be still.
Pray.
Find and pray with mature believers who will empathize (walk in your shoes AND walk with you OUT of it) and not just sympathize (feel your pain and pity you)
There is a difference.
Then, LIVE!
Living and loving your life is the greatest ‘revenge!’
