Rainbow Teardrops

© Photographer: Specular | Agency: Dreamstime.com

"Only eyes washed by tears can see clearly."
~ Louis L. Mann

I cry a lot...and am so glad I finally can. I think I'm making up for many years of numbness and not allowing myself to feel...I love the scripture in Psalms that says God saves our tears in His bottle...can you imagine. Not one tear wasted or unseen.

I especially treasure the gift of tears for my son. He was born three months early and spent 98 days in the NICU. It breaks my heart to say this, but my son literally doesn't know how to cry. His little sensory system handles distress by anxiety, avoidance, and anger, instead of saddness and tears. I know the reason...because tears didn't work for him as an infant. They failed to bring his Mommy to him like nature intended. I'm praying and believing for complete healing in his heart and mind..."I will comfort you like a Mother comforts her child, says the Lord." (Is. 66:13) My very favorite "Andrewism" is when my son implores, "Hold me like a rainbow, Mommy!" What a beautiful picture!

On Wednesday of this week I found myself crying tears of relief. How good it felt to be surprised by understanding, especially as an adoptee. The Women's Bible Study I've been a part of for a few years now has been such a blessing to me. God has used these women to bring comfort & strength to me, and I'm so thankful for them. At the end of this week's lesson, the leader shared on how God wants to heal us of an "orphan spirit". So many of us feel utterly alone and disillusioned because of what we have gone through in life. We have a very hard time trusting anyone, especially God. We feel as though we must take care of ourselves. Yet we know we really can't. Hopeless.

I remember crying out to God several years ago to PLEASE teach me to trust Him. I knew I couldn't trust Him, but I so wanted to. That is when He heard my prayer and began to show me, little by little, how much He loved me and wanted me free. Journal after journal is filled with written prayers and tears, as He helped me pour out my heart to Him, and He sent comfort and promise to me through His Word. I'm still on that journey and asking Him to help me know Him as Father.

So many in the Christian Church loudly proclaim that the only remedy for the "orphan spirit" is the "spirit of adoption"...yet they don't realize that every time they make that claim, they are rubbing salt in the wound of every adoptee, and driving us farther from God, rather than closer. In order for us to be adopted, we were relinquished, given up, abandoned. We certainly don't need more of that in our search for oneness with a loving God.

The more accurate translation from the original Biblical language in those scriptures used to speak of us being God's children (rather than "adoption") is actually "sonship". Thank God we are His son's and daughter's by birth...not adoption.

In fact, that is what made tears well up in my eyes this week. Our leader spoke of God's unfailing, unconditional love for us as our Father, and how we are delivered from an "orphan spirit" through the "spirit of sonship"...my heart didn't have to immediately flinch or harden to the word "adoption" again...and it felt like water to my soul. Exactly what my spirit needed...

She had us raise our hand if we had ever felt like an "orphan" and then the ladies all gathered around those of us who did...and prayed. They loved on us and our tears flowed together...tears of healing. It wasn't until I allowed myself to become vulnerable and take down the walls of "I'm strong" and "I'm OK" that God has been able to help me. I still walk around with some of those walls, but I ask Him every day to peel back more and more layers, help me lay aside my pride and self-sufficiency, and not be afraid.

I wanted to share the teaching on "The Orphan Spirit" here and hope that it will bless you as it has me. I especially saw many of the "symptoms" it speaks of in myself, and am asking God to work miracles in our hearts and speak Words of Love over us as His sons and daughters...

I used to wonder why the Bible uses the term "Born-again" to describe the salvation experience of trusting in Jesus as our Savior. Just this past week I felt a comfort I had never felt before regarding this term...Born-again. It is a promise to those of us who needed help from day one. No matter how much loss we experienced since our very birth, we can actually receive a NEW BIRTH, a new beginning. 

 

I love Psalm 103:2-5..."Bless the Lord, oh my soul, and forget not His benefits. He forgives all our sins, and heals all our diseases. He redeems (buys back) our lives from the pit, and crowns us with lovingkindness & tender mercies. HE RENEWS OUR YOUTH. He can RENEW our spirits with the Love of a perfect Father...even if we don't know what that is. If only we dare to ask Him.

The Spirit of Sonship

by Tino Todino

November 2, 2008

http://heartbeatcc.org/2008/11/the-spirit-of-sonship-v-the-orphan-spirit/comment-page-1/#comment-3151

We worship God who is Trinity in unity. Three unique aspects of the same being expressed in human terms as the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

The relationship that the Trinity enjoy with one another is described as a “Circle dance” (Greek – Perichoresis). It describes the way the Godhead interacts with each other in unity, intimacy, joy and closeness.

•The Father’s mission is to bring many sons to glory (Hebrews 2:10), to invite us to participate in the intimacy and joy of this circle dance with them.

•To receive the Father’s love and to give that Love to others

•The Father’s desire of redemption is to give His sons a home (John 14:2)

•What is Home? Home is a Place of warmth, affection, affirmation. Where you are known and understood and where you can be yourself.

•We either live our life as if we have a home, or as if we don’t have a home (Henry Nouwin)

•Only family (sons) can participate in this dance, for they are the ones that know they belong in it and are at home in it.

•Son = Huios – matured for full partnership in the Father’s business. (Romans 8:14-17)

•The battle that rages in the earth is between two spirits, either the spirit of Sonship or the orphan spirit.

•The orphan spirit cannot be cast out, rehabilitated, or psycho-solved. The orphan spirit can only be conquered by being introduced to the Father.

The Spirit of Sonship v Orphan Spirit – What they say:

The Spirit of Sonship says:

I belong and I can be myself.

The Orphan Spirit says:

I don't belong here, so I must pretend to be someone I am not to be accepted. (sealed records law in adoption harms the very spirits of adoptees).

Sonship: I don’t have to perform to be loved

Orphan: I must achieve, perform and prove myself

Sonship: I’m a son/daughter

Orphan: I don't know who my Father is

Sonship: I have a home

Orphan: I don't know where I am supposed to be

Sonship: Father knows me better than I know myself and He loves me.

Orphan: Nobody knows what I'm going through or the pain I'm in and no one cares.

Sonship: Because I am a son, I have an inheritance from my Father

Orphan: Since I don't have an inheritance I must claw and grab for everything I

can get. No one but me can meet my needs. I am alone.

Our Father says "Though your father & mother forsake you, I WILL TAKE YOU UP." He will never leave us or forsake us. Oh, how HE loves us. We are HIS.