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GervaisNews October 2011>
GervaisNews November 2009
November 15, 2009
Dear friends and family,
I would like to quote for you an excerpt from a newsletter written by an 18 year old who is serving on staff at His Mansion Ministries. Daisy Shih has taken a year between high school and college to serve at His Mansion as a cook but as you will soon see, her education hasn’t stopped while she is serving. Daisy has never experienced the deep pain and misery that the people coming to His Mansion for help have learned to live with. These words are Daisy’s thoughts and insights after a few months of ministering to the hurting people around her. With her words Daisy has opened a window that will allow us to see and begin to understand the world of a wounded individual. Daisy writes:
“I HATE PEOPLE,” she shrieked, “THEY NEVER COME THROUGH FOR ME. I DON’T WANT RELATIONSHIPS ANYMORE!” And perhaps we would find her radical resolution childish and irrational, until we discover the world from which those words were formed. Before arriving at His Mansion, she eked out an existence with a stripper mother and a sexually abusive father. Or, she herself was a prostitute whose body was enslaved by her appetite for heroin. Or, she spent months pleading with urban pedestrians with a cup in hand, or years starving herself to maintain a career. What choice does a wounded heart have, but to despair? Every human being possesses core longings that seek to be fulfilled, and I’ve seen so many women shamed by those longings because of where they’ve led. And shame is only part of it; what follows is the denial that those desires even exist because the result of pursuing an answer has only rendered pain.
A dog or a cat that has been abused will cower in fear around people, and will be difficult to get close to. The animal’s God given survival instincts tells them to protect themselves by avoiding whatever has caused their pain. The problem is that they will cower from all people, not just the ones who caused their pain. People respond similarly when they are repeatedly wounded. However Proverbs warns us that there is a way that seems right to a man, but the end thereof is the way of death. Daisy continues as she writes about the people she has come to know and love at His Mansion:
…If I seek love, I’ll get hurt; if I seek affection, I’ll be abused; acceptance, I’ll be rejected; relationships, I’ll be abandoned; approval, I’ll be criticized; purpose, I’ll be told I’m useless; distinction, I’ll be forgotten. If I seek to be deeply known by someone else, they will only misunderstand me. If I desire to be truly beautiful, I’ll be revealed as truly ugly. Yet, to a woman with this very mindset, Jesus says, “Go in peace.” He says to more than one sinner, “Go in peace.” Where is one to go when told to go in peace? Where in the world can we find better responses to our deepest desires, where we will find something other than hurt, abuse, rejection, abandonment, criticism, uselessness, and insignificance? It must be the Body, it must be the Bride. It must be to those whose love comes from the Father—a love that overlooks the mess we’ve inflicted and that has been inflicted upon us, and reaches to hold us. It is in the arms of the Body, the true church that our wounds are healed, and it is in the arms of the Father where our core longings are met. To every tired soul tempted with despair, go in peace.
One thing that the people Daisy writes about have lost is Hope, hope that they will someday get better, hope that they have a future where survival pain and self-protection aren’t their everyday experience. Hope is what His Mansion gives these people. Daisy concludes that healing for these people can only be found in the arms of a loving God touching them through the people in His church. That is her mission for the coming year. She is one of the people God is and will use to bring healing to the hurting people around her. We don’t have to go to His Mansion in New Hampshire in order to find hurting people. They are all around us, some are in the church, some have left the church after being wounded there, some are in our mental hospitals, some are living on the streets, and many are in jails or prison. We share space with many of them, sometimes rub shoulders with them, or even work or live with them. The problem is that many of them will bury their pain and mask it over with a smile or will medicate it with alcohol or drugs. We might never actually see their pain until its too late. God has placed these hurting people all around us and in our lives, but often we are too busy or just don’t want to be bothered. I am challenged daily as I minister to the hurting people who enter my office seeking help. And I constantly pray for God to love them through me because my love is finite, but His love is eternal.
I serve because Christ has set me free,
Lew Gervais
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