A Word to Therapists, Support People, and Family Members

"Alas for those who never sing, but die with all their music still in them." (Oliver Wendell Holmes)

Every person you meet has a song within them, one they were meant by their Creator to sing!

When you look at that wounded, hurting person sitting across from you, what do you see?

What do you believe God for - concerning them?

Even before we step into the counseling room or the place of helping and support we need to know the answer to this question. How? By seeing every person we come into contact with through the eyes of Christ, aware that they were created in the image of God Himself and their lives were ordained by Him.

Sometimes, we humans miss it. We forget or are ignorant of our true heritage. We forget our true identity.

We also forget that we have been called and commissioned to be a part of God's solution and provision for restoration. What we often forget, most sadly, is that WE are not the solution. God is.

This article is dedicated to those who wish (or have been drafted!) to come alongside abuse survivors in their healing process. Often, we come with the best intentions when we think of how the hurting ones among us need our encouragement and support, but that will not be enough. We need to know, first and foremost, that we are in this place because God has called us and gifted us to do it. We need to be loving and responsible enough to be sure that we are appointed and equipped by God to the extent that we are able to be.

Healing from trauma, especially when the nature of that trauma is spiritual and sexual abuse, is difficult work and requires time and commitment for both helpers and survivors. God will have to be the One to supply the grace for all of us to see the healing process through.

As we come alongside those seeking help and healing we will have to come to terms with our own issues so that we do not unintentionally do harm to ourselves or those we are hoping to minister to. Pray about your particular level of involvement in this process, in whatever capacity God would have you enter into it. Do not assume that your experience or degree or familial relation automatically qualifies you for this particular type of work. Know your own limitations, what you can and cannot handle, and share the work with others who will come alongside you, as well. God is interested in bringing health and wholeness to all of the parts of the body of Christ, and so we jealously guard that essential connection to Him if we are to be conduits of healing for God's people. Some things simply cannot be learned from a book, they must (more importantly) be lived out. One survivor wrote the following about her counselor:

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