![]() Because of the finished work I did for you on the cross, and My spirit in you, you are more than enough to do what I’ve called you to do and be who I’ve called you to be.” It was as if He said to me, “Sharon, you are free from your infirmity of feeling less than. He placed His nail-scarred hand under my chin and lifted my eyes. Then one day Jesus called me out of hiding just as surely as He called the crippled woman from the women’s section in the back synagogue in Luke 13. The more I listened to them, the more emotionally bound I became. They stalked me, yelling taunts and accusations that no one heard but me. I didn’t like these three lurking shadows, but they followed me everywhere I went. ![]() I listened to words from my past telling me I was “ugly,” “not good enough,” and “worthless.” Inferiority, insecurity, and inadequacy were my three closest companions. ![]() Day by day.īent and bowed because of our color, gender, age, marital state, family history, or financial lack.Ĭrippled by shame, fear, pain, disappointment, depression, poverty, insecurity, inferiority, inadequacy, and broken dreams. The weight of the world on our shoulders. ![]() We see trash…the pain inflicted on us by others and many times by our own poor decisions.īent and bowed. We see dirt…the mistakes we’ve made through the years. We see feet…people passing by going about their busy lives. While we might not be able to relate to being bent over physically, most of us can relate to being bent over emotionally. When Jesus saw her, he called her forward and said to her, ‘Woman, you are set free from your infirmity.’ Then he put his hands on her, and immediately she straightened up and praised God” (NIV). She was bent over and could not straighten up at all. “On a Sabbath Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues, and a woman was there who had been crippled by a spirit for eighteen years. There was a woman in the Bible who slumped…not because she wouldn’t stand up straight, but because she couldn’t. I have never seen him slump once since then. From that day on, my son stood straight and tall. He saw firsthand the difference it made to stand up straight. I watched Steven’s eyes grow wide as Papa grew tall. Then he took a deep breath and extended his curved back to its fullest upright position. My 77-year-old father-in-law, who was about five-foot-ten, stood with his back against the door frame. We were measuring and marking various family members’ heights on the dining room door frame. ![]() Then one night my father-in-law took care of it for me. I tried my best not to say, “If you don’t sit up, I’m going to buy you a back brace from Sears.” He didn’t know what to do with all that height, so he slumped. Then I had a son who seemingly grew to six feet overnight. “If you don’t sit up,” she would say, “I’m going to buy you a back brace from Sears.” I don’t even know if Sears made back braces then, but it sounded like a pretty good threat to me. When my brother was a teenager, my mother used to threaten him when he hunched over at the dinner table. Woman, you are released from your infirmity (Luke 13:12 AMPC) ![]()
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