Let me start by saying, this post is not on physical health, at least not directly. I am not handing out health advice today, and I promise not to post a picture of myself in a sports bra ... EVER :) Instead I want to focus on our spiritual perspective of this issue.
My husband and I both work in healthcare. And in the not so recent past, healthcare in this country tended to focus on treatment: What drug will fix what disease? What surgery, diet therapy, or treatment plan, will delay, improve, or cure the diagnosis? However, more recently, what the healthcare community is catching onto, is that not only does it take less (as in less time, less effort, less pain, less money, etc) to prevent the problem from occurring, but it is also a much more effective strategy.
I have read and listened to so many wonderful resources in my life that have freed me from so much. I have attended conferences and meetings. I have sat on couches and at tables, spent countless hours in the homes and arms of dear friends and leaders. So many tears, so much struggle, and the Lord has been so much more than faithful. And I am free, and I am becoming free. But there were so many paths I wish I didn’t take; so many lies I wish I hadn’t believed; so much time, effort and pain to bring me to the place I am now. I was and am blessed to have had the resources and the lives poured out. And I know that not all made it back down the narrow path I did. Not all took the second chance to be made into a new creature. Not everyone does; many I know have not.
But what if instead of “treating” the problems we have as adults, we instead prevent them as children. How would your life have been different if you had known and believed what our Father said? The Word of the Lord says that His people are destroyed by lack of knowledge (Hosea 4:6). There has been destruction in my life because of the knowledge that my heart was lacking.
I know that we cannot and should not prevent all struggles and hurts in our children, just as in healthcare, we cannot prevent all injuries, diseases or aging from occurring. But we do have an opportunity to try to prevent instead of treat, to grow instead of heal, to save some time and pain in going the long, hard way around; and possibly to save some souls that may not have made it all the way down that narrow road we journey.
Through His Grace,
Emily Assell