Seeing My Parents’ Faces

Martha Kilpatrick, from 3-CD series Leave Thy Parents:
“I’ve learned that our love of the world is our connection to our parents.  If we can deal with the parents, we can be free of the world.  Our search for the approval of man is not a search for the approval of man, but a search for the approval of parents.  And when we deal with that, we no longer need the approval of man.

“Our entire connection to earth is through the channel of that parental relationship.  And you cannot ignore it and hope it goes away, which is what we want to do.  You will transfer, onto some parental figure, all of your feelings and all of your accusations of your parents.”

I’ve spent some time talking about the damage we do to others when we won’t face our wounds and forgive, but today I’d like to look at the flip side of that coin.  Refusing to accept the wound and forgive can just as easily lead to chasing that missing love down a dark alley and being surprised at the mugging that ensues.

We are a danger to others or a danger to ourselves (or usually both) until we resolve our hurt with our parents.  It is no less a violent opposition to God to allow others to hurt you than it is to hurt others.  If I hate myself and permit people to abuse me, then that is just another way of raging against God and who He made me to be.

Until I began to work through my issues with my mom and dad, I was navigating the world while blind and stupid.  More often than not, I didn’t really see the person standing in front of me – in any given situation; I saw my dad or my mom.  This made me spectacularly stupid.  I was as likely to be cruel as I was to be weak and vulnerable to cruelty.

I could not accurately discern whom I was dealing with because I was too busy projecting my parents all over them.

The Lord has done a huge work of showing me where I’ve abused the sheep – and where I’ve allowed wolves to enslave me.  Both require great repentance and forgiveness, and both involve my ties to my parents.  God has to untangle me not just from the whips I hold but also from the lashes that bind me.

I have pursued love, thinking that I knew the person, and awakened three years later battered and bruised and a shadow of myself.  I had given them permission to abuse me in the hopes that I’d get their approval or friendship or admiration – you name it.  And what I was really chasing was Love to fill the void in my heart that no human, including my precious parents, could possibly fill.

God requires me to make peace with my parents because chasing ghosts down dark alleys isn’t safe for anyone I happen to meet . . . or me either.

Isaiah 27:5 HCSB
. . . make peace with Me.