Are You a Hater?

Dear God,

So many of my loved ones and friends are caught in a cycle of confusion and despair.  They don’t know who they are.  They have some sense of who You created them to be.  But sin has scarred them leaving their identity scattered in disarray and distress.  Sin hates people.  They tell me that the confusion and questions started with sin–sins against them in a season of innocence.  A relative, a neighbor, an older playmate...  Winning a child’s confidence...  Confusing attention... Uncomfortable touches...  And now...

Father, I have listened to Your children confess their brokenness to me.  I have lifted them heavenward in prayer and love.  So many people are shattered by unsolicited sins committed against them in their innocence.  Your heart grieves at the sins of humanity–abuse, incest, molestation.  You are our only Healer from the brokenness of life.

Blemished, scarred, used, abused... Your children question their worth–their value–to You.  Shame confines Your precious ones to a confounding prison of guilt.  They question their identity, worth, value, and sexuality.  All too often, they fear parents, grandparents and authority who should be able to speak freedom into their lives.  Ignorantly, victim and loved ones uncomfortably proclaim “Just get over it.”

The world injects its proclamation: “You must be gay!”  So Your wounded, broken children pursue a path of sin in a hopeless attempt to heal what sin shattered inside of them.  It does not work.  There is no healing balm in sin.  Sin destroys.  Sin never heals what it broke.  But we try.

My heart aches for friends and loved ones who have distorted images of Your beautiful creation in them.  I ache for innocence lost.  I grieve as I see them pursue sinful paths that multiply their scars.  You grieve.

All the while, You call Your Creation to Yourself.  You are our Hope, our Healer, our Salvation, our Deliverer.  Help me to love people where they are broken.  Grant me courage to proclaim Your message of hope and fulfillment!  Our world calls me a hater, but nothing could be farther from the truth.  I love Your shattered, broken children, as You do, and want to see them made whole in You.  Our world’s message of labeling broken people as gay, lesbian, bi-sexual, or transgender, and trying to force them to adopt these sinful labels and lifestyles is cruel.  The world’s message is hateful.  Sin is the hater.

Help me to be Your agent of grace, peace, healing, and wholeness, for Your glory.

Thank You, my loving Father,
Amen.