When a Woman Overcomes Life's Hurts

Cindi McMenamin

Description

Author Cindi McMenamin's bestseller When Women Walk Alone (more than 100,000 copies sold) confirms her gift for encouraging women who are journeying through difficult seasons. In her newest book, she offers help for women who are dealing with wounds from unresolved issues in their past.When a Woman Overcomes Life's Hurts explores the kinds of hurt women experience and offers gracious, biblical counsel on how and where to find healing. Cindi shares the faulty thinking that often accompanies life's wounds and replaces it with truths every woman needs to know about how God views her. She takes women fromfeeling insignificant to realizing how much the Lord loves themfeeling undesirable to seeing their true beautyfeeling they're not good enough to recognizing how special they areThis is a book filled with grace, redemption, and transformation--leading women toward a renewed focus on God, a resurgence of inner joy, and better relationships with others.

Informations

• Publié par: Harvest House Publishers, Inc.
• Date de parution: 01 août 2012
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780736948593
• Langue: English

Extrait

HARVEST HOUSE PUBLISHERS
EUGENE, OREGON
Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are from the Holy Bible New King James Version, NKJV. Copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Verses marked NIV are taken from the New International Version, 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.
Verses marked NLT are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright 1996, 2004. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, IL 60189 USA. All rights reserved.
Verses marked MSG are taken from The Message. Copyright by Eugene H. Peterson 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group.
Verses marked NASB are taken from the New American Standard Bible 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1973, 1977, 1995 by the Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. ( www.Lockman.org )
Verses marked CEV are taken from the Contemporary English Version 1991, 1992, 1995 by American Bible Society. Used by permission.
Italicized text in Scripture quotations indicates author s emphasis.
Cover by Dugan Design Group, Bloomington, Minnesota
Cover photo ZenShui / Laurence Mouton / PhotoAlto Agency RF Collections / Getty Images
WHEN A WOMAN OVERCOMES LIFE S HURTS
Copyright 2012 by Cindi McMenamin
Published by Harvest House Publishers
Eugene, Oregon 97402
www.harvesthousepublishers.com
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
McMenamin, Cindi, 1965-
When a woman overcomes life s hurts / Cindi McMenamin.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references (p. ).
ISBN 978-0-7369-4858-6 (pbk.)
ISBN 978-0-7369-4859-3 (eBook)
1. Christian women-Religious life. 2. Consolation. 3. Suffering-Religious aspects-Christianity. 4. Pain-Religious aspects-Christianity. I. Title.
BV4527.M43275 2012
248.8 43-dc23
2011045883
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means-electronic, mechanical, digital, photocopy, recording, or any other-except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.
For the precious women who have shared their pain in the pages of this book. You, my friends, are living examples of the healing and wholeness that only God can provide.
And for every woman who picks up this book seeking to overcome life s hurts-my prayer is that you will come face-to-face with the Gentle Healer who has been waiting to turn your brokenness into something absolutely beautiful.
Acknowledgments
My heartfelt thanks to

my husband, Hugh, and daughter, Dana, for their unconditional love for me.
my brother, Dan, for his ability to look beyond my wounds and focus on the transforming work God continues to do in me.
my friends and partners in prayer who have upheld me through the writing of yet another book: Chris Castillero, Cyndi Evans, Theresa Fusco, Sue Laird, Cyndie Lester, Allison Martin, Lisa Pacheco, Debbie Patrick, Mary Purviance, Terri Smalls, Ashley Tarr, and Barbara Willett.
my editor, Steve Miller, and the publisher s committee at Harvest House Publishers for believing in the need for this book.
And above all, I m grateful to my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, who did what it took so you and I could be whole and complete.
Contents
Acknowledgments
Rising Above the Hurts
Part I: Uncovering the Wounds
1. This Wasn t Supposed to Happen
Realizing There s a Reason for Your Pain
2. Why Did I Have to Hurt Like This?
Reshaping Your Understanding of God
3. Where Was God, Anyway?
Rejecting the Lie that He Didn t Care
Part II: Unraveling the Lies
4. I ll Never Be Completely Healed
Re-examining the Healing Power of the Cross
5. That s Just the Way I Am
Receiving a New Identity
6. I Have a Right to Be Happy
Revisiting the Meaning of Surrender
7. I ll Never Really Be Loved
Recognizing Real Versus Distorted Love
Part III: Unveiling a New Heart
8. I Can Finally Be Free
Releasing Yourself Through Forgiveness
9. I Can Experience Joy Again
Refreshing Your Soul Through Praise
10. I Can Be a Blessing
Reinvesting in the Lives of Others
A Parting Challenge: Embracing Wholeness
10 Steps to Healing and Wholeness
Appendix A:
Self-Assessment: Are You Still Affected by Your Wounds?
Appendix B:
Scriptural Encouragement for Hurting Hearts
Appendix C:
Suggestions for Planning and Facilitating a Small-group Study
Notes
An Invitation to Write
Rising Above the Hurts
W ouldn t it be wonderful to be able to say, My life has turned out exactly the way I dreamed! ?
I suppose if you could say that, you d be in heaven-literally.
But maybe, instead, you feel like you ve been through hell.
Perhaps you ve struggled with-or are still struggling through-a painful childhood, a broken relationship, a bitter divorce, the loss of someone you loved, the devastation of a dream, the diagnosis of a disease, or the deep disappointment that comes when life takes a sudden turn you didn t want or expect.
The wounds in life abound. And sometimes they are compounded, one upon the other, making us wonder What s going on? and What did I do to deserve this ? At times we ask Where are You, God? Don t You care? and Why do I have to hurt like this? Regardless of what your particular painful situation is, if you ve struggled with the Why? questions, you are not alone.
From as far back as she can remember, Cyndi has seen death all around her. Tragic death. Unexpected death. Death that no one talked about or explained or acknowledged. There was a time when she began to wonder why her life included so much sorrow and tears.
Sharon looks back on her childhood and finds no one- no one -who wanted her or loved her. Her mother, who tried to kill her when she was just a year old, was sent to live in a psychiatric hospital. Her father resented her ever since, and abused her physically and sexually until her teenage years. Then she married and was diagnosed with an aggressive cancer shortly before her marriage ended. Sharon remembers days when she prayed to die in order to escape her physical, emotional, and spiritual pain, but believed God wouldn t let her die because she wasn t good enough to get into heaven.
Deanna grew up with a critical mother and a father who remained emotionally distant from her, only to discover later that they were her adoptive parents and her real story was a secret. Feeling for years that she had a shameful past no one was willing to talk about and that she was unwanted and unloved, she finally married and felt loved for the first time until she discovered that her husband was having a longtime affair with her best friend. There were times when she felt like a walking ghost, numb to anyone and anything around her.
And Christina was raised to run from the law, learning at an early age to produce drugs to make money for and feed the habit of her drug-addicted mother. Foraging through dumpsters for food and taking care of her four younger siblings as a young preteen, she often wondered if she d ever have a normal life-one she could at least talk about with others.
I have many more stories I could share. And all of these women would tell you today that there is a reason for the wounds they ve experienced. Anyone who knows those women, too, will tell you that they are some of the most remarkable women they ve ever known. Their pain led to their purpose. Their brokenness added to their beauty. Their suffering made them stronger. And they are no longer women who ask Why? Amazingly, too, they are no longer women who consider themselves wounded.
As I wrote this book, I didn t look for women who were spiritual giants and were making a significant difference in the world and then ask them about their past hurts. I started with the wounds. I asked around for women who had come from the worst of the worst. I wanted to hear the stories of women who had endured heartache and then somehow moved beyond life s hurts. And what I found as I talked with many of them was that-from their perspective-their disappointment, loss, and hurt wasn t nearly as significant as their deliverance. They were focused not on their frustrations but on their futures, not on their hurts but on helping others.
These women had endured pain, but their lives are now all about God s plan and purpose. They are examples of how God can take broken women just like you and me and turn them into beautiful women with a passion for life. So this book is not merely about dealing with heartache and wounds. It s about encouragement and inspiration and moving beyond life s hurts and heartaches and into a place of hope and purpose. It s about how you can overcome life s hurts and experience God s healing and wholeness, and how you can offer that same healing and wholeness to others.
I will share with you each of these women s stories-and the stories of many more-so you can meet women who have experienced pain and are still standing, only stronger, and with a passion and purpose they hadn t had before. They have overcome life s hurts, some of which you may have experienced yourself.
God has healing and wholeness for you, too-regardless of how your hurt originated. Whether you were the victim of someone else s wrongdoing, you experienced the humiliation of betrayal or abandonment, you suffered a heartache or many of them, or your wounds came from your own regrettable actions, there is a fountain of healing that f lows for those who are willing to receive it. God offers healing to you and can bring purpose out of your pain.
Pain as a Part of Life
Let me start off, dear sister, by gently reminding you that pain is a part of life. I have sometimes even wondered if it s more prevalent in a woman s life. Maybe it s because, as women, we just tend to talk about pain more, to wear our hearts on our sleeves and allow ourselves to