What God Can Use To Heal You
How your home can be a healing haven in your life by keeping Christ at the center.
By Jenna Kelly
I didn’t realize I had been gripping the wheel so tightly. As I rounded the corner of the off-ramp and approached the red light, I could feel my heart rate drop and my lungs relax again. I had been holding my breath without noticing. Probably something I should have been aware of while driving. As my body unwound itself, I recognized that I was getting closer to home—my safe place.
Each turn brought me closer to the haven I’d been cultivating for over two years while walking through the darkest valley of my life. In the summer of 2019, my oldest sister, my built-in best friend, passed away from breast cancer. Reality as we knew it crumbled around us, and I’d been inching my way through broken glass ever since.
Grief changes you in every possible way. There isn’t a single part of your life that it won’t invade, reshape, and force its way on. And it’s certainly no respecter of convenience. After my sister passed away from the monster that is cancer, anything and everything that had previously felt familiar to me was now an utter stranger. I was groping in the dark for any semblance of familiarity. The world had simply been tipped upside down, and I was a foreigner to my new reality. This caused a tremendous amount of anxiety that would often be triggered when I wasn’t home.
Psalm 91:1 tells us, “Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.”
What a beautiful picture of our true home, knowing the eternal resting place of our hearts is found in his presence. It became my prayer that in the pain and suffering I was feeling, the Lord would center me in his goodness and make his presence known to me in our home.
I started paying attention to how I felt within the safety of my home. How I would freely let my emotions out in the privacy of my bedroom, knowing it wouldn’t catch anyone, except perhaps my own reflection in the mirror, off guard. Or on particularly hard days when my eyes were swollen from incessant tears, I knew the end of the night would hold a comforting hug from my husband as we curled up on the couch to watch a mindless comedy while our kids were tucked tightly in bed.
When the anger of this loss felt like it was going to take me under, I could draw a bath, light a candle, and collect my thoughts while the Lord would sit with me and patiently wait for my communion with him. I began to realize that my home, every nook and cranny, was the sanctuary that my broken and bleeding soul longed to heal within.
Today, take a moment to assess your surroundings:
- Where do you like to sit with your morning cup of coffee and prepare for the day ahead?
- Do you have a favorite blanket you like to use when you’re not feeling well?
- Or maybe there’s a rocking chair on your porch that you consistently return to, seeking to feel grounded and at peace.
Pay attention to the patterns that already exist within your four walls. If needed, be intentional to create more safe spaces for your heart, mind, and body to exhale. Maybe you need to carve out a space in your bedroom, family room, or office that invites you to comfortably engage in prayer and simply be present with the Lord.
Be intentional with how this space is decorated: Buy your favorite candle to light. Stack some of your comfiest blankets next to your Bible and journal so they’re readily accessible. Provide yourself items that make your soul feel settled and relaxed. But most importantly, ask God to make his presence known to you in your home.
Even if you start with a small space, God’s presence will begin to spill over into every corner of your home, making you feel secure and assured as you navigate the tumultuous rigors of life. Your home is there to serve you and to serve your family. It’s not a display room for others to approve of and admire, but a sanctuary to fall back on when the world is too hard. Allow your home, with Christ at the center, to help heal your broken heart.
Jenna Kelley lives in Maple Grove, MN, with her husband, Paul, and their four children. @_jennalkelley_
Scripture quotation is from the New International Version of the Bible.