When Does Restoration Begin

When Does Restoration Begin? By John Henderson - Lancaster, CA Experiencing the restoration available through applying biblical principles is not as difficult to understand as it is to accomplish. Biblical restoration assumes first of all that you actually have or have had a personal life changing relationship with Jesus Christ. This is essential to the process of restoration. Secondly, it is important to realize that, apart from total surrender to God and complete self-sacrifice, restoration is impossible. In my own life, I was “a self made man who worshipped his creator”. Even though I had made a personal and public profession of faith through water baptism in Christ some 45 years ago, I ignored the Godly principles necessary to make that profession a working model in my life because doing so would have interfered with my self-centered, self-image. After all, I was a “man” and real men didn’t need anyone else telling them how to act and any one who did was weak. I was sort of secure in that. And after I died I’d go to heaven and all that other stuff about “being religious” was for women and children. At the core of that ignorance emerged an attitude of intolerance that demanded perfection in my family. I saw myself as a model of perfection and thought my wife and kids should be just like me. And when their rebellion started, I became severely abusive. I didn’t see it then but as I now look back they had, in

reality, become just like me! It wasn’t until my abuse became public that I realized something was wrong. What followed and continued for almost two years was a regimen of court appearances, losing the kids, court ordered counseling and basically being turned over to the State for chastening. I was investigated and my entire life became an open book and all the “skeletons were brought out of the closet”. Although I was never arrested for my abusiveness, I was interviewed by three police departments in two different counties and subjected to a kind of fear I had never experienced and was brought to the point of a near heart attack. I deservedly lived in my own private jail because I was guilty. During the last few months of those two years is when my wife’s faithfulness to a LIVING GOD in spite of wanting to flush me down the toilet, began to pay off. (Hers is truly a testimony of endurance through trials!) We began our search for a local church where compassion was the rule, not the exception. Being broken and repentant, I chose to be an open book and was honest (almost to a fault) with every pastor we met; most just ignored us like we had the plaque. One even went as far as telling us he didn’t want us in “his church” because we’d be “bringing in sin”! Finally, after several months, we attended an evening service at a local Assembly of God church and found that compassion. (Since that time, we have discovered many other places of fellowship that are filled with compassionate and caring people.) We were told about their Marriage Restoration Ministry

and asked for an interview. Our first few months in the group were tougher on us than any other “counseling” we had previously been through. The self-centeredness I had left was systematically torn down by a tough loving giant of a man whose middle name seemed to be “Cut-the-c--p-and-get-right”. Walt NEVER let me play the games I had played so well and held me accountable for ALL my attitudes. I am eternally grateful for his tough-love, and for teaching me how to be accountable. Walt and his wife left that particular ministry and our “givingcouple”, Jack and Agnes stepped in to take over Marriage Restoration Ministry. It’s a different ministry now, but the toughlove, accountability and compelling compassion are still the rule. After five years in Marriage Restoration, Karen and I are considered to be among the “poster children” of Marriage. I say that humbly, because today, God is in charge. We are NEVER as close to God as when we are broken and the Holy Spirit restores us by God’s Grace to the place where we can PRAISE HIM. God does inhabit the praises of HIS people. And we know we are His people when, as broken vessels, we rush to His outstretched arms to receive His UNCONDITIONAL LOVE which is the instrument of restoration. -30-

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