Where Does it Hurt?
The other day, my 1-year-old took her first tumble in the bathtub. After hitting her chin on the side of the tub, she slipped face-first into the water. I quickly swept her to her feet and began to examine her for injuries. She looked me directly in the eyes and cried at the top of her lungs. She wanted to know one thing, “Am I going to be okay?”
After finding no blood, bumps, or bruises, I held her in my arms and answered her question. “That was so scary but you are going to be okay, darling. Mommy is right here.” Within moments she quieted and went right back to playing with her bath toys.
Pain can be good. It tells us that something is wrong—that there is something that needs to be addressed.
I realized that my daughter’s response to her pain and fear was actually very healthy. She turned to me, her caregiver, and allowed me to assess her injury and give her comfort. It got me thinking about how I handle pain. Do I always go to God, my loving caregiver, and allow Him to assess my injury? To tell me if there is a wound that needs tending to?
The following day, I found myself hitting a wall. How many of you know that walls can hurt? So I came up with a solution: “I need a freaking piece of chocolate,” I said out loud. The chocolate tasted great, but it didn’t solve the issue. My prescription for the pain was insufficient.
In that moment, I could hear God whisper to my heart, “Come to me…Come to me all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest”. In that moment, what I needed was the loving presence of my Caregiver, my Loving Father. I needed to spend some time with God and allow Him to assess my hurts. Like my daughter after her fall in the bath, I just needed God to tell me that I was in fact, going to be okay. It was an instance in which I just needed some perspective.
But sometimes our pain is an indication of an actual injury that needs tending. Perhaps an unhealed hurt, or a root of unforgiveness or rejection. We are walking wounded, trying to pretend that all is well—stuffing our faces with chocolate, our appointment books with activities, our minds with television. But these things can only offer temporary relief from the symptoms of our pain. They do not heal our injuries. We again find that our prescriptions for the pain are insufficient.
And there comes a point when our prescriptions for the pain can actually bring more pain. A point when they go from being insufficient, to destructive. It is when the chocolate becomes binge eating and excess weight that jeopardizes our health. When the pain of our loneliness causes us to look for connection in affairs and meaningless sex that jeopardize our families and our hearts. It’s when social drinking turns to drunken stupors, hangovers and missed work.
There comes a time when our prescription for the pain becomes our addiction. We are chasing after what we think we need when only one thing can satisfy.
God has a cure. He says, “Come to me” for “He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds” (Ps 147:3). In the arms of our Loving Caregiver, there is rest. There is safety. There is comfort. There is healing.
Written by Harmony Dust for Treasures
www.iamatreasure.com
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
Monday, August 3, 2009
I hear you...
My good friend Ashley wrote this beautiful poem and I thought you might like it.... Love, Harmony
I HEAR YOU...
Frustration threatens, calls to me, wants to know more than my name! It wants to call me home.
They're all the same.
Suffering, disease, pain, fame.
Calling, calling, calling my name.
Pressure intensifies but I know you’re here… Familiar with my ways, whispering my name, yesterday, today, always the same.
I hear You. I hear You when salt water travels like a creek down the creases of my cheek, collecting, connecting like oceans in my collarbones. I hear You. I hear You.
Disease and death hovering, looming, sea green swampland devils, cooing, luring, consuming, but I hear You, I hear You. Gently, firmly, "You will not drown. Daughter, son, You will not drown" I hear You. I hear You.
Burnt orange and rust colored flames sweeping the land. Red roasting fire of perverted passion rushing gushing, stealing what's left of innocence, ransacking the sacred and holy, raping not just the body, but the soul. But I hear You. I hear You.
Restoring God. Redeemer, Glorious Healer, Magnificent Master, Ferocious Father, Righteous King, Living Word, Great I Am, Alpha and Omega, Beginning and The End.
It is finished, You said. And I hear You. In joy and in pain, we believe You for the day when children are not soldiers, when humans are not trafficked, when cancer will not ravish bones and bodies, when loneliness is not our companion, when poverty and injustice does not reign. We hear You. We wait. We wait with joyful expectation for the day when we see You face to face, when we stand before You in love and longing finally fulfilled.
Holy, Holy, Holy are You lord god almighty! You are the one who was and is and is to come. In light of eternity, I hear You. Let the spirit and the Bride say Come.
Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
Come Lord, Come.
Written by Ashley Dodson for Treasures
www.iamatreasure.com
I HEAR YOU...
Frustration threatens, calls to me, wants to know more than my name! It wants to call me home.
They're all the same.
Suffering, disease, pain, fame.
Calling, calling, calling my name.
Pressure intensifies but I know you’re here… Familiar with my ways, whispering my name, yesterday, today, always the same.
I hear You. I hear You when salt water travels like a creek down the creases of my cheek, collecting, connecting like oceans in my collarbones. I hear You. I hear You.
Disease and death hovering, looming, sea green swampland devils, cooing, luring, consuming, but I hear You, I hear You. Gently, firmly, "You will not drown. Daughter, son, You will not drown" I hear You. I hear You.
Burnt orange and rust colored flames sweeping the land. Red roasting fire of perverted passion rushing gushing, stealing what's left of innocence, ransacking the sacred and holy, raping not just the body, but the soul. But I hear You. I hear You.
Restoring God. Redeemer, Glorious Healer, Magnificent Master, Ferocious Father, Righteous King, Living Word, Great I Am, Alpha and Omega, Beginning and The End.
It is finished, You said. And I hear You. In joy and in pain, we believe You for the day when children are not soldiers, when humans are not trafficked, when cancer will not ravish bones and bodies, when loneliness is not our companion, when poverty and injustice does not reign. We hear You. We wait. We wait with joyful expectation for the day when we see You face to face, when we stand before You in love and longing finally fulfilled.
Holy, Holy, Holy are You lord god almighty! You are the one who was and is and is to come. In light of eternity, I hear You. Let the spirit and the Bride say Come.
Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
Come Lord, Come.
Written by Ashley Dodson for Treasures
www.iamatreasure.com
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Love Overflows
Hey friends,
Just wanted to let you know that we had an awesome outreach in Long Beach where a handful of clubs that seemed weary of us in the past, welcomed us with open arms! At one club, we received 2 rounds of hugs from a girl who was moved by the very gesture of our giving her a gift. "There is something very special about you-you're so generous. There has to be something special about anybody who would come in here and give us gifts like this." We know that it is out of the abundant overflow of love that we have received that you are I are able to give. She said that she is going to contact us and we are looking forward to the opportunity to tell her more about the relentless love God has for her.
This love has not only been evident in the outreach we do here in Los Angeles, but in and among the 15 or so ministries we have had the opportunity to train throughout the nation. To read the letter a club owner in Kansas wrote to a Treasures trained outreach, check out this blog: http://donniemiller.blogspot.com/
UPDATES
- We have just added a NEW STORY to the Treasures site! To read about how Dave overcame addiction to sex, crack and life in the porn industry, check out www.iamatreasure.com/ourstories
- If you are in the LA area, we would love to have you join us for our gift bag assembly on 8/15. Check out www.iamatreasure.com/events for details.
Thank you!
Harmony Dust & The Treasures Team
Monday, July 13, 2009
Wanna Get More Involved?
WANNA GET MORE INVOLVED WITH TREASURES?
We would love to have you! Here are some ideas….
- PRAY FOR OUR OUTREACH THIS FRIDAY
- HELP ASSEMBLE GIFT BAGS: August 15th, at Oasis in LA, 10am.
- JOIN THE PRAYER TEAM: Application available online.
- START AN OUTREACH
- BECOME A MONTHLY PARTNER
- WRITE DEVOTIONALS: 500 words or less. Email to harmony@iamatreasure.com
- SHARE YOUR STORY: Men and Women with stories of hope and redemption. 1,000 words email with picture to harmony@iamatreasure.com
- SIGN UP FOR OUR NEWSLETTER
HELP WITH CURRENT NEEDS:
- New COSMETICS and JEWERLY for the gift bags (please mail by August 5th)
- Beautiful STATIONARY and blank GREETING CARDS (for letters to the girls)
- STAMPS
- DISNEYLAND PASSES for an upcoming trip with the children of an ex-dancer who was severely burned.
- GIFT CARDS: Target, grocery and gas cards (to assist women with transitioning out of the industry)
For more information on simple ways you can support Treasures, visit www.iamatreasure.com
Donations and gifts in kind can be mailed to:
Treasures
PO Box 2013
North Hills, CA 91343
Love, harmony
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Surrendering the Canvas: Understanding Sex Addiction
40 million adults in the U.S. regularly visit pornographic websites and 1/3 of these visitors are women. The question is “Why, and what does it have to do with us?”
What I am learning about sex addiction in its various forms is that it is about avoiding relational pain. Real relationships and intimacy force us to engage with people on a level where our hearts are open. This sort of intimacy is scary...especially for those that have been hurt. So people turn to fantasy and sex because when you are in fantasy, you can control the objects of your desire without risking relational pain. When you objectify someone by turning them into a fantasy in your head, you can control them. They can’t hurt you because they are not real humans…they are objects.
Even reflecting on my own past, I can see that engaging in sex work was largely about sexualizing my pain. I had been raped and abused and learned that intimacy=pain. Stripping offered me a false sense of empowerment and temporary relief from the pain I was suffering. I could pretend that I was in control and as long as I was in control, I could avoid the pain that true intimacy and relationship might bring.
Many people have a difficult time relating to the plight of the sex addict. But I would suggest that if we are honest enough to examine our own hearts, we might find some similarities. Most people spend time imagining what their life will look like. We paint a canvas in our heads of our marriages, careers, friendships etc. What happens when our expectations are shattered by life’s disappointment? Perhaps by the death of a loved one, the breakdown of a marriage or the loss of a career. How do we respond? Do get angry towards God and respond in bitterness? Or, are we willing to engage in true relationship with our Creator and surrender the canvas of our lives to Him. I too have painted a canvas of what my life would look like, but I have discovered that my canvas may not be consistent with the ultimate canvas that God is painting for me.
Are we willing to trust that He is good, and that His plans are good, even when they don’t look like the picture we have painted? If we cling more tightly to the canvas we have painted in our heads, than we cling to God, we too are trapped by fantasy.
Isaiah 42:16-17 says the following:
I will lead the blind by ways they have not known, along unfamiliar paths I will guide them; I will turn the darkness into light before them and make the rough places smooth. These are the things I will do; I will not forsake them. But those who trust in idols, who say to graven images, 'You are our gods,’ will be turned back in utter shame.
Fantasy is idolatry. It is putting trust in a graven image carved out by our minds. It is much easier to place our trust in something we can see and control, then to place it in a God we cannot see and cannot control.
True relationship and intimacy can be scary. Healing can be scary. These things require trust and courage to walk with God along unfamiliar paths by ways we have not imagined. But God, our God, wants to take us on this journey. He will make our rough places smooth and bring light where there is none.
We must allow God’s floodlight to penetrate our hearts, exposing the true source of pain so that healing can take place. Only then will we be able to see clearly what has propelled us to escape in fantasy. Only then will be able to surrender the canvas of our lives to a good God, knowing that He can do exceedingly, abundantly above all we can ask think or imagine!
Love, Harmony
www.iamatreasure.com
PS. I highly recommend the book “False Intimacy: Understanding the Struggle of Sexual Addiction” by Schaumburg.
What I am learning about sex addiction in its various forms is that it is about avoiding relational pain. Real relationships and intimacy force us to engage with people on a level where our hearts are open. This sort of intimacy is scary...especially for those that have been hurt. So people turn to fantasy and sex because when you are in fantasy, you can control the objects of your desire without risking relational pain. When you objectify someone by turning them into a fantasy in your head, you can control them. They can’t hurt you because they are not real humans…they are objects.
Even reflecting on my own past, I can see that engaging in sex work was largely about sexualizing my pain. I had been raped and abused and learned that intimacy=pain. Stripping offered me a false sense of empowerment and temporary relief from the pain I was suffering. I could pretend that I was in control and as long as I was in control, I could avoid the pain that true intimacy and relationship might bring.
Many people have a difficult time relating to the plight of the sex addict. But I would suggest that if we are honest enough to examine our own hearts, we might find some similarities. Most people spend time imagining what their life will look like. We paint a canvas in our heads of our marriages, careers, friendships etc. What happens when our expectations are shattered by life’s disappointment? Perhaps by the death of a loved one, the breakdown of a marriage or the loss of a career. How do we respond? Do get angry towards God and respond in bitterness? Or, are we willing to engage in true relationship with our Creator and surrender the canvas of our lives to Him. I too have painted a canvas of what my life would look like, but I have discovered that my canvas may not be consistent with the ultimate canvas that God is painting for me.
Are we willing to trust that He is good, and that His plans are good, even when they don’t look like the picture we have painted? If we cling more tightly to the canvas we have painted in our heads, than we cling to God, we too are trapped by fantasy.
Isaiah 42:16-17 says the following:
I will lead the blind by ways they have not known, along unfamiliar paths I will guide them; I will turn the darkness into light before them and make the rough places smooth. These are the things I will do; I will not forsake them. But those who trust in idols, who say to graven images, 'You are our gods,’ will be turned back in utter shame.
Fantasy is idolatry. It is putting trust in a graven image carved out by our minds. It is much easier to place our trust in something we can see and control, then to place it in a God we cannot see and cannot control.
True relationship and intimacy can be scary. Healing can be scary. These things require trust and courage to walk with God along unfamiliar paths by ways we have not imagined. But God, our God, wants to take us on this journey. He will make our rough places smooth and bring light where there is none.
We must allow God’s floodlight to penetrate our hearts, exposing the true source of pain so that healing can take place. Only then will we be able to see clearly what has propelled us to escape in fantasy. Only then will be able to surrender the canvas of our lives to a good God, knowing that He can do exceedingly, abundantly above all we can ask think or imagine!
Love, Harmony
www.iamatreasure.com
PS. I highly recommend the book “False Intimacy: Understanding the Struggle of Sexual Addiction” by Schaumburg.
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Healing Journey
My Healing Journey
by Harmony Dust
by Harmony Dust
Every journey is different. Every time Jesus healed someone in the bible he did it differently. And so it is with us. There is no secret formula for healing, but I believe that there are steps that we can take and choices we can make that will strength to our lives. Here are just a few of the things that I discovered on my own healing journey.
Relate
There is no substitute for a real and honest relationship with God. He is Lord over my life and so much more. Through reading His word, praying and simply spending time being quiet and still with Him, I have come to know Him as Father, Friend, Comforter, Healer, Redeemer, Provider, and the Lover of my soul. He is not a distant God, sitting in some far off place judging you and me. He is a God of mercy, grace and compassion. He is Immanuel, God who is with us.
Plant
We are not meant to do life alone. Humans are relational beings designed for community. A tree cannot grow unless it is planted, and I strongly believe that my life would not bear the fruit it has if I had not been planted in my church. I am not talking about simply doing the Christian duty of sitting through a Sunday service. I believe that the local church plays an irreplaceable role on this planet. When the local church is healthy, it is a place where people can come to worship, learn, grow, and experience healing, grace, mercy and the unconditional love of God. It is where I have built some of my most meaningful and flourishing relationships with people who know me—imperfections and all—and love me anyway.Decide
In the bible (John 5), we read the story of a man, lying on a mat, who had been disabled for 38 years. Jesus asks him a question: “Do you want to get well?” At that point, the man starts coming up with excuses, saying that nobody would help him and every time he tried to get better, somebody got in his way. Ultimately, Jesus instructs the man to “take up his mat and walk”. He follows this instruction and is healed.I believe that Jesus is asking you and I the same question. Do you want to get well? Sometimes we think we want to get better, but when it comes down to it, we have a million excuses as to why we can’t. We become comfortable with our condition and content to remain paralyzed on our mats.
Ultimately, the decision is in our hands. Nobody can want it for us. God can’t force it on us. We must decide to get well.
Replace
Eleven years ago, I believed a lot of lies. They were so woven into the fabric of my being that they became my personal truth. I believed that I was worthless, stupid, and unlovable. My life reflected what I thought to be true because I made choices based on those deep and hidden beliefs.
The bible tells us to “Be transformed by the renewing of your mind” (Romans 12:2). It also says that we are to “take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ” (2 Corinthians 10:5).
There is a process of transformation that requires action on our part. It is up to us to actively replace the lies we believe with truth. (See Appendix B)
Face
In my own journey, I have had to face some big giants: Sexual abuse, rape, father issues, fear, rejection, abandonment, unforgiveness, and bitterness to name a few. To rattle them off in a list like this is easy, but to actually face each of these head on was been a battle. I can distinctly remember fighting though Los Angeles traffic to make the 1 1/2 hour commute to see my therapist where I had to pay upwards of $60 an hour to face some of my giants. I would much rather have been sitting on my couch eating chocolate ice cream watching reruns of Seinfeld. But if I wanted to walk in the fullness of God’s promises for my life, there were giants to be faced. Sometimes I felt like David—like I was facing a seasoned combatant with weapons as puny as a sling and a stone. But during those times I learned that like David, God has given me the tools I need to face the giants in my life, and that I never have to face them on my own.
Forgive
I used to think that some things were simply unforgivable—rape and murder among them. I felt completely justified in hating the ex-boyfriend who raped me. To forgive him seemed to mean that what he did was okay and it wasn’t.Eventually, I learned that forgiveness is a vertical transaction between me and God, not a horizontal one between me and another human. God has forgiven me and He asks me to forgive others.
I have heard it said that forgiveness is setting someone free and realizing the prisoner was you. At first I forgave out of obedience, but when I finally forgave, I realized that I was the one being held captive by my unforgiveness. The people that have hurt me were living their lives, going about their merry way, while I was seething with anger, hurt and bitterness. Unforgiveness was holding me prisoner.
Stay
The journey is never over so be gracious with yourself and stay committed to the course. We are all in a process of becoming—becoming healed, becoming whole, becoming closer to God, and becoming all that we are created to be.God is a gentleman. He never forces us to change or gives us more than we can bear. He walks us through this process one step at a time. In His strength we are able to face our giants one by one.
I could apply 110 steps to healing and read a zillion self-help books, but what I am able to accomplish on my own pales in comparison to what can happen when I invite the transforming, gracious and redeeming power of God into my life. His love transcends knowledge, reason, and human effort.
And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.
Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations,
for ever and ever! Amen.
Ephesians 3:17-21
for ever and ever! Amen.
Ephesians 3:17-21
What do you believe is standing in the way of your healing? Which of these steps might God be asking you to take today? Comment below...
*To order the Healing Journey cd, or other resources for healing, visit www.iamatreasure.com/store
*To order the Healing Journey cd, or other resources for healing, visit www.iamatreasure.com/store
Monday, June 15, 2009
Porn Convention Update
This weekend, the Treasures team partnered with Craig Gross and XXX Church at the LA Erotica Convention. If you missed out on our instant updates, make sure to follow me on Twitter @youareatreasure
In addition to giving Treasures gift bags to the girls, in all, we gave out over 4,000 “Jesus loves porn star” bibles to convention attendees and men and women in the industry. And as Craig noted throughout the weekend, God’s word will not return void. We are praying that people would be inspired to read the bibles they received and that God’s love and truth would penetrate their hearts!
We saw firsthand, how moving and powerful God’s word truly is. A Treasures volunteer witnessed a special moment when a grown man sitting on a staircase, cradled the bible (which he kept referring to as “this book”) in his hands with tears in his eyes. He was reading God’s word in the middle of a porn convention, perhaps for the first time, and he was visibly moved.
“Jesus is here? At a porn convention…” one girl asked after telling me how horrible the “preachers” standing outside with picket signs had made her feel. Knowing Immanuel, God who is with us, I confidently said, “Yes. He is here, at a porn convention. He is with us.” I could see in this woman’s eyes that this was an entirely new concept to her and the idea that God would meet her there in such a place, seemed to disarm her. Isn’t’ that our God though? Meeting us where we are at, in the middle of our circumstances, and loving us right there, as is. It is this sort of love and goodness that leads to transformation and healing.
Still, there were so many people at the convention who have experienced the opposite of that kind of love. From an ex-reverend who professed to being almost atheist, to a ex-seminary student, to a husband and wife that had been kicked out of their church, to the daughters of pastors, to a woman who had been raped by a pastor and a man who had been raped by a priest. We saw people with real hurts and heartbreak so deep that it has caused them to run from the Only One who can heal that sort of pain. I wonder about the depth and severity of the wounds in their hearts and all I can do is pray. The common thread among all of these people is that they have been hurt, not by God, but by His people.
And, as a friend of Treasures recently posted on my Facebook page, “if I call myself a Christ-follower and treat others like garbage, it is completely reasonable for others to question the positive value of following Jesus because I am telling them by my life that Jesus is unloving, unkind, uncaring, etc. God uses people as an avenue for Him to come to us. I would suggest that God uses people as His most common method of getting in touch with us (with the Holy Spirit being intimately involved in that process).”
I love that idea that WE ARE AVENUES. By our actions and the way we love people, we can either lead people closer to the heart of God, or farther from Him. May we each honestly and carefully examine our own actions and determine where we want our avenues-our lives- to lead people.
Love, Harmony
www.iamatreasure.com
In addition to giving Treasures gift bags to the girls, in all, we gave out over 4,000 “Jesus loves porn star” bibles to convention attendees and men and women in the industry. And as Craig noted throughout the weekend, God’s word will not return void. We are praying that people would be inspired to read the bibles they received and that God’s love and truth would penetrate their hearts!
We saw firsthand, how moving and powerful God’s word truly is. A Treasures volunteer witnessed a special moment when a grown man sitting on a staircase, cradled the bible (which he kept referring to as “this book”) in his hands with tears in his eyes. He was reading God’s word in the middle of a porn convention, perhaps for the first time, and he was visibly moved.
“Jesus is here? At a porn convention…” one girl asked after telling me how horrible the “preachers” standing outside with picket signs had made her feel. Knowing Immanuel, God who is with us, I confidently said, “Yes. He is here, at a porn convention. He is with us.” I could see in this woman’s eyes that this was an entirely new concept to her and the idea that God would meet her there in such a place, seemed to disarm her. Isn’t’ that our God though? Meeting us where we are at, in the middle of our circumstances, and loving us right there, as is. It is this sort of love and goodness that leads to transformation and healing.
Still, there were so many people at the convention who have experienced the opposite of that kind of love. From an ex-reverend who professed to being almost atheist, to a ex-seminary student, to a husband and wife that had been kicked out of their church, to the daughters of pastors, to a woman who had been raped by a pastor and a man who had been raped by a priest. We saw people with real hurts and heartbreak so deep that it has caused them to run from the Only One who can heal that sort of pain. I wonder about the depth and severity of the wounds in their hearts and all I can do is pray. The common thread among all of these people is that they have been hurt, not by God, but by His people.
And, as a friend of Treasures recently posted on my Facebook page, “if I call myself a Christ-follower and treat others like garbage, it is completely reasonable for others to question the positive value of following Jesus because I am telling them by my life that Jesus is unloving, unkind, uncaring, etc. God uses people as an avenue for Him to come to us. I would suggest that God uses people as His most common method of getting in touch with us (with the Holy Spirit being intimately involved in that process).”
I love that idea that WE ARE AVENUES. By our actions and the way we love people, we can either lead people closer to the heart of God, or farther from Him. May we each honestly and carefully examine our own actions and determine where we want our avenues-our lives- to lead people.
Love, Harmony
www.iamatreasure.com
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