When Your Best Isn't Good Enough


By Phil Scovell






     Being in a religious mood, I flipped on the satellite
channels and began thumbing the scanning button through the
Christian TV channels.  After all, it was Sunday, and why not find
a good sermon to boost my feelings of Christianity.  You know that
old saying; "Christianity is like driving a car with a busted gas
gage.  You never know when you might run out so you need to pull
in more often."  I've always believe that was true so I try to
practice what I preach.

     So, again, I'm surfing the Christian TV channels, jumping
from one to the next, listening for awhile, and then skipping to
the next channel in line.  Oh, by the way, I had heard T D Jakes,
about a week before, preaching a super sermon on marriage.  He was
saying that women think in circles and men think in straight
lines.  That might be the name of a book he wrote; I don't know
for sure.  Anyhow, it was so good and so down to earth, I thought
I would set my alarm watch to listen to him again the next Sunday. 
He was preaching on something that I didn't feel was all that
applicable to where I am at the moment in my relationship to God,
although I have heard him before and always enjoy what I hear, but
this time, as I keep trying to say, I went surfing.

     Suddenly, I landed on a channel with a very interesting
sermon being preached by no one I recognized but I stopped to
listen.  He was preaching right down where we all live, I always
like that, and he was using the idea of different colored flags
to illustrated and emphasize his points.  I like his method so I
focused on what he was teaching.

     His basic theme was, regardless of circumstances life has
dealt, we, born again Christians, can overcome, and otherwise, not
be controlled by, the effects and woundedness such life events may
have brought our way.

     As the sermon progressed, and each flag was identified, I
became more interested.  I even commented to myself how this was
one of the very few times I felt somebody was down on my level and
was teaching something that would set people free, even
Christians, who are still living wounded lives due to tragic
experiences in earlier life.  It was his conclusion that saddened
me but I still gave him credit for the teaching he offered because
it was good.

     For example, he said that we could consider trigger points,
things that upset us emotionally in current daily living, as flags
the pop up to warn us.  He meant, and said as much as he
preached, that a current experience, say a bad day at work, where
the boss climbed all over you for something you didn't even do, or
your feelings get hurt due to a misunderstanding with a good
friend, could trigger woundedness from the past.  Then, all of the
sudden, those old memories and bad painful feelings surface and
you find yourself discouraged or depressed, or worse, and tears
result.  Those who know me and what I do, will understand why this
teaching caught my immediate attention.  I pray with people who
are suffering from such earlier life experiences.  So I really
listened because I thought I had found someone I could gleam more
instruction from in order to improve my prayer sessions with
others in order for them to experience liberty in Christ since
their born again salvitic experience.  Let me explain more
explicitly about what he was teaching.

     For example, as I said, something happen at work.  You are
blamed severely for something and that unjust accusation triggers
emotional pressures, perhaps even a unpleasant memory, and a red
flag pops up.  In this case, he suggested, perhaps it was an
abortion.  You were young, others put abnormal pressure on you
due to your age, to get an abortion.  Perhaps even from your
parents, who are Christian but believed at the time, it is the
best for their daughter personally.  Maybe you were only 14 or 15
years of age and they felt you could not handle maturing into
adult hood as well with a child as a full time responsibility so
they pushed for the abortion.  This preacher wasn't condemning a
person in this situation, not even the girls parents, but he was
just trying to explain a helpless and out of control situation
that could happen to anyone, born again or not.

     Then he describe yet another situation and identified it as
another flag popping up to warn us that woundedness is just under
the surface, with roots buried deep, and is going to effect us
spiritually in very painful ways.

     He repeated this, each time changing the color of the flag
which popped up due to a circumstance beyond our control but
results of painful memories being triggered in current time, that
is, every day life experience upon which we have no control. 
These various flags, therefore, were indicators of woundedness
from other earlier events which had not yet been healed simply
because of the nature of the events.  So far; so good.

     Finally he said, we, as Christians, can hold up these flags,
when they pop up to warn us of impending old wounds and pain that
are about to surface, and taken them collectively, or
individually, and hold them up to the Lord, relating the event
that has cause us so much suffering, and turn them over to the
Lord once and for all.  This was when my spirits fell.  I
continued listening to see if he would cover what we do when,
after offering up the flags that indicates our woundedness from
the past, the pain doesn't go away.  He didn't even refer to such
a thing happening, which is quite common, but rather concluded his
message.  It was good but not good enough.  He left out what Jesus
can really do about just such life experiences.  So let me briefly
tell you what Jesus  can do.

     In most pastoral and psychological therapeutic counseling
approaches, basic human philosophies would be employed to assist
the suffering person from the emotional and mental pain with which
they have been living.  This woundedness may be a year old, 10
years old, or literally decades old.  I have prayed with many who
have lived with their woundedness for well over 50 years and
although they are well Biblically grounded Christians of faith,
they have lived with the guilt and fear and grief and shame and
confusion, nearly their entire lives.  "Why," you may ask, because
I most certainly ask, "hasn't the church addressed these people?" 
We have.  We have told them that we cannot help them and that they
must see a professional in order to get at the root of their pain. 
So off we send them to, at the least, a so called Christian
counselor and at the most, a doctor, psychologist, or preferably,
a psychiatrist.  If none are available, we send them to a doctor
who doesn't even believe in Christ as His Lord and Savior and
expect them to help this "Christian."  God for give us.  Then
treatment, as it is called, begins.

     The first session of psychological therapy is conducted so
the counselor can get an idea of why, and where, they are
hurting.  Of course, if the wounded person has been traumatized to
the degree that actual memory events has been suppressed, just
talking won't find that hidden event.  Oh, sure, after several
therapy session, talking may tap around the outer edges of
something we can't see, normally making the emotional suffering of
the person worse, and it might even totally mislead the counselor
into diagnosing the wrong problem.  That, in fact, happened to me
once.

     The therapist I went to, due to just talk, led me into an
area where I was nearly convinced, after having a completely
normal and happy childhood, that all my current adult issues were
due to my mother molesting me.  For three long weeks, I was
emotionally and mentally trashed out and everything got worse at
the time.  Fortunately, he was wrong and Jesus was able to show
both of us the absolute truth.  This was when we focused more on
praying together in agreement than psychological methodology.  I
had not been molested by my mother as a child; I have been lied to
by a demonic infiltrating lying spirit.  That lie was allowed to
be buried in childhood memories for literally 50 years before it
was exposed for what it was, a lie, a diabolical lie.  Strangely
enough, the lie was allowed to surface in my life 25 years after
it had been implanted in my mind, due to a tragic event of total
rejection, and it nearly destroyed me for several years.  By the
way, that is what the Enemy does; he is there to kill, steal, and
to destroy you.  Oh, sure, you will go to Heaven as a Christian,
but the Enemy is going to do everything he can to destabilize your
relationship with God, robbing you of any possible happiness, and
making you emotionally, the most miserable person on the planet. 
You will receive lots of help, too, mostly from Christians and
self appointed called church leaders.

     Let's return and expand upon the deep woundedness of the
leftovers of abortion of our imaginary woman.

     The pastor illustrated such a woman's situation, as I
mentioned, by using a red flag to explain how we could, and
should, be set totally free upon being triggered emotionally from
something current but has its roots in the past.

     Now, let say, the young lady who had the abortion is 48 years
old.  She has had several children, by two or three husbands, and
now even has some grandchildren.  Yet she still finds the guilt,
at times, more than she can handle.  Her pastor is only
theologically trained, never took a psychology course in his life,
and has only read one or two such books by Christian psychologists
since taking his first pastoral position.  He, thus, feels
incapable of helping this woman to obtain some semblance of
normality in her life because it isn't a spiritual problem or so
he believes.

     Hearing about a Christian psychologist, he recommends this
lady, from his church, go to him instead.  After all, he, the
pastor, isn't trained.  Right?  Apparently we must resort to
psychological therapy when we think the Bible has nothing to say
about what the Holy Spirit can, and cannot, do today.

     The woman, now feeling worse than ever in her entire life,
makes an appointment.  They naturally cover all the same ground
she has covered with the pastor, and the pastor before him, and
even one or two licensed Christian therapist along the way.  They
all did the same thing, that is, they talked.  They offered lots
of encouraging Bible verses and Christian literature that is
available by others who suffer from the same, or similar,
woundedness in order to help lift her spirits.  Although the
psychologist helped, somewhat, she eventually stops going.  After
all, the cost of all this talking is busting her bank account and
she'd rather be spending money on her grandchildren than her
mental and emotional, maybe even spiritual problems, too.  For
that matter, it is beginning to appear that nobody really cares,
or if they do care, they can't seem to help her get anything
resolved or even point her in the right direction.

     As things worsen, she finally somehow is able to find a
Christian psychiatrist.  Maybe he can help.  He pretty much begins
where everyone else did so it is a total repeat of all the facts,
as she recalls them, to the current time.  The guilt is still
there, the shame, and the utter confusion.  This doctor, however,
has a leg up on the others that came before him; he can prescribe
medications that may, or may not, help alleviate her emotional
problems.  So, due to her poor ability to sleep well at night, he
first gives her a sleep medication.  Due to her sadness and lack
of emotional stability, he prescribed an antidepressant because it
is obvious that she has some type of chemical imbalance.  This is
based upon his psychological training by secular humanist,
political left wing liberals, UFOlogists, believers in the Bermuda
Triangle, Atlantis, Adam and Eve were space travelers, and in
short, none of whom were born again Christians with Christian
principals, unless, of course, he obtained his degree from a
Christian university.  In that case, unfortunately, after all the
Bible reading and references to other Christian so called
psychological professionals to which the woman is required to
read, and believe, he informs her that this is something she will
have to deal with throughout the rest of her life.  Well, no
fooling, Jack!  Thanks for nothing except the bill.  I mean, the
poor woman has so far lived most of her entire life with this same
painful guilt and fear.  She then is told the antidepressant will
work but if it doesn't, there are literally hundreds of others to
try that will, or should, work for her.  Ain't that wonderful? 
Praise God!  Be patient, she is told, because it takes three to
four weeks for the antidepressant he has prescribed, to get into
the blood stream.  She will, therefore, have to be patient and
just live with her suicidal feelings until the drugs start to
work.  Yes, there may very well be side effects but if there are,
we will adjust your medications accordingly so don't worry about a
thing.  Easy for him to say; he isn't depressed.  "Wait a minute. 
How many antidepressants did you say I might have to try before
hitting the right one that works for me?"  No wonder the highest
suicide rates in the United States, besides police officers, is
psychologists and psychiatrists; they don't believe what they have
learned any more than their patients they are trying to convince
what they have been taught is the truth, the whole truth, and
nothing but the truth, the Bible notwithstanding.

     About this time, I am reminded of the woman who came to
Jesus, after spending all she had, in order to experience healing. 
So, let's read about her life in Luke 8:43-48.

"43  And a woman having an issue of blood twelve years, which had
spent all her living upon physicians, neither could be healed of
any,
44  Came behind him, and touched the border of his garment: and
immediately her issue of blood stanched.
45  And Jesus said, Who touched me? When all denied, Peter and
they that were with him said, Master, the multitude throng thee
and press thee, and sayest thou, Who touched me?
46  And Jesus said, Somebody hath touched me: for I perceive that
virtue is gone out of me.
47  And when the woman saw that she was not hid, she came
trembling, and falling down before him, she declared unto him
before all the people for what cause she had touched him, and how
she was healed immediately.
48  And he said unto her, Daughter, be of good comfort: thy faith
hath made thee whole; go in peace."

     So where are we now with our imaginary woman?  The woman is
still in church, still crying by the end of every service, living
alone because being married and having children has not worked,
getting drunk far too many times in years passed hasn't helped
either as she tried treating herself, and then she had to pay to
attend alcoholic classes twice a week and was forced to stand up
and admit, "My name is Jo Ann and I am a recovering alcoholic,"
even though she hasn't had a drink for 19 years.  She still has
the desire though, and always will, according to the
professionals teaching and leading the classes she attends, and
she is getting to the point she believes God just doesn't really
love her any more; if he ever did in the first place.  Is there a
God?  After all this poor woman has faced in her life, I'm
beginning to wonder myself.  She has spent all, emotionally,
mentally, financially, and spiritually, but has not found the
answer she so desperately needs.

     One day, in desperation, and after smashing right through her
19 year sobriety, and getting so drunk, she passes out, she
awakens with the worse headache and hangover she ever experienced. 
Hours later, after a bottle of aspirin, and a roll of antacids,
she finally feels half alive.  Sitting down at her computer, she
dials up a search engine, types in some words, forgetting
instantly what they were, and a very strange website shows up that
looks suspiciously new age to her as a fundamental, Bible
believing, born again Christian.  She begins to read all the
personal articles and testimonies; some even sounding a lot like
her own situation she has suffered.  Could it be possible?  Could
she have hit the mother load?  She picks up the phone and dials
the number.  As she dials, she wonders how much they are going to
charge for their "services," although the website insists they
don't put a price on prayer, she finds that impossible to
believe.

     In her first prayer session, she learns the sessions are
called prayer sessions, because the man prays with her and isn't
trying to figure out a diagnosis.  In fact, the man even says
right up front, he doesn't care about a diagnosis because Jesus
already knows her problem and all he does his pray with her. 
She's told him her story and from that point, they talk and pray
and talk and pray and talk and pray.  A lot of it is based upon
how she feels at any given moment of the time they spend in
prayer.  In other words, the prayer session moves along on an
invisible track as the man continually punctuates the session with
prayers, stopping occasionally to ask how she feels, and then he
keeps asking Jesus, and the Holy Spirit, as if he is relying upon
the Lord to do the impossible work instead of his educational
training, to show them both what He, Jesus, sees and knows.  As
more prayer and feelings change, so does the focus.  No, they
don't get it all settle in the first prayer session but the woman
hangs up feeling lighter than ever before and determined to return
to find out the rest.  Can it be true?  Does she feel different? 
Is that truly hope she feels inside?  Does the Holy Spirit really
play that sort of a part in a person's life?  I thought the Holy
Spirit just came to dwell inside a Christian to confirm that
person was save; born again.  Right?  Sure, that's all.  Yet she
feels different and that bothers her because she has been taught
not to live by her feelings because feelings are misleading. 
Funny, though, the Enemy has feelings and emotions and he thinks
and tries scaring the crap out of even strong Christians, so why
is the Holy Spirit, and even Jesus, for that matter, feelingless
and emotionless?  It beats me but just maybe, she thinks,
something real is going on.

     In subsequent prayer session with this unskilled, uneducated,
layman, she eventually discovers the truth about her woundedness. 
Although she was 14 years old at the time and new better, she had
been groomed, and consequently seduced, by the youth pastor in the
small church she and her family attended.  Her father was well
known and well liked in the church as the head of the board of
elders.  Her mother directed the choir and all of the rest of the
music performed in the church.  Her oldest brother had just gone
off to Bible college and her entire family was well respected and
admired as some of the most spiritual Christians in the church
ministry.  No one knew, of course, that the married young man who
became their youth pastor, had done the same thing in the last
three churches, that he had now done again in this church and
again, with a 14 year young girl whom he groomed slowly over time
and then began having sexual intercourse with her.  When she
realized she wasn't feeling well, she went to her mother and told
her everything because the guilt was just too great.  When her
father learned of it, he and his wife both were devastated.  Their
daughter seduced by a youth pastor of their own church?  How could
that have happened.  Was their daughter sexually promiscuous?  Why
did she give into to this man.  How much of a part, after all, did
their daughter play in this tragedy?  Besides everything else,
she wasn't old enough to become a mother, drop out of school, and
try and get a job.  What would the neighbors think?  Forget that. 
Besides, we don't hardly know our neighbors.  What would the
pastor and the rest of the church think about their daughter and
about them.  They were leaders in the church.  Sure, they could
let her have the baby but they'd have to send her away because if
people here saw she was pregnant, well, it would ruin their
Christian testimony.  So they couldn't send her off.  There was
only one thing left to do; she had a quiet, hushed, abortion. 
Nobody but her family would know.  Except the Enemy, of course,
but he never bothers Christians because they are born again Bible
Believers.  Right?  Sure.

     Now, for 50 years, she doubted her salvation.  She doubted
the Lord could ever loved her for what she had done to her baby. 
She was the only divorced person in her family out of five
children.  Neither of her two sisters had succumb to such a
horrible shameful plight.  Her dad often reminded her of that
until the day he died and Her mother just always looked sad and
rarely could think of anything to say to her daughter until the
day she died, too.  Not much different treatment than what she
received from various pastors, church members, and so called
friends.  She had ruined her own life and she knew it.  Now,
however, something made her feel as if all that wasn't necessarily
true.

     Over a handful of prayer sessions, this now 64 year old
woman, discovered that she had believe a lie all of her life, that
is, it was her fault.  She knew better.  Right?  She should have
resisted this older young man's advancements and enticements. 
Right?  She learned, through the intercessory ministry and prayers
of the Holy Spirit in her behalf, that the young man never did
love her; that was a lie, and a lie which, at her young age, she
truly believed.  When the question came up during a prayer
session, "But why did I do it?  I knew better as a Christian," the
man with whom she had been praying, who also called himself just a
witness of God's grace, prayed and asked the Lord to give her an
answer that she could understand.  The woman laughed out loud when
she heard.  "Of course," she said, "that makes sense.  Jesus said
I was deceived by the Enemy from beginning to end."  That was
true, of course, and the bondage she had been living under for 50
years suddenly vanished in a single thought of transformation. 
Her mind was renewed.

     Still, there was the abortion itself.  She was guilty, after
all, wasn't she?  I mean, she hadn't been raped by the youth
pastor, or had she?  She had been so confused at the time her
parents pushed for her to get an abortion, she had no idea what
was right and what was wrong.  During a prayer session, therefore,
she learned from the Lord that the youth pastor had been
responsible and he had deliberately confused her so he could get
what he wanted.  Of course a 25 year old man didn't love a 14 year
old girl more than he did his own wife but that's what she had
been led to believe.  Fear and personal shame by her own parents
had caused them to make the wrong decision.  After all, they had a
spiritual reputation to protect and if that was true, they needed
to protect their daughter as well.  So they did the only thing
they knew to do and pushed their daughter into having an abortion. 
Besides, she was still a minor.  She was given no choice.

     Finally the day came when she saw what Jesus saw in this
situation.  He had truly forgiven her all those many years ago as
a little girl when she had prayed and asked for forgiveness of
what she had done.  He shared with her His eternal and infinite
wisdom in why her parents reacted the way in which they did and
she felt sorry for her parent then.  Strangely enough, she even
felt sorrow, and forgiveness, for the young man who had
deliberately misled and used her for his own purposes.  She didn't
know how but the forgiveness and release was more real than
anything she had ever experienced, out side of her salvation, that
is.

     I have been walking with the Lord over 50 years.  I have
heard over 50,000 sermons in my life, and preached a few of those,
too.  I have traveled and met thousands of Christians.  Some have
listened to me preach in person, some on the radio, and some have
read my testimonies of my own healing through my website.  Others
have never met me but we have literally prayed hundreds of hours
over the telephone; some even from overseas.  I have read and seen
Christian counselors, so called, using all the psychological
techniques they have learned and even some that pushed hurting
Christians into worse emotional and mental shape than they were
before.  I have heard Christians using new age techniques,
mystical methods, hypnosis, forms of self hypnosis, theatrical
methods whereby you picture yourself on a stage, with all the
players on the stage, and you walk through the memory with the
Christian counselor and then you modify the memory and make it
turn out perfect.  Bingo!  You are emotionally healed as a
result.  Yeh, sure.  I have seen, so called, Christians teaching
substitutionary techniques whereby you trade the pain for God's
grace and visualizing such images in your thoughts.  I have
personally tried all of these methods trying to gain freedom from
my own emotional pain and suffering.  I'm talking about daily
creative meditation techniques, Transcendental Meditation, (TM),
positive thinking, pastoral counseling, positive affirmation,
Bible confession up the ying yang, self help programs that would
choke a horse, LSD usage, theatrical modification techniques,
Christian spiritual visual methods, dream therapy, Alpha wave
control techniques, even total Scripture saturation procedures,
and I even went to Bible college and became involved in the
ministry as an adult, traveling, later pastoring, and even,
believe it or not, Christian counseling, God help us, in order to
bury my fears and guilt.  Nope, they didn't work; none of them. 
Some claim they feel better after such techniques but I don't want
to be better; I want to be healed.  Isn't it supposed to be done
when Jesus is finished?  I always thought so but I was taught
otherwise.  Besides, some things Jesus and the Holy Spirit, and
not even God Himself, can do any longer in this world because all
his mighty works died out with the last apostle; whoever that was. 
What I have discovered, is prayer which puts you, the hurting
person, in touch with Jesus the Christ; The Healer.  Sure it
sounds scary.  That is because of all the garbage you have heard
over your life by people you trusted but who didn't know even what
you knew nor did they really care.  They can't, you see, because
they, too, are afraid of what might surface in their own life if
they get to fiddling around with people who are wounded and weak
and next to worthless Christians.  Of course nobody ever says it
that way but you know it is true and so do they.  It is time to
stop screwing around and time to pray; submitting ourselves one to
another in the fear of God.

"18  Verily I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall bind on earth
shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever ye shall loose on earth
shall be loosed in heaven.
19  Again I say unto you, That if two of you shall agree on earth
as touching any thing that they shall ask, it shall be done for
them of my Father which is in heaven.
20  For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there
am I in the midst of them," (Matthew's 18:18-20).


It Sounds Like God To Me
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