Someone wants to heal you… and give you a new identity
The long-standing effects of sibling abuse are demolishing, debilitating, shattering. There is a lingering feeling that follows you everywhere… that for some unknown reason YOU are just “bad”. Just your existence on the earth is wrong.
It would be normal for someone to feel condemned for sins they’ve committed in the past. But people subjected to decades of emotional abuse, psychological abuse and physical abuse are on the receiving end of evil. And yet there is an unending, sometimes paralyzing, feeling of shame, accusation and condemnation trying to speak louder than the truth.
But Jesus takes all the sins of the world upon His body to the Cross. He takes the things we’ve done, and the things done to you. He forgives sin. He takes it away. When you repent (turn from your sinful selfish fallen nature) and believe in Jesus, He gives you a brand new life.
Two things happen (and you’ll never be the same):
The first is that you are a new creation. You are not the person who was “abused”, “broken”, “hurt” or “demolished.” You’re no longer a labeled, marked person. You’re no longer stuck as a “victim” your whole life. You are a brand-new you. You’re not who you used to be. That’s why Apostle John made it clear in John 3 that Jesus said, “You must be born again.” You can’t just be born once. You need to be born all over again of the water and the spirit, born anew of God. And this happens by faith. You receive the free gift of God’s grace (and within the free gift of His grace is the free gift of His righteousness—St. Paul must have thought it was important because he drilled it in 5 times in three verses; see Romans 5:15-17).
The second thing that happens is you receive forgiveness.
Sibling abuse happens when one sibling (usually larger, older, smarter, or more popular) takes control of another “weaker” sibling and seeks to dominate them. When you are consistently on the losing side of things, you learn something horrible about sibling aggression victimization: that you will never win. You have to give up. Or you are left with one other choice: sabotage yourself before your abuser sabotages you. And because your abuser continually sabotages you, it becomes almost second nature to hurry up and first sabotage yourself. It’s a seemingly brave act of “choice.” The abuser takes all choice from you, but you step in to say, “I will have the last word! I will hurt myself first!” and that pattern can last decades with devastating effects.
There is a lingering “self-hatred” that happens to those victimized by sibling abuse.
But guess what? Good News again. Jesus takes all the abuse, the hurt, the pain, the shame, the rejection, the humiliation, the condemnation and the accusation to the Cross. He puts it all on His body so you can go free. You can allow Him to do this, and He will.
And what happens is deep forgiveness. First, forgiving yourself. You forgive yourself for all the self-harm and self-rejection and self-hatred that you imposed upon yourself first.
And when you receive His forgiveness for yourself… something happens. You’re able to forgive others. Suddenly you’re free.
Jesus said something powerful. He said, “You shall know the truth and the truth will make you free.” St. Paul told the Galatians, “It is for freedom that He came” so that you can be set free from the chains holding you down, holding you back, and walk into your brand-new life.
And this is important to know if you’re 4 or 5, or 45 or 95.