Day 2: Acknowledge and lay down
Alexander the metalworker did me a great deal of harm. The Lord will repay him for what he has done (2 Timothy 4:14).
O God, You who examine hearts (Jeremiah 17:10, Romans 8:27), and search spirits (Hebrews 4:12, Psalm 19:12), You are familiar with all [our] ways (Psalm 139:3); [our] sighing is not hidden from You (Psalm 38:9).
You, Lord, know all our wounds and scars—the oceans of unresolved churning, the mazes of endless circling, the piles of smoldering ashes. You hear the soul-cry of dark bitterness, the haunting footsteps of shadowy memories, and the echoes of all that is voiceless, smothered, repressed, and numbed. Yet You desire that we bring them to You, and hold them up to the light of Your healing power and grace.
Heal us, O God, in the scarred and broken places, in the bruised and battered pieces of our psyche, in the splintered and shattered areas of our hearts. Help us to honestly acknowledge all that rankles and festers, and to lay them down before You. Like the apostle Paul, help us to give You all our "Alexanders"—those have wronged us, hurt us or betrayed us—those who have done us a great deal of harm (2 Timothy 4:14).
Show us the places of buried anger and subverted bitterness—places where we have let too many suns set on our anger—places where we have given the devil a foothold (Ephesians 4: 26:27 )—a vantage point from which to taunt us and hold us fast with cords of bitterness. Show us the family members, the colleagues, the friends, the brothers and sisters, all we have pinned in our webs of unforgiveness.
Release our stranglehold on the place of God, who took on Himself all iniquities—theirs and ours (Isaiah 53:6). Cause us to thrive and flourish in the blessed relief of forgiveness, in the freedom to pray, and in the joy of trusting a good and loving God who heals the broken hearted and binds up their wounds (Psalm 147:3).
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