The morning of Monday, February 7, 2022, I woke up having a conversation with “that still small voice.” The impression I was getting seemed to convey a message like this:
“You don’t need to be fixed. You need to be loved. The only ‘fixing’ you need to do is to fix your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.”
Setting to jot down in a journal the insights I was getting, I remembered how a pastor had counseled a large number of women with hypothyroidism over the course of his ministry.
About 90% of the time, hypothyroidism is caused by Hashimoto’s thyroiditis, an autoimmune condition where the white corpuscles single out the thyroid gland as “the enemy” and attack it. (1) White blood cells (or corpuscles) are supposed to attack harmful viruses and bacteria. However, in an autoimmune disease, the white blood cells deviate to attack various organs of the body instead of the real enemies (harmful bacteria, viruses, cancer cells, etc.). The thyroid gland is located in the neck as a part of the endocrine system, which regulates various hormones for healthy metabolism and other functions.
Whenever they came to him wanting to get relief from their distressing “pain point” (or problem) of dealing with hypothyroidism, this pastor would often start by asking them if they were married. If the person [typically a middle-aged Caucasian female], was married, typically he would gently ask her if her husband showed her his love and affection.
This late pastor has said that when he asks them this question, oftentimes he doesn’t get an answer. He gets tears. Then he proceeds to continue ministering God’s love and grace to her broken heart, whatever that looks like in each individual situation. By the grace of God, 95% of those people were eventually healed of their hypothyroidism. Soberingly, the pastor has commented that those 5% who were not healed were typically those who were unwilling to vulnerably and courageously deal with the spiritual, emotional, and relational issues with which they were struggling.
Whenever I listened to this pastor describing this positive end result of seeing women with hypothyroidism eventually be healed on their journey of learning to receive God’s love and grace in their personal, everyday lives, I have been encouraged to expect similar results for myself. The fact of a 95% success rate gave me hope that I could be healed of hypothyroidism too. It makes me think, “Well, that’s awesome! This inspires me that healing is possible. If God did it for them, and He does not show favoritism, then He can do it for me too!”
One time as I listened to that pastor share his experience with counseling those women with hypothyroidism, he then addressed the husbands of those women in his audience: “...You’re Bob the Builder…” He lovingly rebuked them that their wives “don’t need to be fixed. They need to be loved.” (2)
That situation reminds me of an old video where a woman is sharing about deep personal pain with her husband. The camera then backs up a little to reveal that there is a nail protruding out of her forehead. The husband tries to communicate to her that if she’ll just let him remove the nail, then her foggy thinking will get better. However she feels that her husband is just trying to “fix” her and desires just to be listened to for the present moment. “It’s not about the nail!,” she responds.
When the husband stops talking about the problem and reflectively listens to her emotions by saying, “That’s…so hard,” she feels loved, cared for, and better connected. They lean in to kiss each other, but the nail presses against the husband’s head, causing her pain. He begins to say, “if you’ll just let me…” to which his wife agitatedly responds again with “It’s not about the nail!”
That February morning I remembered something that brought incredible clarity to my healing journey. Even though I’m not a married Caucasian female, I could relate to their “pain point” after all. The same emotions they experience that cause their thyroid glands to malfunction are like the accusing thoughts and emotions that physiologically have caused my thyroid to malfunction in the same manner. Those women feel that others are just trying to fix them, and that they don’t measure up to their own and other’s expectations in different areas of their lives. In some ways, deep down inside they feel unworthy of love and affection.
A population sample of Caucasian women aren’t the only group who are singled out by hypothyroidism. There is another major sub-segment of the population who deal with hypothyroidism. Around 75% of people on the autism spectrum also have hypothyroidism. (2) This was more relevant to my personal experience, having been diagnosed with high functioning autism (Asperger’s Syndrome) earlier in life.
What did I have in common with Caucasian women who shared this same hypothyroidism struggle? What negative emotions might those who have been diagnosed with ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder) have in common with "neurotypical" women with hypothyroidism? [The term “neurotypical” refers to somebody who is not on the Autism/Asperger's Spectrum.]
At one time, I remembered feeling how other people seemed always out to “fix” me. I felt that I was not a person who needed to be loved, but a problem who needed to be “fixed.” On various occasions, it seemed apparent that school psychologists were contacted behind my back to take me out of class to "run tests on me" with frivolous questions and easy worksheets. During those days, I felt inferior to other children; for I felt rejected, ostracized, and singled out as mentally inferior to my peers.
Every emotion proceeds from a thought. For every thought we think, there is a corresponding neurotransmitter, neuro-peptide, interleukin, hormone, or other chemical reaction that occurs within the human body. Since birth, for whatever reason, I did not love myself. For whatever reason, my mindsets were rooted and grounded in self-hatred, guilt, shame, and inferiority.
We may not be responsible for everything bad that happens to us, but we can and must take responsibility to respond to the negative things that come our way. We may have been born a particular way and immediately began cultivating particular mindsets, beliefs, values, habits, and predispositions, but the human brain is “neuroplastic.” In other words, it doesn’t matter how we’ve been wired. Our DNA is constantly changing and our brains are constantly being rewired through a process called “DNA synthesis” as our internal chemistry responds to the mindsets and thoughts that we intently choose to think about in our everyday decisions.
In short, just because we were born a certain way, we don’t have to stay that way! Just because we were or felt rejected by our family, loved ones, and peers, we don’t have to remain depressed about it. We don’t have to build our identity upon having been rejected in the past; we can choose to believe that we are accepted by One whose valued opinion about us is infinitely more true than anybody else’s, no matter who they are to us.
Who has the right to tell you that you’re not good enough, when your Dad, the King who created the universe, calls you “accepted in the Beloved”? If Jesus calls you His friend, then whose opinion about you matters?
Who is the greater authority in your eyes at determining your perceived value: Jesus, or somebody who rejected you? What has more power and influence in your mind concerning your self-esteem: God’s declaration about His love for you, or somebody who treated you badly? Is man your god who determines your opinions and conduct, or is Jesus your God whose commandments and words hold a lot more weight in regards to your beliefs and actions?
When we accept and agree with accusing thoughts of self-hatred, rejection, pride, bitterness, guilt, shame, fear, anxiety, and depression, then those accusing thoughts have authority and power (dominion) over us. However, we can go on a journey where grace and truth teaches us to engage in a process where we learn to give and receive love the way we were meant to live.
As a result, we shall learn not to give those negative mindsets any space as we choose to believe the truth that will make us free. Then those lies shall no longer keep us locked up in a mental or spiritual prison, and we can enjoy being filled with love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faith, humility, and self-control.
I’d like to rightly go about “fixing” the broken world we find ourselves in. As a follower of Jesus, I believe that God wants to live His life through me. Jesus healed every kind of disease and sickness, and the authority and power to do the same rests in Him, and He lives His life through those who believe in Him by the agency of His Holy Spirit. Jesus is called the “Word of God,” and His perfect will is revealed in the written “Word of God,” which society calls “the Bible.” What does the “Word of God” have to say about how to “fix” the problems in this fallen and broken world?
I want to examine a few keys through some select passages where the “Word of God” uses some variation of the word “fix” (NASB1995).
“For it is for this we labor and strive, because we have fixed our hope on the living God, who is the Savior of all men, especially of believers.”
--1 Timothy 4:10 NASB1995 [emphasis mine]
“Now she who is a widow indeed and who has been left alone, has fixed her hope on God and continues in entreaties and prayers night and day.”
--1 Timothy 5:5 NASB1995 [emphasis mine]
“Instruct those who are rich in this present world not to be conceited or to fix their hope on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly supplies us with all things to enjoy.”
--1 Timothy 6:17 NASB1995 [emphasis mine]
“Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, 2 fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.”
--Hebrews 12:1-2 NASB1995 [emphasis mine]
“Therefore, prepare your minds for action, keep sober in spirit, fix your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.”
--1 Peter 1:13 NASB1995 [emphasis mine]
“And everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure.”
--1 John 3:3 NASB1995
If I may repeat what that still small voice told me this morning, “You don’t need to be fixed. You need to be loved. The only ‘fixing’ you need to do is to fix your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.”
Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord; seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence.
--2 Peter 1:2-3 NASB1995
To learn more about what it means to become a follower of Jesus by knowing Him personally, I recommend my posts:
https://primehealthdenver.com/how-to-cure-hypothyroidism-permanently/
BeInHealth. "Overcoming Fear, Guilt, Shame, and Lying" Track 5, MP3.
Would you like to go more in-depth on the matter of overcoming shame and self-hatred? Check out my 24-page eBook: Spiritual Leopard Hunting.
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