BreakingMySilence, A Story of Hope and Healing

     Surrender has been on my mind a lot lately! The definition of surrender is to relinquish possession or control of to another because of demand, to give over or resign(oneself) to something as to an emotion. When I think of this word surrender and the action it makes me think of my old history books.  In battle one party waves the white flag as if to tell the enemy we give up you are too much for us to handle. We want to live and not die by your sword! Well we have an enemy as well, and God wants us to raise our white flags to Him and surrender our pain or sin to Him. When the enemy or pain is too much for us to handle we turn to God and He takes over for us.       I remember when I was going to church again after many years of ignoring God and hearing that word "surrender". This used to scare me because being a survivor of rape made me want to be in control of everything! I maintained surface relationships so I felt like I was in control, I controlled how close I got to

    I received an email from Lindsey, she is 24 years old and she shared her story of sexual abuse with me. I asked her if I could share her story for her to help those of you who have a similar story to not feel so alone. I would like to encourage all of you who read this blog to reach out to Lindsey and send her your encouraging words. If you would like to send an email to her you can do so through my email at 4hopeandhealing@gmail.com and I will be happy to send them to her. Thank you Lindsey for breaking your silence here and please know that this is a safe place and I am humbled by your strength and bravery in sharing this with us all. Here is Lindsey's story, written by Lindsey, What a terrible thing to hear such sad stories about people being taken advantage of by those whom they trust. I too was a victim. When I was 9 years old my grandpa offered to rub my back for me while on a trip. I accepted what I believed was just a thoughtful gesture by my grandpa. It turned out