Through Andrea's deep despair and dealings with the occultic world, she sunk to self-mutilation. Andrea speaks of her experiences but shows there is a way out of the darkness.
Read part 1 of 'Freedom from Self-Mutilation'
Choosing darkness
From the ages of 12 through to 28, the devil had a hold over my life through my practice of the occult. I was deceived into the world of darkness where spirits turned out to be demons, where enlightenment turned out to be madness. Over those 16 years I suffered severe depression, addictions and confusion. My thoughts were messy and destructive. I had talents but nothing I ever did lead to true success. The occult offered me nothing but deception, despair and ultimately, if I had continued down that path, destruction.
Choosing the light?
"And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose" (Romans 8:28). This is sometimes translated as "God turns all things for his Good."
After I became a Christian and the hold of the occult over me was broken, the torment from the enemy was defeated … thrown away … destroyed, and God has turned my life into something good. I am able to use my gifts given to me by God to communicate and teach … to reach out to others and show them the light of Jesus Christ. To God you are precious. He has a plan for your life … a plan that will lead you beyond your wildest dreams of happiness and purpose.
I did not realize the full implications of my occult activity until I came to Jesus and everything became clear for the first time. Now I can warn you what to expect from my own experience, backed up by the timeless words of the bible. Know that you have an infinitely better offer from Jesus Himself. Accept Him as your Lord and Savior and you can have riches in heaven, rather than eternal hell. It's a fantastic promise from God (who does not lie) but Satan doesn't want you to take it seriously for a moment.
Which way do you want to go?
"He who was seated on the throne said, "I am making everything new!" Then he said, "Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true." He said to me: "It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To him who is thirsty I will give to drink without cost from the spring of the water of life. He who overcomes will inherit all this, and I will be his God and he will be my son. But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile... those who practice magic arts, the idolaters and all liars-their place will be in the fiery lake of burning sulfur" (Revelations 21:5-8).
Self-Mutilation … not the solution to your problems!
Starting from the age of 14 through to 21 I used to self-mutilate. (I cut myself but some others may burn themselves.) I did this whenever all the dark feelings inside me became so big I did not know what else to do. Once I slashed myself up I felt some sort of emotional release and experienced an illusion of a very short-lived calm. The moment things got too much again, I would find myself once again carving into my own flesh. Once I scratched the word 'death' on my thigh with the end of a compass. Every time I took a step this wound would hurt so I had to limp around for a while. After the scabs fell off there remained a scar of the word 'death'. I did my best to hide it from others.
Christian Counterstrike Series by Andrea Reincarnation, neo-paganism, understanding spiritual warfare, freedom from the occult, New Age teachings, drugs and mental illness, ... read about this series
Self-Mutilation … an addiction that produces scars
People asked me if I could never explain why I did it. All I knew was that when things got too much … whenever I felt like I was going to explode … whenever I felt too much anger or hurt or despair … cutting myself seemed to be the solution. For a while it was very addictive … the more chaos was going on with my parents or home life the more likely I was to cut myself up. Towards the end of my teens the cutting slowed down maybe because by that stage I was using other things like drugs and sex to deal with my emotions. The last time I cut myself up was when I was 21 after I had a huge argument with a guy I was living with that had triggered off a lot of childhood memories. I felt totally out of control … so full of rage, hurt and despair that I smashed up all my unicorns (they were ceramic and I had been collecting them since I was a little girl). Smashing them up didn't take away those feelings so I grabbed a knife and made three deep cuts on my wrist. I still have those scars today.
Self-Mutilation … to try and cope or to get attention
When I was in High school there were a few girls who self mutilated. Some of them did it because they were in crisis … with a lot of problems in their lives and no way of coping … others did it for attention. Believe it or not, some girls tried it because they thought it might be 'cool'! The girls who did this tended to stop after trying it a couple of times. There were not many of us and no one ever spoke about it. Our parents were horrified with our mutilation. I think it scared them to see these ugly scars on their daughters and to know they were self inflicted. These days it seems there is a lot more awareness about the topic … counselors, websites and the media seem to understand that self mutilation is a coping tool for people who feel like there is no other way to deal with their emotions or stress.
The bible says 'do not cut yourself'!
It surprised me to find out that the Bible talks about self-mutilation. "Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon you: I am the Lord" (Leviticus 19:28). This verse suggests that it may have been a common practice for cultures outside of Israel to cut themselves (self mutilate) when they were grieving for the dead. Grief is a time when people can be overcome with emotions to the point they do not know how to handle them and perhaps they made the connection between self-mutilation and relieving these emotions. Yet God makes it clear He does not want us to do this. "You are the sons of the LORD your God: you shall not cut yourselves, or make any baldness on your foreheads for the dead" (Deuteronomy 14:1, Amplified Version).
SOME REASONS WHY GOD WANTS YOU TO STOP SELF-MUTILATION
Reason1: God does not want us to have addictions
There are probably many reasons why God does not want us to self mutilate. First of all, most people who use self-mutilation to deal with their grief end up becoming addicted to the practice. Jesus came and laid His life down for us so we could be set free from addictions. Jesus said "I have come that you may have life, and have it to the full" (John 10:10).
Reason 2: It can be doing permanent damage to your body
Even when we were ashamed of our scars, we kept going and part of us even enjoyed the whole ritual. Deep down we knew it was sick, crazy, destructive and potentially dangerous … we knew it scared our parents and those around us. I stopped when I was 21 because I realized that I could really do serious damage to myself. I could have lost the use of my hand if the cuts had been any deeper.
Reason 3: People who self-mutilate are not full of joy
I started going to a psychiatrist and talking about my feelings. This was the beginning of seven years of therapy, self-help and all sorts of other things in an attempt to change. I knew a lot of people who were still self-mutilating even into their thirties and onwards. They became addicted to self-mutilation as a way of dealing with their emotions. People who self-mutilate are not full of happiness, joy, peace, self-control or any of the other fruits of the Spirit of God. Instead they are tormented by darkness, self-pity, hatred, depression, anger and anxiety. Maybe they started self mutilating to escape these feelings but the very act of self harming (which goes against God's specific instructions and therefore is a sin) opens them up to darkness and the manipulation of the Devil.
Reason 4: Self-mutilation opens us up to demonic forces
The bible describes an incident where prophets of Baal where trying to contact the false god Baal by cutting themselves. "And they cried aloud, and cut themselves after their manner with knives and lancets, till the blood gushed out upon them" (1 Kings 18:28).
Whether we do it on purpose or subconsciously, the moment we go against God's instructions by self-mutilating we are performing a satanic ritual. This ritual is sometimes called bloodletting and can be found in various forms throughout the world in different religions. If we accidentally injure ourselves, our body responds by releasing chemicals to help us deal with the pain of that injury. When we self-mutilate the same thing happens, chemicals are released to deal with the pain. Because we are already in a heightened emotional state (angry, scared, anxious, overwhelmed, depressed) our body is already flooded with hormones.
What does all this mean in every day English? We are in a mild trance state before we self-mutilate. By adding the self-mutilation to this trance state and achieving an emotional release we have basically performed a ritual. We perform a ritual like this and experience a false peace from the devil in an attempt to achieve a lasting peace that only the Lord Jesus can give us when we submit to Him. We become addicted to the ritual because of the momentary peace it gives us. We probably do not realize we have opened ourselves up to demonic forces by performing this ritual just like the guys in the bible did when they tried to reach the demon Baal.
The good news!
The good news is that God wants us to be filled with love, joy and peace. Jesus tells us "The thief (the devil) comes to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly" (John 10:10, italics added). Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil. "Jesus too shared in our humanity so that by his death he might destroy him who holds the power of death - that is, the devil --- and free us who all our lives were held in slavery by our fear of death" (Hebrews 2:14,15).
Jesus is offering us beautiful things
Jesus tells us He has come to give us life … and give it to us abundantly. (Abundance is having beautiful excess.) Jesus wants us to have all the good things life can offer us … not just a little bit to get us by, but a lot! In fact, when you accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior, when you are 'born again', God is so happy that He sends you some beautiful things … called the fruit of the Spirit. "The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control" (Galatians 5:22-23).
Becoming 'alive'
When you have been filled up with darkness, anger, despair, anxiety you will notice this change in you when you become a Christian. Before I knew Christ I felt dead but the moment I gave my life to Christ I felt alive! Does this mean once we accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior we will never feel sad, angry, grief or anything negative ever again? Of course not, but when we have Christ in our lives we have a better way of dealing with our emotions. We can turn to Him in prayer, we can look to the bible for instruction in dealing with problems, and we can seek out wise Christians for guidance and counsel. We have the comfort of Christ in our dark times.
Jesus offers to take on the burden of all our problems and replace it with a way of life that gives us love, joy and peace.
"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light" (Matthew 11:28-30).
It is up to us to turn away from the things that God doesn't want us to do (repent) and accept Jesus as Lord over our lives. Once we take that first step, God will take care of the rest.
