Parakalein

I recalled a young man who felt called to the ministry only to later in life slip into a depressive role as life in ministry did not go well.

In his head was a deep wound.  He had been hurt by the very call that had given him hope. His only conclusion was that he was a failure in ministry.

He hated successful people as they pointed what he saw as a sharp accusing finger of failure toward him.
In his head he held the truth that he was a failure.  That he had failed god, his calling, and his family.

Inside his heart was the hope of healing and rebirthing of ministry but it was elusive.

One day he saw what he was unable to see before.  That it was out of his hurt and wounded heart that  gOd was birthing a ministry.  The very thing that he hated became the thing he loved.  The very thing he once loved became loved again.  What changed?

The chains of death became the birth canal of life.  He shifted perspective.  He began to see himself and God not from the tunnel of his own darkness but from light in the tunnel.  The tunnel of darkness became a birth canal of new life and living.

Perhaps this is what Paul and Peter experience that had them living and loving with passion the world so that that would could move from the wounds of the head that debilitate and depress to the healing of the heart that leads to open doors inside and out side.