Helping the Hurting

http://www.crosswalk.com/blogs/joe-mckeever/reach-the-ugly-woman-in-the-balcony.html

This article that I have posted a link to here really spoke to me.  I saw myself in this; not as the one doing the helping, but as the "ugly woman."  I know how it feels to be that hurting person, one who told people to stay away by my countenance.  Because of the emotional pain I was in, I was firmly and safely inside a shell of my own making.  I might still be there today, except that God sent someone to me, someone who was listening to the Spirit and kept reaching out to me.  That person didn't give up on me, and I allowed God to deliver me from my bondage because of them. 

I want to be that compassionate person who allows the Holy Spirit to work through me to help the hurting. I pray that in 2012, I can begin to allow God to work through me to reach that hurting person who is in the same kind of bondage I was in.  He has His work cut out for Him with me, but "with God ALL things are possible"(Matt. 19:26).  He can do it.