Healing Hurts

 One of the blessings of this journey is meeting amazing and inspiring people.

Linda Kennedy is one of those people!  She is a friend, an encourager, a fellow grief traveler and a gifted author.

I just finished her latest book, Healing Hurts, and have found myself holding the truths close long after the last page was read.

Linda shares her story with a raw and vulnerable honesty.  She knows pain and hurt.

She understands the heart that is grieving loss... as a teenager she experienced the loss of her father when he disappeared from their lives and sent her into years of self-harm.  Finally getting her life back together, she and her husband had 3 beautiful boys...

But grief seemed to be stalking their joy when they lost the smallest twin and then their oldest son just 5 months apart.  There is no agony that can compare to a mother's loss.

Linda understands the pain you are feeling.  And passionately calls us all to trust the God who walks right beside us and will use each moment of our pain to mold us, refine us, and give us power to hope.

In Healing Hurts she gently weaves stories of her life and struggles with the hard and the grief into the hope of a God who is carrying us through it all.  Stories from the Bible come alive as she shares how the trials these biblical saints endured shaped them, giving us a roadmap to follow when all seems lost...

The biblical accounts of Joseph and Job and Jonah mingle with modern day stories from Joni Erickson Tada, Grace Gonzalez and Sallie Saxon.

Each chapter examines suffering from a very human place of hurt and anguish... 

Why Me?
Has God Forgotten Me?
Raising Beauty from Ashes
Forgiveness Even When You Don't Deserve It
Get Better, Not Bitter

Linda leads us through a beautifully practical guide to living a life of hope in the midst of the hopelessness.  Questions at the end of each chapter help us to reflect and process the stories journeyed and how they relate to our own life and struggles.  She tenderly explores the many reasons God may allow us to experience such difficult trials, not the least of which is to draw us closer to Him and focus our eyes on eternity...

Even in the depths of brokenness, Linda's words become a gift to each one of us.  

Heartfelt and honest, Linda's encouragement will help change the way we look at our circumstances and help move us forward into the healing that awaits us all in the arms of Christ.

Thank you Linda for sharing your heart with such grace and hope.  It is a light when all seems dark. 

You are a Blessing today!