Book Recommendation by Aaron Steelman: Healing the Wounded Heart

Book Recommendation by Aaron Steelman: Healing the Wounded Heart

Dan Allender’s Healing the Wounded Heart: The Heartache of Sexual Abuse and the Hope of Transformation (Amazon and Christianbook) is a difficult book to read. Not because the concepts are abstract or because the theology is challenging, but because the subject—abuse—is one that disgusts and horrifies us. Like maggot-infested roadkill, it’s a topic we’d rather turn our gaze from than examine, study, or understand. Unfortunately, the number of sexual abuse victims is high, and the abuse is often hidden or even buried in the survivor’s psyche. If we ignore the fact that it exists, though, we close ourselves off to helping and serving our brothers and sisters who have experienced pain and trauma. For those who are able to bear the burden of hearing the stories of abuse survivors in order to better minister to them, this is a book that will change your heart and open your eyes.

Allender presents a comprehensive picture of the results of sexual abuse, notable for its examination of not only the psychological trauma and aftereffects suffered by survivors, but expanding this exploration to the physical and spiritual repercussions. For example, one description of an abuse survivor’s bodily ailments went on so long that I initially imagined it was a list suffered by the entire support group, not just one member. He also shares the stories of multiple survivors whose relationship with God was profoundly damaged. While it’s very painful to experience the suffering of these survivors, even vicariously, in sharing a fuller picture of the effects of abuse, Allender helps to lay out how any approach to recovery and healing must be comprehensive. Just as God has created us with mind, body, and soul inextricably knit together, anyone ministering to or listening to those who have been abused mustn’t take a gnostic, mind-only approach.

Allender’s explanation of how Satan uses abuse to turn survivors against their own God-given desires is thought-provoking. Through numerous case studies, he demonstrates how deceit, manipulation, and shame by an abuser conspire to cause survivors to hate what God intended for good: their God-given desires, which have been twisted and misused. Because of the victims’ hatred, not only of their abuser, but of the parts of themselves they hold responsible, at times they even turn against trusted counselors who seek to point out that God-created desires are not inherently wrong; they only become wrong when indulged in the wrong context. Understanding this distinction is not only valuable for survivors of abuse, but it was one of the most valuable concepts in the book for me, simply because it is such a common tactic of the enemy. If he can turn us against the natural desires that God intends for us, we become an enemy both to ourselves and to God.

Finally, Allender gives a great deal of practical advice about what may be the most important (and most difficult and underutilized) ministry to survivors of abuse: listening to their stories. Beyond a simple admonition to offer both your heart, time, and ear to abuse survivors, Allender presents a great deal of useful advice about how to prepare yourself to enter into the pain of abuse survivors and to help bear their burdens. Crucially, Allender also gives guidelines for how to be an active listener, and how to help the survivor avoid the traps the enemy is trying to lay for him or her. All of this is with the hope or understanding that the survivor is also seeking necessary professional counseling.

Whether or not you are a survivor of sexual abuse, many of us know the trauma of emotional, verbal, or physical abuse, or the pain of broken family relationships. Dan Allender’s Healing the Wounded Heart will give you deeper insight both into how you’ve been affected by relational trauma, as well as how you can help support the recovery of abuse survivors.