I was five years old in 1958 and regularly watched the Disney show. Each week Jiminy Cricket crooned the same song to my listening ears:
When you wish upon a star, makes no difference who you are
Anything your heart desires will come to you.
And each week I would go to bed and sob because I thought there was something seriously wrong with me. If Jiminy Cricket said that anything your heart desires will come to you – it makes no difference who you are, then why were the desires of my heart not coming to me? I must be the only one in the world, I thought, who didn’t matter.
There was abuse in my life, but at that time, there were no words to express it. I was tormented by a boy in our neighborhood and I was terrified of him. Once, while walking to my school just four blocks away, I saw the boy waiting for me, so I hid in the bushes. After the school bell rang, I came out of hiding and started to walk home. My plan was to walk home so slowly that school would be out by the time I got home, and my mother would never know that I skipped the day. Pretty clever for a five-year-old! But it didn’t work. My mother tried to get me to tell her what was wrong, but I didn’t know how to tell her.
So, every week, I listened to Jiminy Cricket sing that it made no difference who you are and every week I sobbed because I thought I was the only exception. A particular nightmare plagued me during that year. I dreamed that I was walking home from school and when I got to where our home should be, there was nothing there but a huge square black hole in the ground. I would wake up scared, not knowing what that meant. We moved away from that area, but the song and the message of it plagued me for years.
Relief came through Christ
As a teenager, I discovered John 14:1-4 “Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also. ” I read that passage repeatedly – especially when my heart was troubled. I didn’t know how to look it up by book and verse, so I flipped through my Bible until I found it. Soon, that page became so worn that I could turn right to it.
In my forties, the truth of the situation came to me. It really “made no difference who you are” in Christ. “In truth I
perceive that God shows no partiality.” (Acts 10:34.) A loving relationship with God can be had for anyone who chooses to serve and follow Him. It is explained in what I believe is the most misquoted passage in the Bible, “Then Jesus said to those Jews who believed Him, “If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed. And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” (John 8:31,32). The two verses go together; we cannot know the truth without abiding in the Word.
Am I still wounded? Yes, the past left its mark and I remind myself that my relationship with Christ gives me victory over it. Like a physical wound that fades, but doesn’t disappear, my emotional wound reminds me that Christ helps me overcome and offers salvation in Him. And that’s the real truth.
Anna Glass is a member of Joy of All Who Sorrow where, as someone who sorrows, she does find Joy. She serves on the Board and the Capital Campaign Steering Committee. Anna invites those who sorrow to come and find joy in the midst of your hurt.
Please send comments on our blog to annetteglass03@gmail.com .