Excerpts from Healing the God Image
The First Image of God
“Long before we can think or speak, we begin forming an image of God—shaped not by theology, but by how it felt to be held, ignored, protected, or punished. Before creeds or catechisms ever touch us, the atmosphere of our childhood home imprints itself on our soul. In those earliest moments, love or neglect, tenderness or harshness, quietly paints the backdrop against which we will one day imagine the Divine. To heal our God-image, we must look not only to ideas, but to these first, wordless experiences.”
The Courage to Feel
“You cannot heal what you will not feel. To face your hidden resentment, fear, or grief toward God is no small act—it requires courage and honesty. Yet, the moment you tell the unvarnished truth about how you really experience God, something shifts. In that act of raw honesty, you stop pretending and open the door for love to enter. The repair of your soul begins not with denial, but with truth that makes space for grace.”
Stepping Out of the Story
“Most of us are just doing our best to survive inside a story we never chose. Family systems, cultural myths, and religious teachings weave a narrative that can feel like destiny. But destiny is not the same as truth. Healing begins the moment we dare to step out of that story—to question what we were given, to imagine a life shaped by love rather than fear. In stepping out, we find not abandonment, but a homecoming to ourselves and to God.”
From Fear to Love
“Religion often taught us a God of fear. Obedience was demanded; questions were punished. Yet, beneath those layers of fear lives the truer God—gentle, spacious, and unafraid of your doubts. This God welcomes your wrestling, your cries, even your silence. To encounter such a God is to discover that love is wider than fear, and that the Divine heart is not a cage, but a vast openness.”
A Path, Not a Formula
“This isn’t a formula. It isn’t about checking the right boxes or mastering the right beliefs. It’s a path—a living way that asks for your honesty, your willingness, and your courage. Healing the God-image is not about perfection; it’s about walking forward, sometimes faltering, sometimes in tears, but always toward the deeper reality of love. The path is not about becoming someone else. It is about becoming more truly yourself in the light of God’s gentleness.”
The Wound and the Gift
“The very place where we were most wounded often hides the seed of our deepest gift. When religion wounded us with fear, shame, or silence, it left us carrying scars. Yet these scars can become openings—doorways where compassion, honesty, and courage are born. Healing the God-image is not about erasing the wound, but about discovering the gift that has been waiting beneath it all along.”
The God Who Waits
“We spend years trying to be good enough, to believe the right things, to silence our doubts. But God is not rushing us. The Divine waits—patiently, tenderly—until we are ready to turn, not out of fear, but out of love. Healing comes when we finally let ourselves be embraced by a Presence that has been there all along, waiting not for our perfection but for our permission.”
Becoming Whole
“Wholeness is not about never being broken. It is about discovering that even in our broken places, God’s presence is near. The false images we carried—of wrath, abandonment, or indifference—begin to dissolve when we risk trusting love again. In that trust, the fragmented pieces of ourselves slowly knit back together, and we realize we were never as lost as we feared.”
Trusting the Journey
“Healing is rarely quick or linear. Some days it feels like progress; other days like unraveling. Yet even in the unraveling, the thread of love holds. Trusting the journey means allowing yourself to be in process—messy, imperfect, unfinished—while knowing that God’s heart does not flinch at your becoming. The path itself is holy, even when you cannot yet see where it leads.”
The Larger Story
“Your life is more than the pain you inherited. Beyond the narratives of fear, guilt, or abandonment lies a larger story—a story of belonging, of being carried, of being loved. To heal the God-image is to awaken to this larger story and to step into it as your own. The Divine has always been writing it, patiently waiting for you to join the page.”