Peace with the Past: Receiving God’s Remedy for Family Relationship Issues

How can you have peace with the past if you have had family relationship issues? God’s remedy is available to you, and a Christian counselor can help you receive it.

While there are many expressions of freedom that God has given for us to enjoy, there are aspects of our lives outside our control. We don’t influence when we are born or the people and environments we enter. Some of the circumstances may have been welcoming, while others have warped our mental and emotional wellbeing.

Whether or not we sensed belonging where we were born or felt accepted in the families where we were adopted, God gifted us to the world. Our relatives don’t permanently define or disrupt God’s greater purpose in our lives.

Whatever may have been our reality, the scope of the Father’s intention is bigger than the history unfolding within our origins. Family, with all of its distinct qualities and traits, represents a necessary passage to earth to fulfill our eternal kingdom assignment.

God is intricately familiar with our lineage and challenges don’t have to barricade us from accomplishing His aims while on earth. It may not always be easy to talk or walk by faith, especially when our formative experiences have been marked by pain and trauma. However, God’s grace offers a healing prescription for the detriment caused by family relationship issues.

Trials and tools for relationship issues

I make known the end from the beginning, from ancient times, what is still to come. I say, ‘My purpose will stand, and I will do all that I please.’ – Isaiah 46:10, NIV

Remember that God is the Potter who shapes uniquely through the trials that He allows. The facts may reveal the impossibility associated with your circumstances. You may have endured mental and emotional pain, but God often retools difficulty to form our character and deepen our relationship with Him.

The abiding truth is that the Lord knows your end from your difficult beginning; He has planned a hopeful future on this side of eternity as well as the glorious heaven to come (Jeremiah 29:11).

Furnished and filtered

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. – Ephesians 1:3, NIV

Having crafted you with all you need, God’s goodness and glory has already furnished you with everything for this life (2 Peter 1:3). It is your established inheritance. Christ’s love and sacrifice filters through your status as an overcomer (Romans 8:37).

He’s outfitted you with every spiritual blessing. Take an active role in bringing Heaven’s reality of peace and joy into your present suffering and sorrow. Nurture relationships with supportive people and gather resources for your mental and emotional wellness.

Identity and insecurity in relationship issues

If we perseverate on insecurity, we won’t rise above our own negatively-tinged perceptions (Proverbs 23:7). Self-deprecation holds us captive to inertia or paves the way to sabotaging God-dreamed destinies. In essence, how we esteem ourselves despite our bloodlines plays a significant role in how or if we live out the dreams the Father has seeded in our hearts.

Walking by the Spirit fuels us with the divine power of God as sons and daughters. But we forfeit our abundant portion in God’s family when defining ourselves by past or present family conditions more than our kingdom identity and acceptance in the Beloved (Ephesians 1:6).

Often, we don’t even realize that our thought patterns reflect an identity shaped more by human circumstance and our origins rather than God’s Word. We require a circle who champions God’s highest and best for us.

This may include the people with whom we fellowship, whether select relatives, supportive social connections, or members of communities that enhance our lives. It may also include professionals such as Christian counselors whose training and experience help us uncover and uproot the underlying issues.

While our lives may not yet reflect what we imagined, true identity and worth come from the Father. He fashioned us to be like Him and do as He does. When we receive Christ’s sacrifice, we experience an initial transformation destined to shift our minds and lives into newness, now and throughout eternity. The matter of our completion has been settled (Colossians 2:10).

What Christ accomplished was comprehensive, including salvation for our spirits, healing for our physical bodies, and deliverance for our souls (including our mental and emotional wellbeing). If God’s will in heaven is to be done in the earth, His good plans that flourish in the invisible realm can also manifest in the physical environments where we live, play, and work.

Crowned and confident

And you will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart. – Jeremiah 29:13, NASB2020

God has already settled His favor and our advantage long before we encountered our present or historic distress. From the beginning, He has invested in humanity, shaping His image and likeness into the form of a person. In confidence, He entrusted Adam with Eden’s oversight.

In love, He sent His only Son to die for us; and His Holy Spirit evidenced Heaven’s treasure within (2 Corinthians 4:7). In anticipation, God’s hopes and faithfulness reset daily with the promise that He will crown those in His Family who long for His return (Lamentations 3:23; 2 Timothy 4:8).

We can invite the Spirit of Christ right now to align and transform our hearts and minds. He won’t disappoint when we pursue His truth, abandoning loyalty to the negative mindsets and limiting beliefs that have plagued and poisoned our family trees. We can enlist the Holy Spirit’s help for divine direction; to equip us for the unseen battle against our generations; and to empower us to emerge in faith and confidence.

Enlist the helper

But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you. – John 14:26, ESV

Still yourself in the Lord’s presence, asking Him to reveal His Heart for you and your family. Locate Bible narratives about family legacy that illustrate what to do as you engage or create healthy boundaries with relatives.

Search relevant verses concerning the relationship issues affecting your particular family. The Holy Spirit brings understanding and healing, making the Word alive. He illuminates biblical principles like a prescription and cuts through mental fog to remedy with clarity and practical guidance.

Equip for the unseen

Put on the full armor of God, so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. – Ephesians 6:11, NASB 2020

We tend to focus on what we see, hear, and feel when navigating the dysfunction of interpersonal relationships. Family conflict is no different. Albeit challenging, let’s realize and remember that this is primarily a spiritual battle (Ephesians 6:12).

We take practical steps to communicate, seek counsel, and commit to change. The first steps, however, must include fortifying with our armor to stand against the spiritual enemies who wage war against our minds, our family relationships, and the potential for hope and wholeness.

Emerge in authority

When he had received the drink, Jesus said, “It is finished.” With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit. – John 19:30, NIV

Consider what the Word of God says about the state of the generational matters affecting your heart and mind. While family relationship issues threaten to overwhelm and trigger you into anxious or depressive responses, return to the Lord where you have attempted carrying your family burdens. Renounce the hold that these issues have leveraged over the generations connected with you.

Then rest, verbally releasing and remanding each worry to Christ’s care (1 Peter 5:7; Matthew 11:28-30). Though you may still have the residue of lingering family issues, know that the Savior settled your identity and authority with His defining words underscored from the Cross, “It is finished.”

Christian counseling for relationship issues

While you cannot undo your history, you can accept God’s sovereign goodness that presides over it. You have the opportunity to embrace today as a new beginning and follow the Lord’s leading into a fresh story.

Begin by seeking a Christian counselor through this site and reaching out today. New narratives of relationships unfold as you receive the legacy of peace with your family’s past, present, and future.