Before you were born He set you apart

Have you ever wondered what makes people go into the line of work they do? What makes a neurosurgeon decide they want to understand and operate of the human brain? What makes a member of the clergy decide to take care of other people? What makes a cop decide they are willing to go through what they do? The answer is, they listen to the calling of their soul.

If they hear it correctly instead of based on being pushed into it or out of their own ego, then they equipped to do whatever it was they were intended to do. Doing what they were designed for, they find their bliss. It does not mean they will have an easy time doing it because the rest of the world does not listen to their own calling, but they will find the courage, strength and ability to do it.


Jeremiah's mission was something he was well prepared for because God put it all into his soul. He was too afraid of what the world put into him to find it but God reassured him it was all there inside of him.

The Call of Jeremiah
4 The word of the LORD came to me, saying,

5 "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you,
before you were born I set you apart;
I appointed you as a prophet to the nations."

6 "Ah, Sovereign LORD," I said, "I do not know how to speak; I am only a child."

7 But the LORD said to me, "Do not say, 'I am only a child.' You must go to everyone I send you to and say whatever I command you.

8 Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you and will rescue you," declares the LORD.

9 Then the LORD reached out his hand and touched my mouth and said to me, "Now, I have put my words in your mouth.

10 See, today I appoint you over nations and kingdoms to uproot and tear down, to destroy and overthrow, to build and to plant." (www.biblegateway)

Each one of us are called to do something in this life. Most do what they do because they have a passion for it and they are pretty happy doing it. Some are forced into it and they are pretty miserable doing it. That is because what they are doing is not what God intended for them to do and they are missing what they need to do it with bliss.

What we all need to understand when it comes to PTSD is that what we need to heal is already inside each of us but first we need to understand what makes us all different.

When people decide to enter into the National Guards or become firefighters, usually there is great compassion within them and they want to help others in times of need. They have the courage within them to be willing to act, risking their own lives for the sake of someone else.

It is the same way when people decide to enter into the military or law enforcement. They have the same compassion and courage but they also have the additional knowledge they may have to take lives in order to save lives.

What we get wrong is when they are forced to do something they were not intended to do. This is one of the biggest reasons the National Guards are coming in with higher PTSD rates. They were sent to do something God did not intend for them to be doing. Yet even with this, there is still the ability to heal within them.

Just as with the military and law enforcement, the citizen soldiers or protector warriors, risk their lives and are often wounded emotionally by what they have to endure and they need help to heal from it. First they have to face it instead of denying it. To get them past that we need to make sure no one is still telling them or expecting them to "get over it."

We have to acknowledge what they were like most of their lives to begin to understand the changes in them are out of character, like a stranger inhabiting the body. That should be our first clue there is something much deeper than them simply changing. Look back in your history with them and know if they were compassionate and how deeply their compassion was. The deeper the ability to feel for others, the deeper PTSD will cut into them. Caring for others opens the door to feeling pain for others. The expression "it comes with the territory" applies well here.

If we understand where we all came from and what we enter into this world with, we end up doing what we were intended to do. The problem is getting from there to where we are now and then to where we need to go.

People will assume all kinds of things but among the long list is that they should have known better once they discover they got something wrong. They need to ask how they should have known better if no one ever told them. How would we understand anything about faith itself if no one ever bothered to write it down? How would we know anything about history if no one ever wrote anything? We all need to start looking at what we do know about people in general if we are every going to understand what makes some hurt more than others.

Veterans beat themselves up over suffering when they hear the truth, but no one ever told them the truth before.

Families beat themselves up over doing wrong things or making wrong judgments because they didn't know any better once they hear the truth.

We as a nation have an obligation to make sure every veteran, every police officer, every firefighter and emergency responder along with survivors, know what makes them so different they end up wounded by the events out of their control while others walk away. It begins with the level of compassion they have inside of them in the first place because they walk away with their own pain plus the pain others felt as well. It also comes from going through something abnormal they were not intended to experience and not equipped to endure. It comes from being in the wrong place too many times for the right reason. Above all, it comes from being a human just as imperfect as Jeremiah.

"Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart" so that you can do what you are supposed to do and when you need help, it is there inside of you and all around you.