Supernatural Freedom From The Captivity of Trauma:
Supernatural Freedom From The Captivity of Trauma: Overcoming the Hindrance to Your Wholeness is written by the multi-hyphenate writer, pastor, counselor, and best-selling author Dr. Michael Hutchings. As its title aptly suggests, 'Supernatural Freedom From The Captivity of Trauma' is a book that aims to help heal those suffering from the devastating symptoms of trauma.
Overcoming the Hindrance to Your Wholeness
The Supernatural Freedom From The Captivity of Trauma is author Mike Hutchings’s seminal book that teaches readers how to help themselves and others heal from the effects of trauma. Unlike many religious and non-religous, ‘self-help’ books, Supernatural Freedom presents a balance of clinical and biblical perspectives on trauma, as well as an added focus on the mind-body connection that Dr. Hutchings has used to help restore the lives of traumatized people for decades.
In the following, we will review and discuss what makes Supernatural Freedom From The Captivity of Trauma – Hutchings' second book on the subject of overcoming trauma – such a radically influential and impactful addition to his already formative body of work.
What is The Premise of Supernatural Freedom From The Captivity of Trauma?
In what some religious critics consider to be his "landmark book," Dr. Michael Hutchings pulls from his life's work of helping people heal from trauma to equip new readers with proven clinical and spiritual tools to overcome post-traumatic stress disorder. These tools include:
- How to the underlying issues, symptoms, and consequences that stem from post-traumatic stress
- How to overcome clinical anxiety, depression, and fear associated with PTSD
- How to utilize the combination of therapy and healing power of prayer to regain mental and spiritual freedom and wellness
As previously mentioned, the author, Dr. Michael Hutchings, is well-versed in the service of helping people break free from the spiritual bonds of traumatic stress. Besides writing a previous bestseller on overcoming PTSD, Hutchings has traveled the world conducting "Healing PTSD" training seminars that have helped thousands of people, including clergymen, church leaders, counselors, and military veterans. His life's work and expertise not only speak for themselves, but they also serve as the basis for this book.
With decades of experience in helping thousands of traumatized people heal from their emotional and spiritual wounds, Dr. Hutchings is sure to change the lives of anyone who reads and applies the message of therapeutic and prayer-based healing of Supernatural Freedom From The Captivity of Trauma.
Like previous book reviews, our summarization will be broken down chapter by chapter in four parts -- the following is part one of the series.
Chapter One: LIVING UNBROKEN
In chapter one: Living Unbroken, Dr. Hutchings writes about what it means to “live unbroken.”
First, to live unbroken, we as mortal beings must come to terms with our true identity and gain a deep understanding of who we are. However, rather than look to the world or within ourselves to find our identity – which is what we are more or less taught to do – we must discover who we are within the context of God’s plan and the identity he has already created for us.
Living unbroken also requires us to understand and accept the unyielding grace that God has given us. No matter what we have done in the past, no matter how gravely we have failed in life, we are never disqualified from living the life God has planned for us. Also, we must not fall victim to the enemy’s lies that tell us we are unworthy due to our failures and shortcomings, and therefore, irredeemable. Thanks to the blood of Jesus, we can always be brought back to a place of restoration regardless of our past sins and failures.
To illustrate this truth, Hutchings points to an account in the book of Acts, where Peter, along with John, and with the power of the Holy Spirit, miraculously heals a grievously disabled and disfigured beggar.
He explains how Peter and John, just weeks removed from denying Jesus on the night of his arrest, were called upon God to perform a miracle.
Despite being less than perfect disciples of Christ – especially during his most dire time of need and subsequent crucifixion – and despite not having the experience for what many would think is possible to accomplish what God would call upon them to do, God used Peter and John to fully heal the extreme, lifelong physical ailments of a man who had never walked in 40 years.
The unnamed beggar in this story was a man who, due to his debilitating physical disabilities, had lived an agonizing and traumatic life we would find hard to imagine in today’s culture.
According to the traditions of Jewish culture at the time, those born disabled or disfigured were a living curse from God, used to punish the sins of their parents. He was the manifestation of his parent’s curse, who, in turn, were forced to wear a symbolic cloak of shame for sinning against God.
Born with congenital disabilities that prevented him from walking, the lame man was forced by the Jewish cultural laws of his time to live a life sitting on the street begging for scraps of food by passersby.
Banned from entering the temple – due to his “cursed” birth defects – the lame man sat at its entrance every day for forty years, dependent on the charity of judgemental temple-goers to survive. This man’s trauma wasn’t an emotional response to a singular traumatizing event in his life. Post-traumatic stress was his birthright; it was all he knew.
Peter and John, who, like every citizen at the time, visited the temple every day (Jewish law required citizens to visit the temple daily), undoubtedly had passed the lame man hundreds of times in the past. However, one day, through the guided spirit of the Lord, Peter and John “saw” this man for the first time. Peter then told the man to look up at them, a bold request since beggars were not allowed to look at people in the eye as they entered the temple. In defiance of Jewish law and led by the Holy Spirit, the man looked up at Peter, expecting to be given money or food. Instead of giving the man money, Peter proselytized the power of the name of Jesus, took the man’s hand, prompting him to stand. At that moment, this“living curse” of a traumatized person stood up for the first time in his entire life and promptly started jumping for joy as if he had been born an able-bodied temple-goer.
In that moment of unmitigated joy after a lifetime of trauma, the once-lame man knew that Peter was merely a vessel in which God used to heal him. In addition to being physically restored, he was emotionally healed to the extent that trauma no longer affected his emotional well-being. For the first time, he walked into the temple to be among the people he wasn’t allowed to look in the eye mere moments prior.
The point of using the miracle of Peter and the lame man is twofold. First, it’s a perfect example of how – in the case of Peter – our identity isn’t dictated by our past failures or misdeeds. Rather, our true self is found within the grace of God, the blood of Jesus, and the Holy Spirit’s plan for our lives. Secondly – in the case of the lame man – no matter the extent of trauma or setbacks we are dealt with in this life, we can find healing through the same grace that enabled Peter to heal the “curses” of an unfathomably miserable and marginalized beggar.
Whether shamefully denying Christ in his final moments during what would be the most pivotal moments in the world's history, or living forty years in incomprehensible trauma and neglect as a "cursed" lame man, through the Grace of God, no one is disqualified from Living Unbroken.
