God’s Assignment for You During the COVID-19 Crisis

In response to the world COVID-19 crisis, we feel called to reach out to the women and people of the world with resources, help and hope.

So much about the current COVID-19 situation brings up or exacerbates our natural instincts of fear, worry and anxiety. Phrases like sequester, quarantine and social distancing can prompt fear, while shops and businesses closing doors, job losses, illness, schedule changes and rapid changes can disorient us. It can make us feel alone.

If we focus on the negatives, we begin to feel stuck: stuck at home, stuck in worry, and stuck in fear. That would be the enemy’s assignment for this time. But what is God’s assignment?

God’s Assignment

God’s assignment is for you to be in your home, using your social distancing, and washing your hands. But God is also using this time to grow you in holiness, wholeness and legacy living, like never before.

How can a time of uncertainty help you grow in holiness? Isaiah 43:1 says: “But now, thus says the Lord who created you, O Jacob, and He who formed you, O Israel: Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by your name; you are Mine.”

I like the way The Message puts it: “The God who made you in the first place, Jacob, the One who got you started, Israel, Don’t be afraid, I’ve redeemed you. I’ve called your name. You’re mine. When you’re in over your head, I’ll be there with you. When you’re in rough waters, you will not go down. When you’re between a rock and a hard place, it won’t be a dead end—Because I am God, your personal God, the Holy of Israel, your Savior.”

Put your own name in place of Jacob and Israel and read it aloud. God has called you! He has redeemed you! He hasn’t forgotten you. This time will not be wasted.

Joshua 1:18 reminds us that we are to meditate on God’s word day and night. Meditate—not fret! Joshua says we meditate on God’s Word, “so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.” If we breathe in the light and hope of God’s Word and breathe out the negative uncertainties of life, we fill our minds and hearts with what is true, what is beautiful and what will make us whole. We will find ourselves more fully walking in hope and in God’s promises.

Finding Wholeness in Mind and Spirit

Becoming more whole is a process that requires intentionality and active participation. Achieving personal wholeness is a lifelong adventure and pursuit. Intentionally working toward wholeness builds an essential foundation for a joyful, satisfying life.

A psychologically whole woman seeks wholeness in her mind, will and emotions. She is mentally alert, has clarity in her thinking and is not confused but able to confront the mental challenges of work and relationships with wisdom and a cognitive understanding. She is able to use her will and choice in ways that are helpful. A whole woman also cares for her emotional self. She listens to her emotions but does not live by them. She lives from her values. Mental wholeness involves choosing positivity over negativity towards the self, others, life and the future. Research indicates that we thrive with a 3-to-1 ratio of positive to negative emotions.

Spiritual wholeness recognizes that we are spiritual beings with a need for a personal relationship with God through the Lord Jesus Christ. We also need fellowship and growth opportunities inherent within a healthy community of faith. We grow in spiritual wholeness as we do life with others who are also growing spiritually.

There are many events and crises in life that lead to brokenness and lack of a sense of wholeness: addiction, betrayal, loss, financial concern, grief, infertility, abusive relationships, neglect, or even a broken childhood. The list is unimaginably long! And today we add to that list a virus that has the world in a frenzy.

God longs to reclaim and restore the age-old broken places in women’s lives, to turn the broken places into grace-filled spaces. Isaiah 55:1 (NIV) calls us to “Come, all you who are thirsty, come to the waters; and you who have no money, come, buy and eat.” The whole chapter speaks to a call from God to all people of the earth to come and receive what is needed. His spirit transforms the broken places into wholeness.

The journey to finding wholeness has many paths. Besides therapy with the women who come into my office, I offer retreats, breakthrough intensives, and online courses that lead and empower women to a deeper faith and belief in healing and wholeness. Using my “Faith + Therapy” tools, my online courses, “Find Your Happy” and “Hearts Returning Home,” are divided into workable modules with audio/video so that you can work at your own pace, supplemented with transcripts, downloadable activities, meditations and prayer.

Because community is an essential aspect of healing and wholeness for women, Hearts Returning Home also offers a private, safe, and secure Facebook page, where participants engage in helpful and meaningful communication as they work through the modules with other participants and online coaches, and weekly live-stream Bible studies with me. Free online resources include books that help women transform, overcome and heal. There is a guide for finding hope on the “dark side of motherhood” and a guide on how to walk through tragic losses, including the suicide of loved ones.

For Such a Time as This: Content For Wholeness

Just prior to the outbreak of the coronavirus, we launched the World Women’s Wholeness Summit, a 3-day online conference featuring more than 70 well-known authors, speakers and teachers. This conference reached yearning hearts around the world! Many women found hope and truth through the talks that focused on bringing more wholeness into the lives of every woman.

We believe God caused us to pre-record our fully online women’s conference for such a time as this! This is all part of the revival He is sparking. He has women home as a captive audience.

Therefore we will be:

1) Re-releasing the 3W Summit conference for free, March 27-29. The Summit will include about 30 videos releasing per day and 74 speakers talking about wholeness in every area of life. Please feel free to send all your followers, and use your affiliate links for this: 3wsummit.com/optin.

2) Creating a free World Women’s Wholeness Tribe Facebook group for community. Feel free to invite your followers, now.

3) I am praying with a guest each night for the world’s women (and people) live at 5pm ET on Facebook. Friends such as Cora Jakes Coleman, Joanna Beck, Christy Johnson, Leslie Vernick, Valora Cole, Dr. Gina Prince, Dr. Venner Alston, Brenda Crouch and others will be joining me in praying for and encouraging you at our Live at 5’s.

Please join us! It is an opportunity for you to grow and be well, to have access to content and community, and to find your path toward more full and whole legacy living! {eoa}

Dr. Barbara Lowe is a licensed psychologist, founder and owner of Greenleaf Psychological Services, Somatic Experience practitioner, EMDR practitioner, Board Certified Life Coach, educator, researcher, lay minister and author. As a gifted international speaker, her audiences are left with the feeling that they have been seen, that their pain has been witnessed and that their hope for a better life has been renewed. She and her husband Tim are founders of the World Women’s Wholeness Summit 2020 (3WSummit.com), a free, three-day (March 6-8, 2020), international online conference dedicated to unity with diversity, legacy and women’s wholeness.