Stormie. Some would say that described her life more than her identity. For Stormie Omartian, it did both. Best known for her series "The Power of a Praying....", she shares her dark past and what brought healing and freedom to her life through the book entitled, appropriately, "Stormie".
The writing of such a story must have been emotionally exhausting. She shares with such depth and detail that you end up vicariously living it with her. At times her story is dark, others rich with hope. It sheds light on the fact that ordinary, average people are in the world functioning with such a load of pain, and yet masking it unbelievably well. It reminds the reader that even those that have it all could feel empty and hopeless; suicidal with shame that we could never understand.
Not only is this a book about Gods healing power, but a textbook example of how even the rich and famous and beautiful need God. Dealing with the burden of insecurity and feelings of worthlessness, Omartian makes her mistakes along the way in trying to cover up and mask her pain. Instead of dealing with it, she found it easier to stuff it deep below the surface. Only when it kept resurfacing, promising to overtake her life through fear and anxiety did she finally deal with it. And that confrontation brought her to Jesus.
Finding him as her loving father enabled her to forgive her mom and dad and become Stormie again. Just Stormie. Not the Stormie that laid in bed for days, begining each day with suicidal intentions. But the Stormie that could wake up without those suicidal thoughts and actually help other women find their healing and deliverance.
She makes it clear this is not a finger pointing session. The only one she points to is her heavenly father. After reading her story, you think 'so that's why she's such a prayer warrior.' God really did take her pain and weakness and made a ministry out of it. And lucky us. We benefit from her struggles. But isn't that what the body of Christ is all about? Sharing and bearing each others burdens, partaking in the pain and the redemption together?
"I have a burning desure to tell people who are hurting that there is a way out of their pain....there is hope for their lives." Stormie is willing to bear her soul if it saves yours. She has found the peace and acceptance and love she craved as a little girl locked in a closet. She is free today because of her faith. This is not a weightloss commercial where we share her results and then say that she is not typical of the average persons experience. You can expect to get the same results as Stormie has gotten if you are willing to go down the path of healing. She is not unique. She is not extraordinary. You can be healed, too. She wants you to experience it and will take you there personally.
Harvest House Publishers
188 pages
