Hi everyone,
Please excuse the sheer length of this. There is so much going on in my heart.
I had a bit of an emotional breakdown halfway through church this morning. Fortunately I was seated towards the back so I was able to put on a brave face before sneaking out at the end. Perhaps I should have stayed but honestly I think if anyone had spoken to me I probably wouldn't have been able to stop the tears once they started.
For a little bit of background I have two older sisters. They are very different from one another. The eldest (we'll call her Sister A) has dipped in and out of all of our lives since I can remember. We all had a pretty traumatic childhood but of the three of us she just hasn't seemed to be able to come to terms with it all and as a result is very confrontational, quick to anger, often appearing to be quite narcissistic (hopefully I've spelt that right). There is a repeating cycle where she cuts us all out of her life, then she reappears and tries to wedge herself back into everything like she never left (usually years later), everything is fine for a couple of weeks then its ruined when she 'plays the hero' to a situation she has created, lapping up lots of attention from the current audience of people she has gathered, and usually to the great detriment of whoever her current target is. Rinse, repeat. I have managed to keep her at arms length for long enough now that none of this touches me, but I care deeply for Sister B (current target...) and by proxy it affects me although I don't get involved. We were all living so peacefully until she wedged herself back in...again.
Today's sermon was about the spiritual warfare between satan and God. I am so concerned for Sister A's soul. She is a hard drug user, has stolen large amounts of money, has violent tendencies. She is a bomb waiting to go off. Her terrible deeds and misbehaviour clearly comes from not being able to reconcile her hardships in early life, but I fear she is beyond saving and will never be able to truly look at herself in the mirror and heal. She is nearly 50 years old and can't seem to even have a normal conversation (everything that comes out of her mouth is a cruel joke framed as 'banter', no exaggeration) so I don't see how theres ever potential for a deeper chat.
We are getting married this year and I am kicking myself for inviting her. I stupidly invited her during once of these short periods of peace. I feel I now have to uninvite her because there are more people than not attending that she's disrespected or hurt in some way :( How do you uninvite a person who is so volatile? I am genuinely afraid of this situation despite it definitely being the right thing to do.
Please pray for her that she finds some peace in her heart. Please pray for my other sister who has had her entire family ripped apart by this person. Please pray for me that I can find some strength and wisdom to navigate this tense situation in a diplomatic way.
:(