Dr. Jessica Peck is prescribing Hope for Healthy Families on American Family Radio

Hello and welcome to the Dr. Nurse Mama show prescribing Hope for Healthy Families here on American Family Radio. Here's your host, professor, pediatric nurse practitioner, and mom of four, Dr. Jessica Peck.

Dr. Jessica Peck: Well, hey there, friends, and welcome to my favorite part of the afternoon, getting to spend time with you, prescribing Hope for Healthy Families. We are right in the middle of November, and I. I cannot believe how fast November is going. It feels like it was just yesterday I was talking to you to go out and vote, and now here we are in the middle of November and we are speeding towards the holidays. Now, I know there are some of you out there who are still not going to put up your tree before, before, Thanksgiving has finished and the turkey is eaten and all of that is put away. And that's okay. But there's something that you should be thinking about regardless of when you start listening to Christmas music or regard of when you decorate for Christmas, and that is Operation Christmas Child. This is the opportunity to pack a shoebox to send to a child somewhere in the world. You. We've been talking about this every day. You can go to samaritanspurse.org/occ and find out how to pack a box, where to take it, when to take it, all the things to do. And we'll be talking about that more as time goes on.

Nick Hamilton writes a book about finding spiritual healing after trauma or loss

But today, right in the middle of November, we are in Veterans Day. And today, as we honor veterans, Veterans today, we really want to pause to recognize the sacrifice of our military service members. And many of them, it's just. It's not enough for us just to stand in a church service, to clap, to stand at a ball game, to clap and to say thank you for your service. Although those things, those gestures are lovely because many of them carry unseen wounds long after the uniform comes off. We're talking about things like trauma, moral injury, loss, hopelessness, darkness. And these aren't just military experiences. They are human experiences. And today I have a veteran here to talk about those very things. My guest today is Nick Hamilton, and he's the author of a book called Making Friends with Darkness, Finding Spiritual Healing After Trauma or Loss. Now, Nick has served as a chaplain for 25 years, first in the military and then after retirement, retirement from the Navy in health care. As the director of spiritual care for Baptist Health of Central Alabama, he led a team of 11 chaplains through the COVID 19 pandemic. As a Navy chaplain, he served on an aircraft carrier on 9 11, deployed to Iraq with the Marine Core ground forces and served as A chaplain inside Guantanamo Bay detention facility. He holds a doctor of Ministry from Gateway Seminary where he's taught courses on crisis ministry and spiritual formation. Nick is a board certified chaplain and a healthcare ethics consultant certified. He currently serves as as the director of Ethics at Mercy Hospital in Oklahoma City. M. Most importantly, I think Nick and his wife Karen have three children and four grandchildren. And Nick, it is such an honor to welcome you here today. Your service country is so impressive and we thank you. On behalf of myself, on behalf of everyone listening, we thank you, we thank your wife, we thank your children for all of the sacrifices that you made to help us to live in a country where we are free. Thank you so much.

Nick Hamilton: Thank you very much. It's a pleasure to be here. And you know, I think one of the things that you mentioned there is that it is a family affair. I think my, my wife and kids would say that they served every much, every bit as much as I did, during the years that I was a chaplain.

Dr. Jessica Peck: Absolutely. And I'm.

Nick Hamilton: The number of schools and new friends that they had to make every two or three years was was pretty incredible.

Dr. Jessica Peck: It is incredible. I am always so inspired by military connected children because they have a resilience about them that is truly admirable. And you can see the pride they have and what their parents are doing and you know, but the flip side of that, Nick, as I said, is that freedom, it does have a cost. And sometimes, you know, that cost is really easy to calculate. You can see it. But a lot of times that is a cost that is unseen, that is born silently in the hearts of veterans, of soldiers. And when we see that, let's, let's talk a little bit about that. Why don't you share your own personal experience? Because I know you share that very candidly in the book, your own struggles with depression. And as a veteran, give us a little bit of your personal background and how that informs your ministry today.

Nick Hamilton: Yeah, I grew up on the Oregon, California border. I grew up in a small little Baptist church and came to Faith when I was young. and as I was in my high school years and in my early adulthood, I think I went through a time of undiagnosed, depression, and not completely sure what that was related to other than some of the normal things that people experience, in that period of life. But I did join the army, shortly after I graduated from high school and spent three and a half years in Germany, and really experienced, a little bit of that depression even then. but it wasn't until I started college later on, after I got out of the army, that I began to understand a little bit about what depression, meant. and certainly then as a chaplain, as I began to, to study it on a more regular basis, to understand what that meant for other people. and, and some of the struggles that were involved in the experiences that they were going through. one of the reasons that I decided to write the book in the first place was an experience, that I had when I was in college. I was an exchange student, overseas. And and you know, I really met this guy that was struggling with the question of, you know, if there's so much trauma, if there's so much difficulty in the world, how can there be a God? And so we read Mere Christianity together. We had these long talks about, can there be a God when there is so much difficulty and pain and so many problems that are in our world? and his answer was always the same. It was no, but I want to believe. and then when I came home from that particular exchange, student experience, I took a course at Grand Canyon University in my last semester of college that was in Old Testament poetry. and I began to realize that if people only understood the wisdom literature of the Bible, and how that ministers to us in the middle of our depression, in the middle of our ah, darkest and most difficult moments, what a difference it would make, for the world around us. And maybe, just maybe it might cause people to believe in God even in the middle of those difficult and dark moments.

Dr. Jessica Peck: You know, Nick, that's not what I expected you to say when you said you were taking a class. You expect, you, you're taking a class on psychology or something, but Old Testament poetry. But really that is the beauty and the wisdom of God's word. Because you're talking about the lamenting, the deep emotional distress that is experienced in the Bible, that's expressed in the Bible. Just read the Psalms and they are filled with lamenting, with deep soul gripping grief. And you know Nick, I think it's important that when you talked about the depression you first experienced, that was just associated with everyday life, which that can happen. And we know now that, you know, genetics and environment play a role and how people experience depression. But even then you went on, you have served in some very intense environments. And much like that man asked you, how can there be a God? How do you see that? I mean you're talking about 9, 11 Iraq, Guantanamo Bay, COVID 19 and healthcare. how did those experiences, even, even more so, you know, those intense experiences, how did they shape your view that God is still good and the message of hope that you put into this book?

Nick Hamilton: Yeah, well, I think, you know, you hit the nail on the head when we talk about, God's word having the answers. You know, I go back to those Psalms of Lament, that I include in the book, where you know, in our world, in our culture, we often think it's not okay to not be okay, for one thing, but certainly within the church culture we say it's not okay to ask certain questions or we say we don't question God. and yet when we turn to the wisdom of the scriptures, we, we find that David and the other psalmists poured their hearts out to God. and so what I found is I was often, doing pastoral counseling of people in these environments was that the psalms in particular ministered to people in those dark places, that somehow, as I would read a particular passage to someone in the, in their moment of crisis, it was as if they understood in that moment that God was there with them too. and he had just sent the chaplain so that, that, that I could be there to accompany them, through the journey. But it was, was incredible to just to watch oftentimes, the light come on, the tears start to flow, and an individual began to understand that yes, I'm in the middle of this dark situation. I'm in the middle of this dark moment of my life. And I don't really understand how it's going to make sense in the totality of my life. And yet you're reading these ancient psalms to me and, and I get it, I get it on a guttural level. I get it, just deep in my bones that I, I feel that God is here with me. God is experiencing and understanding all that I'm going through. And one of those deployments, I, I would go, go ahead.

Dr. Jessica Peck: No, no, no, go ahead. On one of those deployments, in one.

Nick Hamilton: Of those deployments, I was often, reading Psalm 139, to people. and you know, it begins, oh Lord, you have searched me and you know me. You know, when I sit and when I rise, you perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my lying down. And people would understand that God was there with them in the middle of their trauma, as they were struggling with. How do I make sense of these experiences?

Dr. Jessica Peck: You know, Nick, I Think that's one of the hardest life lessons to learn. Because we expect when we pray to God when we're experiencing trauma, that he will fix it, that he will heal it, that he will make it go away. And that is not the promise that is given to us, but the promise that is given to us is, I will never leave you nor forsake you. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you. Over and over, God tells us that he will be with us. And I think about that, especially with Christmas approaching, that God is Emmanuel. He is God with us.

Nick Hamilton: Exactly.

Dr. Jessica Peck: I think in today's day and age, Nick, we have people who try to outrun pain. We have very little tolerance for any uncomfortable emotion. If we're bored, we start scrolling through our phone. If we're, We don't tolerate impatience. We want every, everything, instant. We don't tolerate, you know, if. If there's some conflict that we're experiencing, we just disengage. We ghost. I mean, there is just whatever you can do to numb yourself, to not sit in that pain.

Nick Hamilton writes Making Friends with Darkness about dealing with pain in life

And yet the title of your book really caught my attention. Making Friends with Darkness. What do you say to those people who are sitting in a place of pain? And maybe they're at that place where they're saying, okay, God, you know, when are you going to act here? And when is this going to go away? And why does it have to last so long? How did you come to the place to sit in that pain and to not just endure it, but to make friends with it?

Nick Hamilton: Yeah. You know, the title comes from just really my time in clinical pastoral education. my. My CPE educator had this saying that, you know, in order for us to be able to help somebody who's in the pit, we have to help them understand first of all that they are in a pit. And, to get comfortable with that pit, in. Or in other words, to make friends with the pit that they're in. And I think we see that example in some of the Psalms of Lament, that, you know, David in, in Psalm 88 says, Darkness is my closest friend. he. He ends the Psalm with it. Psalm 88 is the only psalm in the Bible that doesn't wrap it up kind of neatly, and say, but God, it ends with, and darkness is my closest friend. And, And David is pouring out these. These horrific questions of God. Where are you, God? I keep praying, God, I don't understand where you are. and yet there's no condemnation for David asking those questions in the first place. I mean, the psalms are in the Bible. And oftentimes I've read Psalm 88 to people in a pastoral counseling situation. Not told them what I was reading. I just said, hey, can I read something to you? and it touched them on that deep level. And then I would ask them the question of, does it surprise you to learn that Psalm 88 is in the Bible? and oftentimes it would, you know, they, I can't believe that. but you're also.

Dr. Jessica Peck: Well, Nick, I'm going to hold you right there because we are already at our first break. There is so much more help and hope and healing on the other side of this break. We are talking about honoring our veterans and walking through tough times. We'll be right back with Nick Hamilton.

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We Remember by Steven Curtis Chapman: This is for the ones who heard the fight for freedom calling for the ones who answer I'll do what I can for the ones who ran the battle who believe that freedom matters this is for you and this is for the ones whose orders took them to the front lines for the ones who fell and never made it. Home. For the ones who came back broken with memories too hard to be spoken oh, this is for you we remember we remember we are thankful we are grateful we know freedom isn't free we remember we remember the gift you gave the price you paid is not in vain and it will never be forgotten.

Dr. Jessica Peck: We remember welcome back, friends. That is We Remember by Steven Curtis Chapman. And on this Veterans Day, please allow me, on behalf of everyone who is listening, to thank everyone who has served our country. I thank the veterans and especially their families, their wives, their husbands, their children, their parents, everyone who has sent someone to the service. We just thank you so much for all that you have given for our country. And on Veterans Day, we often talk about physical sacrifice, and we often talk about the logistics of service and war. But I believe that far too rarely do we talk about those invisible wounds that happen, the ones that no one see, the ones that veterans carry around silently, with stoicism, with bravery, with courage, but also with pain. We're talking about things like trauma and moral injury and spiritual fragmentation. These things don't just impact veterans, but they also impact healthcare workers, first responders, and just everyday ordinary people who are walking around carrying trauma and tragedy and trials and pain and loss. And today I'm talking to someone who has walked that road. We're talking to Nick Hamilton, and he is a veteran and director of ethics at Mercy Hospital, a former Navy chaplain, and he's author of a book called Making Friends With Darkness, Finding Spiritual Healing After Trauma or Loss. And, Nick, right before the break, you were just about to tell us a story about reading Psalm 88 to a group of veterans, and I can't wait to hear what their response was.

Nick Hamilton: Yeah, I did my clinical pastoral residency at Naval Medical Center San Diego, and we had a rotation, where I went to the VA's PTSD clinic, outpatient clinic in San Diego, for six months. And each Friday there was a group of combat veterans, and we had a group that was called a debrief group. And so, one particular Friday afternoon, I decided to, as I mentioned earlier, just read Psalm 88 to the group. I didn't tell them where it came from. Just said, I'd like to read something to you. and when I finished, I ask, for their responses, and One World War II veteran said, it sounds like they're in deep something. And instinctively, instinctively, these guys got it. They connected with the emotion, that was in the psalm. They connected with the pain and the lament, that were in the psalm. And they connected with, I think, the questions that were there, too, that the psalmist was asking of God, of Lord, where are you? In the middle of my pain. and sometimes I think that that's exactly what our. Our veterans need. And people who have experienced any kind of trauma, really, not just veterans, but they need the opportunity and the freedom to ask those questions, because asking the questions and having sort of a structure, of how to get out these feelings that I have from my experiences that I don't know what to do with and I don't really know how to articulate is very important. And I think that. I think that the psalms really do give us a structure for people to be able to say, hey, this is what I'm feeling. When they really don't know how to articulate it any other way. They, they can read a psalm, hear its message, connect with it, identify with it, and put words to the feelings, of their experiences that they've been having. I've done an exercise in the past where I would read a psalm to a group and ask them, okay, now I want you to write your own as a group. I want you to write your own psalm of lament, so that you can now connect with those feelings of feeling abandoned by God. And, oh, by the way, one of those psalms, of lament that I'm talking about is also Psalm 22, that Jesus quoted as he hung on the cross. my God, my God, why have you abandoned me? Or why have you forsaken me? And there have been volumes written in theological realms about why he quoted that particular psalm. And I would say I think it was because he was human. He was certainly the God man, but in his humanity, he was hurting like we hurt. And he was identifying with the hurts that we have, and that so often go unspoken and unexpressed. And yet he was also wanting to identify with us to. To help us to know that he knows what we're going through as the God man, God in the flesh.

Dr. Jessica Peck: That's really the beautiful thing about Scripture, because Solomon said there's nothing new under the sun. And we look at all of these things and we see in the world that it seems like there's new threats every day. But the sin issues, the heart issues, the hurt issues that are underneath are the same. I mean, you can relate to so things. I mean, the psalms are full of lament over things like family drama over losing a child over. That's right, you know, grief over your own disobedience. I mean, all of these things are things that we can appreciate today. And that is the relevancy of Scripture. And when we look at the Old Testament especially, and even through the New Testament, I mean, trauma is certainly all throughout there. People had traumatic experiences. And now, you know, we, we. Science is so slow to catch up on what God created, the ways that God created our bod to respond to trauma is so marvelously intricate. And, you know, I think, Nick, I went to nursing school in the 90s in, the literal previous century, as my kids like to often remind me. Mom, you went to nursing school like you were born in the previous century. But I remember doing clinicals at the VA hospital, and at that time we were taking care of a pretty young Vietnam veterans. This was in the 90s. You know, these, these were men who had experienced war in the 60s. They were not very old, but definitely, carried with them a lot of PTSD at Post Traumatic Stress disorder. And there's a lot of people who just associate PTSD with veterans, but we're learning so much more about that. What do you wish that people understood about ptsd? How widespread it is and how common it is? What do you want? What have you learned about it? What do you want people to know?

Nick Hamilton: Yeah, I think that's a great question. What I'd like for people to understand is it's not just a veteran thing. you know, it did the, the definition of PTSD did grow out of the Vietnam War, that after Vietnam, our veterans came home and, and were experiencing something that we couldn't quite put our finger on. And by 1980, I think it was that the American Psychiatric association finally coined the term Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and put it in their dsm, their Diagnostic and Statistic Manual, as a mental health disorder. and that definition has been developing and growing over the years. and there's people that, have even gone further and have said that there's something else out there that's more than just a psychiatric issue or a psychological issue. And the startle reflexes that we so often associate with ptsd, there, there's maybe more of a moral aspect to it sometimes also. But, you know, there's. Anything that interrupts our ability to cope with life can be a traumatic event. you know, I, I think oftentimes about a story that I heard years ago about a woman in a car accident with her husband, and she literally watched him take his last breath as they sat there in the car together, waiting for the emergency services to arrive. and so she is going to have a level of post traumatic stress that is on par with some of the other experiences that maybe veterans go through. And, you know, certainly during COVID our healthcare workers, experienced levels of stress and, moral distress, that, the American Nursing association has, defined, over the years just because they, they're overwhelmed by what's going on. And I would hasten to add that, you know, oftentimes we talk about this as a disorder, and yet I think it's important to, to say that trauma reactions, trauma stress are normal reactions to an abnormal event. you know, these traumatic events that we hear about in life, like the, the hurricane that we just saw in Jamaica a couple of weeks ago, we're still, still hearing about the hurricane recovery from Hurricane Helena, North Carolina over a year ago. and these are things that interrupt people's lives to such a point that they have difficulty coping and yet it's a normal response to an abnormal event. In other words, if, if you pulled me out of an environment that I'm responding to and you put any other human being in that same situation, they're going to respond in very similar and predictable ways. And so I like to say, a lot of people say these days actually that we should use with caution the term ptsd. oftentimes we should be using the term PTS and leave that disorder off of that PTSD diagnosis and just talk about the terms of post traumatic stress. Because oftentimes any person who has been through a traumatic event, a crisis event, they're going to have post traumatic stress of some kind. Yes, sometimes it turns into a disorder, but oftentimes people are just dealing with the aftermath of the trauma what they've experienced in life.

Dr. Jessica Peck: I think explaining that I said a few moments ago, Go ahead, go ahead, Nick.

Nick Hamilton: Yeah, go ahead. I'm sorry.

Dr. Jessica Peck: No, it's okay. Go right ahead. You go.

Nick Hamilton: Like I said a few moments ago, like I said a few moments ago, there's there's also an immoral aspect to it. there were some guys in the V in the VA in Boston several years ago, Jonathan Shea has written, extensively on this, who have said, you know, I think there's an aspect oftentimes of trauma that's more than just the psychological response to trauma. There's a moral aspect to it. and Jonathan Shea wrote, he said moral injury is what he called it, it's a betrayal of what's right by someone who holds a legitimate authority in a high stakes situation. And it has to be all three of these and other people have written on this as well, you know, where they describe moral injury as this, perpetrating or failing to prevent or bearing witness to or learning about acts that transgress their deeply held moral beliefs and expectations.

Nick: When we talk about trauma, we have to talk about moral injury

And I think that, you know, we have to, when we talk about trauma, we have to talk not only about the psychological aspect of it, but we have to talk about the moral aspect of it as well. Because that's, I think, what David was talking about in the Psalms of Lament, you know, as he was asking God those questions. God, where are you, God? I don't get it. I don't understand why this is happening to me. And I think really that as we talk about moral injury, what we're talking about is that, that why question. That really is the universal human question that we all long for. And if we're honest with ourselves and we look deep down inside, we all wrestle with that question at some point in our lives, of questioning God, do I really even believe that you still exist? Do I really even believe that you're still there? Because right now it doesn't feel like it. And yet the Psalms give us the permission and the space to do that. And I think oftentimes in American church culture these days, we don't like those questions. they make us too uncomfortable. and as I said earlier, we often feel like we're not supposed to ask those questions. We're just supposed to say, but God. and I think oftentimes when we, when we rush to putting that but God on the end of the phrase, too soon, we can interrupt a person's natural healing process, and we can cause psychological dysfunction. And I think sometimes we can even cause some religious dysfunction where people get, to so involved in church that they deny their own emotions, that they deny what's really going on inside. They're out of touch with themselves, and they're really, not in close relationship with God either, because they've just put those questions of God off to the side, and they're not allowing themselves to go there.

Dr. Jessica Peck: That is a lot to unpack, Nick. But I couldn't agree more with everything that you said. And I think there's an important distinction. We talk about trauma a lot, and trauma has become a buzzword in and of itself that can make people think like, oh, yeah, you just need to get tougher. You know, we were tougher in our generation. But I think it's important to differentiate between there's big T trauma and little T trauma. And big T trauma is exactly what you were describing. War devastation, famine. Seeing someone die in a car accident as you described, that's big T trauma, and that's more often connect to that post traumatic stress or post traumatic stress disorder. I'm so glad you said, you know, sometimes we gotta drop the disorder off of it. It's just a normal human respons. The little T trauma is all of those underlying things. Just financial stress, relationship conflict, bullying, just any, any, all of those little things that can happen. Those are more likely to be connected with anxiety and with depression. And then there's a problem though, Nick, because there's some people who have experienced big T trauma and little T trauma and they have those things together. But I agree that sometimes we oversimplify that. Like God said it, I believe it, that settles it. And in some cases that can be good. But there certainly are biblical examples and you've given us those of wrestling with these issues. And I say it all the time, that if God was small enough to be understood, he wouldn't be big enough to be worshiped. And so it's expected that we would wrestle with those things and that we would have a very human response.

Dr. Jessica Peck: And when we come back, we'll talk more about the biblical path to healing from trauma on this Veterans Day. We'll see you on the other side of this break.

At stake in battle for the Bible is the daily life of each individual believer

Here's Dr. Michael Krueger from the American Family Studios documentary the God who Speaks.

Dr. Michael Kruger: Every day people are faced with critical questions about what to believe and how to act and how to think and what things they should accept and call culture and what they should reject. these are very life centered questions and important questions that people want to know the answers to. And if they can't trust the Word of God for the answers to those things, they're going to go other places to get them. And so at stake in the battle for the Bible is the daily life of each individual believer. We want them to have confidence in the scriptures of the Word of God that they can turn back to that every day. They can rely on it, they can trust it. It's a guide. And we want them to be spending time in it, devotionally in the scriptures, absorbing it, thinking about it. And so if the church loses its way and loses its trust in the Bible, then the ramifications on the practical day to day life of believers is going to be enormous. Visit thegodwhospeaks.org.

No Fear by Jon Reddick: I Got Enemies at every side it ain't looking good, I ain't gonna lie Arrows flying, devil's trying to make me think I'm going down this time. You might think that I'd be afraid running scared with the shaking faith but the God I know says it ain't over The God I know is going to make a way yeah, though I walk through the valley I will have no fear. No fear. The mighty power of Jesus is fighting for me here. No fear. No fear. The light of the world makes the darkness disappear. No fear. Not Over my life. No fear.

How do we fight the fear that we may have when going through tough times

Dr. Jessica Peck: Welcome back, friends. That is no Fear by Jon Reddick. And that's what we're talking about today on this Veterans Day. How do we fight the fear that we may have when we're walking through really tough times? I've been talking to Nick Hamilton today, a veteran, a former Navy chaplain, and current director of ethics at a health system. And we've had some such a great conversation. We've talked about veterans and everyday people who experience trials, who experience trauma, who have wounds that they're carrying around. We've named those wounds. That matters. To speak over your pain, to identify it, to name it, to claim it, to say, yes, this is what I'm feeling, to take it to the Lord. But now the question becomes, where do we go from here? Is healing possible? What is scripture on offer us? And can I heal even through from what I've been through? Like, if you even knew the things that I've seen, the things that I've experienced, you would see how it just seems impossible to heal. But Nick Hamilton has written a book to help you with that, and his book is called Making Friends with Darkness, Finding Spiritual Healing After Trauma or Loss. And it reminds us the scripture never shies away from the dark. And so, Nick, let's.

What does it look like when you are experiencing trauma?  Let's do a contrast here

Let's take us to hope. Let's do a contrast here, because what does it look like when you are experiencing trauma? You. You Talked about Psalm 88 just ending kind of on a depressing cliffhanger, like, that's you. That was interesting to me to hear. That's the only psalm that just kind of ends like, that's it. What does it look like if we, put that into our lives? Yeah, just say, like, okay, I'm just gonna sit in this pain, and that's it.

Nick Hamilton: Yeah, yeah, that's a great question. And I mean, I think we see that all around, our world every day. I think there's several ways that people respond when they don't, find resolution to their trauma. and the questions that are deep inside about God, why is this happening to me? I think oftentimes people turn to numbing, themselves through, alcohol or other substance abuses. I think people, use relationships, to numb, what's inside. I remember talking to a young guy, years ago, who was wrestling with these questions, and as he being began to describe his life to Me. After the traumatic event, what he was describing was just trying to get away from the questions by immersing himself, in his life, with his girlfriend, in that relationship that had become dysfunctional, and in the substance abuse with alcohol and, some of the other drugs that he was taking. And so, we often see it manifest itself in those ways. we just try to cover it up, pretend like it doesn't exist. And oftentimes that doesn't go well. And, you know, we look at the world that's around us and we can see, very easily, how people have done that. And. And the results of, the results of it in. In destroyed lives.

Nick Hamilton: We do have an opportunity to choose how to respond to trauma

Dr. Jessica Peck: Well, what does it mean, Nick, to make friends with the dark? Because, you know, we do have a lot of people, I'm sure people listening, who feel like I'm sitting here in the dark. I'm sitting in that pain. And. And what I say often, Nick, is that, you know, a lot of times what happened to you is not your fault. What you saw, what you experienced, what happened to you. But you have a choice in healing. And you've described some of those destructive choices. And it may seem easy in the moment. It may numb, the pain for a moment, but it creates such a much more difficult path down the road. And choosing a path of spiritual healing, it's hard in that first moment. It's very difficult. But it leads to life. One road leads to death. Literal death and destruction. One road leads to life. So what does it mean to make friends with the dark but also be on a journey, pilgrim towards the light?

Nick Hamilton: Yeah, Yeah. I think choice is involved. you know, if we look back to World War II, Viktor Frankl was an Austrian Jewish psychiatrist, that was arrested and sent to the concentration camps. And you can read his book, about his experiences. He lost his entire family there. but as a trained psychiatrist, one of the things that he did while he was there was to observe human behavior. And one of the things that he discovered as he was in the German concentration camps was that I think the quote goes something like this, that the last of the human freedoms, after everything else is taken away from a person is the ability to choose how to respond. that we do, no matter what has happened to us, have an opportunity to choose how to respond. And I think we go back to the Psalms and we find that same thing, you know, David said in Psalm 13, but I choose to trust in your unfailing love. And that's just after he has just again been lamenting and pouring his heart out to God and saying things to God like, restore the sparkle to my eyes or I will die.

Dr. Jessica Peck: I mean, that's pretty dramatic. Yes.

Nick Hamilton: Or the sparkle tomorrow. Right? And so, but, but then there's this sudden shift, between two verses there where we're not told of any change in his circumstances whatsoever. It's a deliberate choice where David says, but I choose to trust in your unfailing love. And I think we see that in, in Jeremiah chapter 29 too, you know, where we all love that Jeremiah, 29:11, you know, that talks about the plans that God has for us. Plans to give you a hope and a future. But we don't often look at the context of those verses where Jeremiah is telling the exiles to, to get used to their new circumstances, that this is their new normal. And I think there's a level of choice in that too. and Jeremiah goes into some pretty specific detail about how they're to accept their new normal. They're to, to build houses, to settle in, to work for the good of their community, to give, their loved ones, in marriage there, to, to get married and continue to have families and, just to carry on with life. and then Jeremiah says in that same passage, this is the Nick Hamilton version. This is your new normal. but what he says to them is, you're going to be here for 70 years, basically settle in. and I think oftentimes when we talk about trauma, we think that, oh, I, I have to get over it. I have to recover, you know, in just a few weeks or a few months or whatever the case is. And oftentimes trauma, traumatic events are things that are going to change our lives from now on. Our lives are going to be different from here on out. And so there's a level of choice where we have to say, God, this is not what I would have chosen. This is not what I wanted. This is not what I would ever have expected of my life. I don't like it. I still have questions. But I choose to trust in your unfailing love. And I'm going to trust that this is part of what you have planned for my life, even when I don't understand it. and I'm gonna. The way that I'm going to try to recover from this is I'm going to choose to, to continue trusting in you. Despite, the fact that I still have questions.

Dr. Jessica Peck: That is the hardest thing to do, Nick. And I remember after experiencing some hard things in my own life, I remember praying to the Lord and just asking him and just saying, God, when am I going to be okay? When am I going to be okay again? And I remember so clearly, the Lord impressing back on my heart, no, the question is, when are you going to be okay with not being okay? When are you going to trust me in the interim? And that was so hard to do. And so in looking at that, you know, we talk about. There's. There's a lot of information clinically on, On PTSD and other mental health conditions. We've talked about that. But there is a spiritual element, a spiritual healing that has to occur too. What does that look like to you when you pursuing spiritual healing?

Nick Hamilton: Yeah, I think David said it best. He said, you've lifted me up out of the miry pit and set my feet upon the solid rock. and I think that's the same thing that Job said, at the end of his experiences where he looked back in life and said, I. This is, again, this is the Nick Hamilton version, of what Job said that. But I think what he was saying is, God, I only thought I knew you before I went through this. You know, before I experienced all of this loss and this trauma. You know, I worshiped you, I trusted you. But now that I've been through this, and now that I look back on your goodness, now I can really see that you were with me through the whole thing. You have lifted me out of the pit. and, you know, as we look back on our traumatic experiences, we can often see how God was the one that was with us. We often can't see it in the middle of the situation because we're stuck in that moment of saying, why God? I don't understand this. but as we look back on it, in retrospect, we can see, you know, Lord, you were the one that lifted me out of the miri pit and set my feet upon the solid rock. And I would just say, you know, as we look at that psalm through Christian eyes, we often look at that psalm in terms of, our salvation. and so I would just hasten to say to your listeners that, you know, if we find recovery from trauma in this life and everything goes on and we're able to experience a wonderful life, in the here and now. The, the worst, tragedy of our trauma would be that we never experience God in the middle of it, and then we die and we're separated from him for all eternity. And so as we look at that verse, in Psalm 40, we often look at it through Christian eyes in terms of saying, you lifted me out of the miry pit of sin and set my feet upon the solid ground, and you have changed me. You've transformed me forever. One of the things that I used to tell, the students in the classes on crisis and trauma ministry that I taught at Gateway Seminary was that that the goal of trauma ministry is to. To help people, or to accompany people through their suffering so that we can help them to see that suffering in the context of God's redemptive story for their lives. and so if we don't ever get to the part where we are seeing God's redemptive activity in their lives, I think it's all been for naught.

Dr. Jessica Peck: Where have you seen that, Nick? I mean, we started the show talking about all of the. You have been there at the world's darkest moments. In our generation, you have seen a lot of tough stuff. I can't even imagine the kinds of things that you've experienced. How do you see that redemptive arc? Is there a story from your own life, from your ministry, a way that. That God has been gracious in showing that to you?

Nick Hamilton: Yeah, there was a. A guy that I met, during COVID he lost a loved one. I won't go into the details, on the air, but, he had lost a loved one. And we began to, talk about God, as a result of his experiences. And he had been an atheist for a number of years. And so every time we. We got to the point of talking about, could, God exist? He, would just say, no, no, I can't, I can't believe in a God that would allow, there to be, sexual assault in the world. That there would be a God who would allow natural, disasters to happen. I just. I just can't believe it. and so I think there's. There's this contrast where, you know, people do respond in very different ways. And it goes back to that choice of, can I. Can I, at some point choose to trust in God's unfailing love, even when I can't see his hand at work. I think Babbie Mason has a song where she says, when you can't see his hand, trust his heart. And I think that's adapted from a Spurgeon quote, from way back. but, you know, it's that choice to trust him or to not trust him. sort of like what, what Frankl said. You know, as we think about it, that the ability to choose how we respond in those moments of trauma, I think are critical where we can see his redemptive activity and we're able to see what he's trying to do, in our redemptive story.

Dr. Jessica Peck: And, you know, Nick, I mean, as a nurse, I can relate in seeing people on both sides of trauma and the. Seeing the people who reject God. Honestly, Nick, I see a lot of bitterness. I see anger. I see fear on that side. And the people who choose to trust God, I see peace. I see joy. I see just unimaginable. Just joy, in the middle of unimaginable sorrow. And that is so compelling to see how it's understandable. It's a human response to see, oh, I can understand how you be angry, how you be bitter. This is awful. It's not understandable at all to see how you would choose light in the face of darkness. And, Nick, we're already at the end of our time together. If you have just like, you have 30 seconds to wrap it up, go ahead, give a last message.

Nick Hamilton: Yeah, I would just say choose to trust God. you know, I've seen it in hospital rooms, emergency, rooms. You work for people. People have been completely distraught. And I've seen people who have been at peace at the passing of a loved one. and it makes all the difference.

Dr. Jessica Peck: All the difference. All the difference.

Nick Hamilton: To trust him.

Dr. Jessica Peck: To trust him. The. The book is by Nick Hamilton. Making friends with darkness. Finding spiritual healing after trauma or loss. I pray the Lord will bless you and keep you and make his face to shine upon you as See you right back here tomorrow.

Jeff Chamblee: The Views and opinions expressed in this broadcast may not necessarily reflect those of the American Family association or American Family Radio.

Veterans Day 2025. Former Navy Chaplain and Author Nick Hamilton joins Jessica to talk about the spiritual side of trauma recovery, moral injury, and PTSD. He also shares about his new book entitled "Making Friends with Darkness"

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