It is amazing how much you can learn in just a few short days. I actually credit most of my enlightenment to the books I have been reading and am reading currently. Which, of course, is driven by my desire to seek God. Because anything else would, in the end, be worthless and meaningless. But seeking God...and seeking Him first, well that's just everything in this life. I love the gift of literature to this world. I love that it can be used as a tool to deepen our understanding, appreciation, and knowledge of God and His Word.
In opening my eyes to see what God wants to reveal to me, I'm finding I ask the question, "why?" less and less. Why me, Why did this happen, Why is this person doing this to me, Why did you let this continue, Why? Instead, more and more, I say, "ok this is happening or this happened, and that is ok. This is how I am going to choose to respond and react."
If you are an alcoholic or a cocaine addict or a sex addict or a cutter or WHATEVER......When asked who you are, do not answer "I am an alcoholic." Because you are not an alcoholic. That is not who you are. That does not define you. Who you are, is who GOD SAYS you are. God says you are His chosen ones, His child, His son or daughter, His beloved. God's truth says who I am and who you are. Not your best friend, not your enemy, not your parents, not your professor, not your roommmate, not your boss, not your boyfriend or girlfriend or latest crush. GOD'S WORD says who you are.
Sometimes I don't even realize that I have begun to let the world around me TELL ME who I am. I listen to the world, and the world says, "if you mess up, you are bad, you are a failure." my dysfunctional family legacy has taught me, "if you disappoint someone, then you are a disappointment, and you must punish yourself for that." And I don't even think about the millions of times I have read the same verses in the Bible OVER and OVER again that tell me, "You are the daughter of the King," and, "you are a child of Light," and, "you are not an orphan because God has adopted you into His family and You are loved, every part of you, all of you, He loves you." Because if I really believe what I believe, then I will not do the things I have been doing whenever something hard in my life hits me, even when something not so hard happens.
So many times.....scratch that- almost EVERY time the opportunity arises for me to choose how to react to something that happens in my life (anything, just anything), I go from the activating event straight to my reaction. Sure, I think about things. Some more than others, some less. But my emotions override my thoughts almost 100% of the time. I think I'm thinking, but I'm really just feeling and thinking about how I feel. I never stop to think about WHAT I BELIEVE, and how that is what I should base my reaction off of.
We act the way we act because of how we believe what we believe.
Faith is how I live, it is what I do. I live by faith because I believe in God's truth, I trust in His promises, I hope for an intimate relationship with Him to keep growing and to continue deepening. I love the people around me the way that I love them because God loves me and I believe that. I truly, truly believe that. I believe that God has given me the gift of joy. So why have I let Satan stifle my amazing gift of laughter and smiling and zeal for life and people? Maybe because I really haven't believed it all this time. Maybe I'm starting right now.
Romans 12:1-2 says to not conform to the patterns of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. For the past year, I have had horrible, disgusting, painful lies swarming around in my mind, and they have tried to overcome my faith in Jesus Christ. Satan has been twisting the truth in my head for far too long. It has caused so much destruction and devastation in my life, and I've had enough. It is time to change the lies in my mind from the world and from Satan to God's truths. And there is no better place to look for God's truths than in His Word, the Bible. And thus, the renewing of my mind journey begins.
So far, it's going great.
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