Always Growing
I find my life presents me with way more opportunities to practice Christ-like-ness than I care to have. Anyone? Our path is strewn with obstacles that can either trip us up or grow us. I’d like to think that I’m further down the court than I am in my spiritual growth, but then a situation comes along and hits me sideways….more growing to do.
There is not a way to avoid pain; at least not while we walk this earth. We should not be asking “why” but “what”. What do I do with this pain? My emotions always want to run the show and rant, cry, and blame another person. Blame is easy, facing truth, not so much.
When another person or situation hurts me, I have two choices. I can “react” in my fleshly emotions, or I can take a hard look at the WHY behind the way it made me feel. There is always a “why” behind a “what”.
When a recent situation happened, I immediately felt betrayed and rejected. Two wounds from my childhood that I have had major healing in but…the enemy knows where to poke us to see if we will take his bait.
A hard situation is nothing more than a temptation to get us to react. Reaction comes from our emotions. David said in Psalms 62:5…”My soul, be quiet before God…I have had to talk to my soul many times. Ps. 116:7 he tells his soul…”return to your rest, o my soul…” and in Ps. 94:19, “When my anxious thoughts multiply within me, your consolations delight my soul…”.
David was good at being real. He vented to God quite often. But after that, he always brought it back to expressing his love and trust in his God to handle the problem and take care of him. Basically, he processed his emotions with God…this is what happened, this is how I feel BUT I know you can work it out.
Emotions are part of our soul which consists of our mind, our will, and our emotions. I’ve learned that when someone says or does something that makes me “feel” hurt, I can choose to think they are just terrible people and wonder how could they hurt me OR I can look deeper and ask myself why I feel that way. No one can offend me unless I choose to TAKE offence. #ouch
I immediately go quiet when I’m hurt. Because I know me…if left to its own devices, my mouth will say a lot of things that I cannot take back, resulting in an even bigger mess. Of course, I’ve done that more than a few times…clean up on isle 5….!
This gives me time to process how I’m feeling. A lot of terrible self-justifying thoughts usually run through our minds at this point…which is our enemy, trying to PUSH us in to action.
Our emotions will want to control the situation. Our job is to not let them control our actions but to let them process and allow the Holy Spirit to show us how to proceed. It’s not easy to sit on your flesh and not let it run amuck. When we take the reins and refuse to react, we gain control of our flesh and let our Spirit lead.
My only prayer was, help me. I’m hurting and the hurt feels justified. How do I handle this? Sometimes the situation needs to be confronted. Your hurt could be justified and need recognition. But sometimes just letting something go, realizing that hurting people hurt other people and they probably did not mean it like we took it.
People do not, for the most part, maliciously hurt us. Their brokenness just rubs our brokenness the wrong way. #selah
We cannot make another person do what is right. It’s not even our job to try. The only person we can control is us. When the other person is wrong, pray and ask the Holy Spirit to help them deal with their stuff. My part is to respond correctly, leaving Jesus room to work.
Jesus’ Word teaches us to take the high road, think the very best of others, and not be found as the judge and jury for someone else’s choices. It feels easier to NOT do His Word and just say all the words, spewing all the hurt and anger right back at them. But feelings are not truth, they will not produce the justice of God we are seeking.
Father sometimes life just hurts. People hurt us. It’s not always fair…but Your Word is always true. I’m praying for each person reading this today, that you would help them to take a long look at themselves, how they react, think, and feel. Bring revelation to them about them. Holy Spirit teach them to understand the things that Jesus taught us. Help them to walk out your truths in the everyday situations they face. Give them the grace to do what you require, and the grace to give grace to others. In Jesus name….