Cleaning the skeletons out of the closet

Do you have things in your past that you are ashamed of and that you try to keep hidden? This could include a number of different types of things, including things we've done or things that were done to us, or even things about how we grew up that are contrary to the type of identity we're trying to create for ourselves now. We may carry a sense of shame around with us like a weight around our neck because we know, even if no one else does, that there is a reason we don't open the door to that part of our mind. Sometimes we can feel anxiety over how a conversation steers in a certain direction because we feel a line of questioning begging to ask us about something that would reveal the shuttered door that we don't talk about. It's an incredible burden to carry when you are always worrying about people finding out about these things that are in the past. We don't want people to know about our past failures and struggles, or about the dark secrets that we would prefer to keep buried deep inside.

It is my belief that the reason we often prefer to keep these secrets and shameful things hidden away is not necessarily just because they are bad things that happened to us, but rather because they are associated with lie-based thinking that we have come to believe about ourselves at the deepest level, in our identity. The brain is an incredible association engine, as God has designed it in a way to learn from our past in order to better help us to survive in this world. What we have learned in the past, will help us when we encounter something again in the future. The problem is not with how God designed our brains, but with the effect that sin has on everything else, which in turn affects this memory association process.

When we are young and vulnerable, we are taking in all kinds of information from our surroundings and drawings conclusions and forming beliefs about who we are as people. When we are victims of sinful behavior, whether it be things that were intentionally done to us, or if we were simply bystanders hit with shrapnel from someone else's toxic behavior, it can result in us coming to some false conclusions about ourselves, and our brain remembers it all. In many cases as well, we don't even have to be victims of something that is so obviously awful either, we can arrive at a false belief about ourselves from a passing comment that someone made about us, or something we did, and it sticks with us after that. You don't have to have a traumatic childhood to have lie-based thinking that connects to your childhood and ultimately your beliefs about who you are; it can affect everyone.

As adults we often find ourselves in negative behavior patterns, reacting to current situations that feel a lot like those events that happened to us a long time ago. That's because although life has moved on and we've grown older, our brain stored away the lies that we internalized about ourselves, and those lies surface again when a familiar trigger shows up. Something I learned at CrossCounsel International Ministries about this principle, is that "It's not what happened to us that affects us, it's what we believed in that moment that affects us," and that "Your emotions reflect what you believe at a heart level." We often continue in these cycles, reacting in the present to the things that happened to us long ago, until we are able to make the connection from the present to the past, and seek freedom and healing from the Lord in those areas.

"[Transformational Prayer] Principle One:

Our present situation is rarely the true cause of our ongoing emotional pain.

More often than not, the emotional pain we feel in the present tense has been triggered by lie-based thinking, which is rooted in memory. Lie-based thinking is the false belief one holds in memory learned during a specific life event. For example, a man raised by an alcoholic parent might believe the lie that he was somehow the cause for the chaos in his home and responsible to resolve it. This might in turn play out by his being stressed, anxious and overreactive to life situations in which there was perceived lack of order. If we blame the present situation for the emotional pain coming from the earlier memory event, we will be trapped in an irresolvable cycle of emotional pain and defeat. To believe that other people or circumstances are the cause of our emotional upheaval is to empower them to control us emotionally until they change. When we find freedom from the lie-based thinking, we will no longer be triggered by it and can walk in peace, content in whatever circumstance we find ourselves (Phil. 4:11). This is a common scenario in marital conflict. Each partner in the relationship assumes that the pain he or she feels is being caused by the other. When in reality, each one is merely triggering the other's lie-based pain. It is difficult to admit that one's mate is not the source of the pain and that he or she is only exposing what was already there. It is easier to make someone else the cause than it is to choose to hold myself responsible for the emotional pain in my life. This is not to say that what the other person may have done was inappropriate or justified, for it may not be. However, our emotional response often goes much deeper than the current moment. If what I am feeling is rooted in my own lie-based thinking and I blame another, then I am doomed to suffer in this pain until the other person changes."

--Dr. Ed Smith, Healing Life's Hurts

Emotions were created by God for a reason, good and bad emotions serve a purpose. God, in His wisdom, has also given us survival skills to continue living as long as we can in this world, and one of those skills is the ability to sense pain and to avoid it. This principle makes sense especially in the physical realm, when I feel pain, I move that part of my body so it is no longer feeling that before I get hurt even worse. This same principle tends to play out in the emotional realm as well, when we feel something negative in our mind, we automatically try to avoid those feelings in the same way we would if it were physically happening to us. This is problematic with emotions though, because unlike pain in the physical realm, you cannot ultimately escape from the source of the pain when it's emotionally based. This is usually the basis for most addiction cycles: I feel negative emotions, I use substances or other physically stimulating activities to numb out, the brief high triggered by the substance or activity wears off eventually, and I again feel the negative emotion that was never properly dealt with, repeat all over again until madness ensues. We often focus on the wrong thing when dealing with negative emotions, we focus on the negative feeling and think of it as the problem, rather than seeing that it is just smoke from the fire, only a symptom, rather than the cause of the pain we feel. Until we follow the smoke back to the source fire that is burning in the recess of our mind and find the lie-based belief that is keeping the fire going, it will continue to show up and affect our current reality.

The good news is that we can find freedom from this cycle of insanity that keeps showing up in our lives. A lie-based belief that is associated with our identify will not hold any power over us once we receive truth in that area. Because we are created in the image of our creator God, He is the ultimate source of truth-based experience that has the ability to heal and free us from this bondage we may have been carrying for years. If we are willing to stop running from the pain and allow ourselves to feel it and follow it to the source, we can cooperate with God as He helps us to identify the lies we have believed, and submit them to Him as we ask for His truth to be revealed about who we truly are. Identity based lies are almost always learned through experience, so you typically can't remove them simply with logic, you have to replace them with truth learned through another experience. This is why very often as Christians we can start to get to the source of negative behaviors we struggle with and admit them, but after reading in the bible and learning truth about who we truly are, we may actually feel more shame than before because we logically know that the bible is true and we believe it, yet if we are willing to be honest we see that nothing has changed in our hearts, and we continue to struggle with the same thing. This is because although truth received in our left brain is still true in nature, it doesn't cross over to the right brain in the same way that experience does. This results in what the bible refers to as "double-mindedness," which is essentially a conflict of beliefs.

I struggled in my life for many years with substance abuse, and I experienced the madness of this cycle over and over again. I truly believed in my heart what the bible said about who I was and what I was created for, yet I couldn't escape knowing I had those skeletons in my closet. The shame I carried about those things I hated to talk about held me hostage for years, so it took me a long time before I recognized the pattern of avoidance I continually engaged in as I tried to escape opening the door on that closet in my mind. I would find success in one area, only to find new struggles in a different area. I struggled for years with various drugs and alcohol, using pain pills when they were available, to smoking weed, to drinking alcohol, then to an Adderall addiction, then back to weed for quite a few years, before I finally saw the cycle for what it was: a potentially never ending behavior pattern that was being driven by something inside of me that I hadn't put my finger on yet. When a very difficult life event happened to my family, the weakness of my numbing techniques was finally revealed to me in greater clarity and I knew that I had to get to the true source of my struggles, or I was doomed to continue in this process and potentially pass bad habits on to my children. After working with CrossCounsel I began to learn about all of these things I've just shared, and I personally experienced freedom from some core lies I had been carrying all of my life, and experienced healing in some of those areas. Since a core lie of believing I was "unsafe" was exposed in my heart and was replaced when the Lord revealed to me that He was safe, I no longer had the desire to continue smoking weed, which was the last substance I could not break free from at the time. Although in my mind I knew that the Lord was safe (which is ultimately an issue of trust), my heart had never fully believed it because of the life experiences that told me most people could not be trusted. His truth set me free from that lie once I experienced it in my heart.

The Lord loves it when we come to Him seeking truth, because His truth always draws us closer to Him as it frees us from the bondage of lies and sin. Where sin and lies are removed, He is free to work in those areas where "skeletons" once lived, the evidence of our past that we tried so hard to ignore and cover up. The Lord also doesn't waste anything, He doesn't simply want to set us free from those lies, He wants to use them for His good purposes. Ezekiel 37 has a beautiful picture of what this looks like, as we see a vision described to us that the prophet Ezekiel received from God at the time. I have personally experienced this in the areas I have received truth in, as I saw not just personal freedom, but a desire to share and talk about the once painful things of my past, things I swore I would never share with anyone. I know that I still have other lies in my belief system that still need to be exposed and worked out, but now I look at conflict and negative emotions as the first step in the process that can bring them to light. I will continue to look for opportunities to work with the Lord to receive His truth so I can replace those lies and break free from the negative behavior that results from carrying them.

I believe that every one of us has a closet in our mind that we don't want to let others into. The contents of that closet may vary from person to person, some may have more skeletons than others, but I think we all have something in there. Once we recognize where the door to that closet is, we can continue to go back and clean more of the bones of our past out as we are ready and willing. The question for you is, do you trust the Lord enough to open the door of your heart and let Him in?

"This is what the Sovereign Lord says to these bones: I will make breath enter you, and you will come to life. I will attach tendons to you and make flesh come upon you and cover you with skin; I will put breath in you, and you will come to life. Then you will know that I am the Lord," -Ezekiel 37:5-6 NIV.

Reflections on 24 years of marriage

Have you ever wondered if you have found your soulmate? Have you ever wondered what people mean when they say, "soulmate?" According to American Heritage Dictionary online, a soulmate is either:

 1) One of two persons compatible with each other in disposition, point of view, or sensitivity.

 2) Someone with whom one has a special, almost spiritual connection.

I remember when I was much younger, I bought into what I think most people think about the idea of a soulmate, which is more like the second definition I just shared. In this concept of a "soulmate," there is essentially one person in the world that was made for you, and when you find that person, life will be just great together. On the surface, this idea of only one person out there in the world for you sounds so romantic, but in practice I think that it ends up turning into a license for people to leave their spouse or partner once they are no longer feeling the sparks they felt at the beginning of the relationship, so I no longer buy into this disastrous way of thinking.

In a sense, I still believe in the idea of a "soulmate," but I believe in what the bible has to say about it. In the book of Genesis, we read that God is the creator of marriage, as he instituted it from the very beginning between a man and a woman: "That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh," -Genesis 2:24 NIV. When a man and woman join together in marriage, they become "one flesh," or one person, in a sense. Obviously we are still individuals in our personal sense, but in terms of how we are to operate together, we are one. In this way, I now believe in the idea of a soulmate to reflect the biblical idea of marriage, held together with the biblical definition of love, while honoring the commitment made to God and the spouse.

Today, as I celebrate my 24th wedding anniversary with my beautiful wife Stephanie, I have included a few pictures in my post back from when we were just dating, and as I look at them I have a lot of things go through my mind. For one, I remember how much fun we used to have when we just started hanging out as friends. Eventually, we started dating, and we still had fun together no matter what we did. As I look back through the years, I can see that one of the things I have valued so much with my amazing wife, is our underlying friendship. No matter what we have gone through, I have always viewed her as my best friend, in addition to being my wife. We can have fun together no matter what we are doing, and I think that keeps life lighthearted, so we don't get so serious that we forget how to have a good time together. I love having fun with my wife, she is that absolute best person to hang out with, and I have always loved that about her.

Another thing I think about as I look at these old pictures, is how absolutely selfish I was back then. As I think about the fact that I was 19 or 20 years old at the time, I just lacked a lot of life experience that I have gained since then. In a way, I think that is totally normal for anyone at that age, and it shows up in a relationship, where you are just totally infatuated with the person you are "in love with," and you almost have no regard for anyone else in your life. Besides young age, I think elements of this are true in any relationship at the very beginning, and is what some refer to as "the honeymoon phase." This is the part of the relationship where everything is new and exciting, and you can almost forget that the other person is a human being just like you, who in time you will come to realize also has faults and can push your buttons in ways you didn't realize in the first year or so you were together. In a way, this phase of the relationship is itself selfish, as we feel elated to be the object of someone else's affection, and it gives our ego a boost and we feel good about ourselves. At this point in the relationship, both are feeling that way about each other, so for a time, they both really think they have found their soulmate based on those feelings alone, and from here on out, everything should feel this way, and they were made to be together. Right? Wrong.

The reality is that the honeymoon phase never lasts for anyone. If you don't realize that going into a relationship, and you basically believe that in this whole world of billions of people, there is only one person that is made for you, how do you feel when the sparks stop flying between the two of you? Sadly, many will decide that they must have been wrong and that things just weren't meant to be, and they will go on to stage two of what could be a lifelong quest of trying to find that one person that makes them feel those sparks again, with no regard for the other people that are caught in the middle. This is why I think the modern idea of a "soulmate" is an absolute disaster, and I don't believe it's true at all. I now believe that my soulmate is the one that I have chosen to pair my life with, as declared to them in an oath and promise to God. Biblical love is what holds a marriage together, not lovey-dovey feelings that will come and go with the challenges of life.

After 24 years of marriage and reflection, I now think that the most romantic idea of a marriage is one that reflects it the way God designed it, and is held together by the type of love that Christ has for his people. It is the kind of love that wakes up every day and says, regardless of how I feel right now, I choose to love this person not because they make me feel better about myself, but because I am putting them before myself, as Jesus has done for us, and because I made a promise and a lifelong commitment to that person, and that means something. When we put God at the center of our marriage first, and if each of us is pursuing Christ individually, we are no longer trying to use that person to fill the void in ourselves that only God can fill. The reality is that no person is able to fill that void, and it will always have disastrous results in the end. If my focus is on Christ before my wife, it enables me to handle conflict differently as well when it inevitably comes up. Instead of looking at conflict as something my spouse caused, I can choose to look at myself and try to see which parts of my own brokenness contributed to the situation, and asking God what I can learn from it so I can grow to be more like Christ.

I think one of the greatest challenges of our day that contributes to marital difficulty, is that we have lost the idea of what love actually is. With the culture putting out wishy-washy definitions of love that are devoid of any real substance, we have to look elsewhere to know what true love is supposed to look like. I mean, if we don't understand what love actually is, then how can we honestly expect to find love in a marriage with our spouse? The longer I have been married to my amazing wife, and the more I have matured in my faith with God, the more I have understood that when the biblical principles of love are applied to a marriage, it just works better. The bible has so much to say about love, but I'll just share a couple key teachings that I think everything else hinges on.

Jesus shared a powerful picture of what biblical love looks like by living it out himself, and he shared what it looks like when he said: "My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends," -John 15:12-13 NIV. On the same note, Jesus also said to, "Love your neighbor as yourself," -Matthew 22:39 NIV. Now, you may say that Jesus didn't say those things about a spouse though. I would say that the teaching is a universal principle, applied to all relationships. In line with much else that Jesus taught, the ironic thing about following Christ is that the more you put your own selfish ambitions aside and put others before yourself, the more you will find true happiness and satisfaction that results from living as Christ did. It should not be surprising that these principles will also produce fruit inside of a marriage between a husband and wife. The more I put my wife's needs before my own, the more she will feel loved by me and in turn will probably want to do that same for me in return. This is what a God-centered marriage should look like. I did not say that it's easy, but it is what we are called to do if we are to love as Christ loves us.

By no means am I saying that I have this all figured out. God knows, and my wife sure knows, that I have plenty of faults and other things that still show up in my daily life. We don't have a marriage that is free from conflict by any means, but when conflict does show up, we know we will work through it together and we will come out on the other side stronger, because we choose to love each other in spite of our shortcomings. I am so thankful and honored to have enjoyed 24 years together with my best friend Stephanie, because I can't imagine going through life with anyone else by my side. I am so thankful to have a wife who chooses to put God first in our marriage, before me, knowing that I can never fill every need that she has, and she doesn't expect me to. I am so thankful to have a wife who for some reason still chooses to love me everyday after she wakes up and sees me with all of my faults. Stephanie my dear, you mean the absolute world to me, I thank God all of the time for you. I am eternally grateful for your friendship and your love for me and our family. You are a wonderful woman who I love so much, and I am hoping and praying for 24 more years to go, and then some! I love you forever, happy anniversary babe. 😘

Cast no stones

There is a very popular saying that goes, "people who live in glass houses should not throw stones." The principle appears to be essentially the same as a story from John 8:7, which I also talked about in my previous post from last week. Although I talked about this last week, I think it is such an important principle to live by, so I thought I'd look at it a little more and apply it to modern times in a current scenario.

First, let's go back to John 8:7. In this story, the religious leaders of Jesus' time, the Pharisees, had brought a woman who was just caught in adultery to Jesus and were asking him what they should do with her. Now, in this story we can see that the Pharisees were actually trying to bait Jesus into a situation where they could get him to say something contrary to the law, so they would have a basis for accusing him and discrediting him. They knew Jesus was all about love and healing people, so they probably figured it was likely that he would recommend something that didn't align with what the law of Moses instructed to do with an adulterer, which was to stone the offender to death. Jesus, being the Son of God and all, knows exactly what they are up to and he knows the thoughts and sins of the hearts of those standing before him. He therefore pulls a classic Jesus move and he refuses to be baited into their trap, and instead flips the situation around on those who are bringing the accusation by saying the quote that is so well known, and I would argue is the basis of the "glass houses" quote that is used outside of the bible:

'When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” ' -John 8:7 NIV

Did you notice that in his interaction with the Pharisees he doesn't even address the woman who committed adultery? His sole focus is on the Pharisees and rebuking them for their hypocrisy. These guys weren't at all interested in entering into the woman's world and trying to understand what was going on in her life that led her to make such a bad decision. They weren't interested in helping her to turn her life around and make better decisions moving forward. They were simply using her as a pawn for their own gain and their own agenda.

I think that it's always easy to read things in the bible, or anything in history for that matter, and fail to see the parallels in our modern times simply because the scenery and the circumstances look different. One thing I have learned from studying the bible is that the human heart has really never changed over time. The times may changes, the culture may change and look different, the way accusations are made may change and vary, but at the end of the day, we repeat the same behaviors over and over, throughout history. We see this observation made by the author in the book of Ecclesiastes:

'What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun. Is there anything of which one can say, “Look! This is something new”? It was here already, long ago; it was here before our time. No one remembers the former generations, and even those yet to come will not be remembered by those who follow them.' -Ecclesiastes 1:9-11 NIV

You see, the core issue in the human heart is sin. In the example with the Pharisees in John 8:7, the motives of their heart were sinful. It seems that the primary reason they are willing to use her as a pawn is really to get at Jesus, but I think another reason is to elevate themselves. This was a classic move they were well known for, and called out by Jesus many times for it. The focus of the Pharisees was almost always to focus on the outward appearance of a person and their lives, and to neglect the internal issues of the heart. It's easy to focus on what a person has done and to neglect what's going on under the surface in their heart, recognizing that we are all capable of sinning in the same ways as every other human being. This is why he elaborated on this so much in his teaching, for example, in Matthew 5 he teaches that engaging in lustful thoughts is actually the same as committing adultery, because in that case you've already done the deed in your heart:

'“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.' -Matthew 5:27-28 NIV

In other words, what we allow to go on in our hearts and minds actually reflects the type of person we truly are. As human beings we tend to do what the Pharisees often did and just focus on what's on the outside of our lives, and to neglect what's going on inside of our hearts. When we see someone else do something shameful, how often are we quick to point it out on social media and to say, "Look at that person, shame on them, I would never do something like that!" My personal thought on social media in this regard is that it is a social contagion because it enables people to so quickly and easily condemn others with no regard for what might be going on in their lives, or to consider the consequences on the person or those close to them, after being publicly shamed and humiliated. There's a reward for doing this on social media too because we often choose to live in an echo chamber, surrounded by people that think just like we do. We can hang someone out to dry with absolutely no consequence to ourselves because we have no connection to that person, we can shame them publicly and then close out our phone or computer and go about our day. Meanwhile, we are getting likes from all of our friends who also think it's great to tear someone down, so it reinforces itself. When we look at the world through a lens of externally focused, works-based thinking, and fail to look at the heart of people, this is where we can end up. Jesus told another story in Luke that is reminiscent of this modern day example that I just shared:

'To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everyone else, Jesus told this parable: “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other people—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.’

“But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’ “I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.” ' -Luke 18:9-14 NIV

Everyone has a story, everyone has most likely gone through good times and hard times. If you haven't gone through hard times yet, just wait. We all bring our own baggage and psychology along with us, and that greatly influences the decisions we make as a way to cope with the ups and downs of life. It's easy to look down our nose at others who have done something that "we would never do." One thing the bible is clear about is that every person has sin in their heart: "for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God," (Romans 3:23 NIV). Are we able to see that even if we haven't done a particular sin that we are hanging someone else for, we've probably done other things that are equally bad, if not worse? If we fail to see the potential in ourselves to sin equally, we are full of pride, and we only fool ourselves.

To throw stones from a glass house is to fail to recognize the fragility of our own lives, and the fact that every single one of us is capable of sin and wrongdoing in some capacity. Is it possible that you're one day away from your entire house of cards collapsing in on itself and destabilizing the life you once knew? Once the comfort of routine fades away, are you going to be in a position to sit here and judge everyone around you still, or might you fall into negative coping habits to get by? Do you have skeletons in your closet that you make sure to keep locked away, far away from the public square? What if someone found out about the secret addiction or habit that you have and put it all over Facebook, destroying your reputation overnight? To have a realistic view of the sin in our own heart and to allow it to shape how we treat other people is to live out the "golden rule," which Jesus also taught about:

"Do to others as you would have them do to you." -Luke 6:31 NIV

If we act in humility and recognize the potential for sin in our own lives, we are far less likely to judge other people in an attempt to elevate ourselves. If we look at the plank in our own eye before pointing out the speck of dust in someone else's eye (Matthew 7:1-5) and to consider how we would prefer to be treated, perhaps we may be moved to compassion and empathy that allows us to consider what might be going on in someone's life that caused them to get to the point they are currently at. In the story in John 8:7, I wonder what this may have looked like in that context. What was going on in the woman's life that led her to adultery? Did she possibly have an abusive husband, or even just one that was consumed with his job or religious duties while he neglected the marriage relationship with his wife, leaving her lonely and vulnerable? We simply don't know. And even if the worst possible scenario would be true, it would never justify whatever sin was committed, but it can provide a way to look into the life of that person and what led them to that point, which then paves the way for compassion and empathy.

Perhaps instead of being so quick to throw rocks at others, we can instead recognize the glass bubble from in which we are standing. Perhaps as we pick up the rock that we intend to throw at someone in condemnation for something they've done, we can instead choose to look at ourselves and reflect on Jesus' words from John 8:7: “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” In living this way, we truly "love our neighbor as ourself" (Matthew 22:39).

From now on, sin no more

I recently watched a clip from a Charlie Kirk interaction with a college student after she asked him to clarify what Jesus stood for, especially on the subject of love. I found this brief interaction so well articulated on Charlie's part, that it got me thinking about this subject a lot and I felt compelled to share my thoughts here.

The question asked, "what did Jesus stand for," can be pretty easily answered just by reading one of the four gospel accounts in the bible. I think Charlie hits the nail on the head here with his quick summary of what Jesus stood for though, by pointing to John 8, which shows Jesus' mercy and love, but uncompromising commitment to truth. Charlie then goes on to point out that in our modern age especially, we are really good at pointing out the first part of this story while we neglect how it ends. In the first part of the story, a woman is accused of adultery by the religious leaders and they take the case to Jesus in an attempt to trap him by trying to get him to say something contradictory to the law. In response, Jesus calls out their hypocrisy:

'When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” ' -John 8:7 NIV

In God's word (The Bible), God has given us the law in the old testament, which shows us as his people, how we are to live in this world. The law reveals God's design and intended purpose for humanity, but the risk we run in applying it to our lives is that we can be overly legalistic and focus on just "keeping the rules," so that we fail to miss the point of the law, and what it points us to. This is why it's so important as followers of Jesus to understand the deeper purpose behind God's design for humanity, which is to draw us into an intimate relationship with himself, while He is perfectly holy, and we are not. When we only focus on the law and we lose sight of God's mercy and love, we can end up in legalism, seeking to be saved by our works alone. The reality is that the old testament law simply put words to the law to show what it looks like when lived out in our world. Summed up though, the law is about God's love, which Jesus articulated beautifully when he was asked to clarify which law was the most important one in Jewish law, which we see in the following exchange:

'"Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” Jesus replied: “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments."' -Matthew 22:36-40 NIV

To understand the purpose of God's law and design for humanity, you have to understand his infinite love for us all that is underneath it, and how everything is created and ordered to point us back to Him. If you only focus on "following the rules" and don't have love, you end up going way off the rails and aren't even following Jesus at that point, you're following a god of your own creation. The Pharisees were the masters of legalism in Jesus' day and the absolute experts on God's law, they knew every part of it, inside and out. Yet Jesus called them out again and again about their hypocrisy, calling them "whitewashed tombs," because their outside portrayal of following all of the letters of the law didn't match the sin that was still in their heart (Matthew 23:28).

This was not just a problem for the religious people of Jesus' day, it's an equal risk for us as well, as we can be tempted to justify and elevate ourselves by comparing our outwardly appearances to that of other people. Those in the church can easily focus on the acts of sin as they appear on the outside, while failing to look inward and see what's going on in our own hearts. This is an effect of pride. The prideful person is quick to point out the sin of others, while arrogantly failing to look inside of himself. Jesus had much to say on this, for example:

“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?" -Matthew 7:3 NIV

When we look at Jesus, we see his unlimited grace and mercy in his interactions with people, and that he is always pointing them back to himself as God as he grounds them in truth. If you have mercy and grace with no truth, you have a very dangerous combination there. This is a prevalent problem in our current time, as we increasingly seem to have a hard time accepting the fact that we live in a world that is filled with truth. Our world has countless truths that keeps it working, scientific truths that keep our planet spinning, keep us breathing, and keep us from floating away into space. People don't seem to have too much of a problem with scientific truths, as long as they don't point to God (although I think they do). What is it then that makes us so offended when we hear that God has created this world with specific purpose and order, and that there is a right and wrong way that we can choose to live?

When we choose to live in opposition to how God has intended us to, it is sin for us, and it always separates us from God. As it turns out, it seems that in general, people don't like to be told that they are sinful, or that something they are doing is wrong. This is not actually anything new, it has been happening from the beginning of time. One thing we see many times in the old testament is that when God would send his prophets to call his people back to him, there were always competing voices, false prophets, that would generally present a distorted view of God that focused on his love and forgiveness and removed the fact that God was trying to call them to repent and turn from their sinful living:

'Because they lead my people astray, saying, “Peace,” when there is no peace, and because, when a flimsy wall is built, they cover it with whitewash,' -Ezekiel 13:10 NIV.

In general, it seems that we don't want to be confronted with the truth that there is a way that God has told us how to live, that there is right and wrong in this world, and that the sin that results from our willingness to engage in wrong behavior will keep us from being with him, by our own choice. We want to be affirmed in our choices, and we don't want anyone to tell us that we're doing wrong, and we naturally look for the voices of the world that tell us we're just fine the way we are, and that we don't need to change anything about ourselves. Again, this is not surprising, as we see it again and again in the bible, as another example:

"For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths," -2 Timothy 4:3-4 NIV.

When we look at Jesus and how he called people to himself, after some sort of personal encounter, he always gives an invitation to follow him and turn from their former ways, and to sin no more. There is always a cost to follow Jesus, he never affirms anyone in their sin and tells them they are fine just the way they are. To do so would not be loving at all, yet we see that all over in our current culture, and unfortunately it is spreading in the church as well. We see churches more and more that are willing to compromise on truth to be popular and to avoid criticism, for one reason or another. Jesus was not interested in coddling people and allowing them to live in sin, which would result in their eternal separation from God. No, he was interested in showing people who they really were to God, and that they were loved eternally, but that they had to leave their former way of living, or to "take up their cross," to follow him.

You simply cannot have the real Jesus without biblical truth. Jesus literally was the word of God incarnate:

"The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth," -John 1:14.

Although Jesus was all about love and showed us how everyone is invited to be with God for all of eternity, he also confirmed that he did not come to get rid of the law, rather, he came to uphold it. He was exposing the hypocrisy of the legalism that was rampant in Israel at that time and pointed to the love of God that they were missing as they studied and enforced the law. God's law and order did not go away when Jesus came to Earth; a Jesus with all love and no truth, is not Jesus at all:

"Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Therefore anyone who sets aside one of the least of these commands and teaches others accordingly will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven." -Matthew 5:17-19 NIV

Jesus Christ was the only one in the history of the world who loved perfectly, as the Son of God he has eternally been in perfect relationship with the Father and the Holy Spirit. As we look at Jesus, we should be drawn in by his love and by seeing what it looks like to live a life grounded in that perfect love, fulfilling all of the requirements of the law perfectly, as he was without sin. To follow Jesus will always cost you something, this is biblically sound teaching, but what you gain in return far outweighs all that you stand to lose in this world. As we look at Jesus in scripture, although we should be drawn in by his love for us, we should also be compelled to turn from our former ways and pursue holy living, as he told the woman in this example: "...from now on sin no more."

'Jesus stood up and said to her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more.” ' -John 8:10-11 ESV

Troubled hearts

Fear and anxiety are directly connected emotions, you can't have anxiety without fear, but not all fear turns into anxiety. From my own experience with anxiety, to me it felt like when I would really struggle with anxiety or panic attacks, it was as if whatever particular fears I was feeling at that moment were playing on a loop in my brain. When you feel that fear over and over, it can be so overwhelming that you feel like you can't breathe, and that you are trapped in it. The first time I experienced this personally, I thought something was medically wrong with me, until someone pointed out that I was just having a panic attack. A panic attack? No, that couldn't be right. I didn't get panic attacks up to that point, so that had to be wrong. The longer I thought about it though and analyzed my symptoms and thought patterns, I knew the assessment was accurate. The physical symptoms I was feeling at that moment, were a direct result of the fears that I was allowing myself to hyperfocus on. In other words, it was all in my head.

We live in a culture that embraces a victim mindset for many reasons, so my opinion on this issue may not be popular with everyone, but I believe it to be true. Although I leave room for some medical conditions that may make someone more prone to anxiety, I do believe the majority of those who struggle with it could treat the condition if they were willing to engage with it, rather than try to mask it. The thing is though, it can be a terrifying thing to do. Remember how I said that anxiety is based on fear? Well, in order to target the anxiety then, one has to really look at the fear itself. Again, drawing from my own experience, I would be willing to surmise that most anxiety causing fears are rooted in deeply painful events, typically from our childhood. I think it is hardwired into every human being to have a natural response to pain of wanting to avoid it. This makes sense when you consider pain in the physical realm. If I place my hand too close to a flame or other heat source, I can get burned, so I naturally pull my hand away when those nerves began to sense the impending danger of increasing heat. God has hardwired our bodies for survival, so it is extremely logical that we would have natural pain avoidance techniques, without even having to think about it.

Although fear can eventually manifest physically in our bodies, I would have to say that the origin of fear is strictly in the mind. Fear reflects something that we believe in a given moment or situation. If I feel fear while standing on the edge of a cliff that is high above the ground below, I probably feel fear because I believe that I will die if I slip and fall. When fear manifests as a result of a physical situation like that example portrays, it's a lot easier to understand because it's right there in front of us. Anxiety can be a tricky thing to try and figure out though, because the fears that drive it are often buried inside of us. Besides the fact that anxiety is being driven by things that are not right in front of us, add to it the natural pain avoidance response that we all have built into us, and you've got something that is going to take some work to figure out. I think that for most people though, it is possible to do, if we are willing. We have to be willing to reject a victim mindset though, and to take ownership of our thought patterns, and to be willing to look at our deepest fears if we are going to get anywhere.

So does the bible have anything to say about anxiety and fear? It does actually, it has a lot to say about both of these. I would suggest to anyone struggling with fear and anxiety, to read through the book of Psalms, these writings were instrumental to me when I was working through the worst of my anxiety just a couple of years ago. For this writing though, I want to take a look at one particular example from the book of John. To set the stage for this example I want to look at, we are coming off of what we nowadays refer to as Palm Sunday, where Jesus rode into Jerusalem on a donkey. Jesus knows his time on Earth is coming to a close, and he again refers to his coming death as he addressed the crowd in Jerusalem, and again in a more personal setting with his disciples during the last supper. It seems that after telling his disciples how he was going to die at the hands of the religious leaders several times, it is finally starting to sink in, and Peter asks Jesus where he is going and if he can follow him. Even though the disciples had been with Jesus for a few years at this point, it seems that despite everything they have learned from him, Jesus recognizes the fear building in his followers' minds as they grapple with the fact that their beloved teacher and leader is about to leave them. It is quite possible that as they began to wrestle with the many fears and questions swirling in their minds, the disciples probably began to feel anxiety over the situation. I have to think they were feeling fears and doubts that they probably didn't want to even acknowledge were present in their minds.

So what does Jesus say to them? He says, “Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me," -John 14:1 NIV. When I look at this response from Jesus, I see that he was addressing the root fears that he could see were beginning to build. He was telling them to look at the facts, or the truth that they knew from all of his teaching up to that point, and to anchor themselves to it, so they wouldn't be carried away by anxious thoughts. Jesus goes on to tell his disciples that despite the fact that they don't seem to know what he's talking about or where he's going, he says directly to Thomas after he declares that they DON'T know where he is going, that actually "You know the way to the place where I am going," -John 14:4 NIV. So what is going on here exactly? Well, although we can't know with absolute certainty, because the bible doesn't elaborate on what each disciple is thinking or feeling in that moment, I think we can logically make some assumptions that are probably accurate.

In this example, I would imagine some of the disciples reaction is them still putting the pieces together. It's one thing to hear information and to learn from teaching, but it's another thing entirely to actually apply that teaching to real life. I can almost see the wheels turning in the disciples' minds as they hear Jesus reminding them of things he'd already taught them repeatedly, thinking to themselves, "Oooohhh, so THAT'S what he meant by that!" We are capable of the same sort of learning delays, where we absorb information into our left-brain, but when we encounter our first real world example where the teaching would apply, it may not initially register with us that this is what that teaching was all about...until it does, and then we really get it.

Here is another possibility of what is going on with the disciples too, and I think this is probably closer to the truth, based on Jesus' words to them. I think that fear is starting to set in. Sure, they've heard Jesus say a few times now that he was going to suffer and die at the hands of religious leaders, but did He really mean it, and why is it happening so soon? If he is about to leave them on their own, all of their faith in him as the true son of God was about to be tested, putting it all on the line. There had to be so many fears that were starting to trickle in, threatening to destroy the wall of faith they had just spent the last several years building up. What if Jesus died, and what if he didn't rise again after three days like he said he would...what if then? What would happen to them as his followers if he was proven to be a fraud? How could they go on with life, could they really go back to the way things were? Jesus speaks directly to their fears and he says, "Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me." He knows where there thoughts are going, and they have everything they need to know about who Jesus was, but the fears are still there, and they don't end there. Peter denies Jesus three times, as was predicted by Christ himself. After Jesus died and was resurrected, Thomas doubts the reports of his being raised from the dead until he sees him for himself. There are more examples too, but all of these guys that were giving in to fear for a while eventually completely turn around and become powerhouses of faith and do incredible work for God's kingdom as they launched what would become the largest religious movement in the history of the world. So, what changed things for them? Experiencing the truth, that's what.

Reading about the disciples of Jesus may feel too far removed from our present day to be relatable to us at first glance, but I assure you that the principles are very applicable to everyone. Based on my personal experiences with anxiety and depression, I believe that most of it may be caused by false beliefs that we carry inside of ourselves, which we may or may not even be aware of, yet they may influence our behaviors on a regular basis. Anxiety is rooted in fears that we have, which are based on things that we believe, which almost always intersect with our identity in some way, which almost always trace back to real things that happened to us along the way, usually in childhood. These beliefs are often painful to reflect on, so our natural tendency is to try and avoid them, to build walls around them to keep things from getting to them and poking at them and making us feel vulnerable. Inevitably though, things happen in life that threaten those walls that we constructed, cracks begin to form, and those beliefs begin to seep out into our daily life. Maybe we have kids, and through raising them we witness events that trigger past memories and begin to make holes in our emotional walls, and the false beliefs start to come through. Maybe we get a new job with some big responsibilities we haven't had up to that point, and as we step up in our role we feel some of those old familiar feelings from something that happened as a kid that made us believe we were stupid and we would never measure up to expectations, and the beliefs surface. Maybe we get into a new relationship, filled with the hopes and dreams that we have inside of finding the right person we could get married and start a family with, but like has happened so many times before, something happens with that person and it triggers old feelings from our childhood when our parents divorced and we felt like our world was falling apart and we were not loved, so we sabotage the relationship. This list could go on and on, and on and on, there are a million examples of how this plays out in various ways in people's every day lives.

You see, the solution isn't found in gaining more head knowledge. Although it is critical to have good truth based information in our brain, it is clear that often times that mind and the heart are at odds with what they believe about ourselves, and we can call this state being "double-minded." Living in this state is extremely frustrating for the person who genuinely wants to find healing and freedom, because as we do the work of learning the truth about what we should believe in our present circumstances, we continue to find ourselves repeating the same behavior cycles, despite having all of this new information in our heads. Why isn't anything changing? What is often the case, is that even though we've absorbed all of that data into our minds, our hearts are still stuck in the past, believing things about who we are that are based on lies. In other words, we have learned about the truth, but we haven't actually experienced it yet. Very often, the only way an experientially held lie can be overcome, is by encountering an experiential truth, which is rooted in our identity in Christ, and revealed to us by the Holy Spirit.

God loves to free his people from the lies that we often believe about ourselves, as he has called us to live in the freedom he promised through his son Jesus Christ. The hard part about finding the freedom that the Lord wants for us, is that we have to find the source of the lies that are entangled with our identity. How can we find genuine healing and freedom, if we don't even know what we truly believe? If we choose to erect walls to guard our deepest fears and lie-based beliefs from being triggered, then we should not expect to receive any truth in response to our prayers as we ask the Lord to be freed from the burden of anxiety or depression. Walls do much to keep things from triggering our painful memories and beliefs, but they also keep God from gaining access to the very things we want him to free us from. God will not violate our will, he lets us make the choice to let him in, so where we place a wall, he will not be able to enter in unless we place a door there and open it up to let him in.

It can be a terrifying feeling to think about tearing down the walls we have carefully constructed in our hearts, or even at the thought of putting a door there to let anyone in. The payoff is worth it though, the ability to find freedom from the heavy load we've been carrying up to that point should be a welcome thought. We don't enter into the process alone either, we have a friend in our savior Jesus who walks along with us through the process:

"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” -Matthew 11:28-30 NIV

So where do you start in this process, if you are wanting to find freedom from the lies you've held deep in your heart for so long? Pray for the courage to face your fears, because the fears will usually lead you to the false beliefs that are under the surface. There are often layers of beliefs, you have to get through those until you arrive at the core lies, those are the ones that are wrapped up in our identity, and these beliefs are almost always at odds with truth that God has revealed in his word about who we are to him. So take hold of the vision and purpose that God has for you, and his promises for your life. You were created with a purpose, and you are loved beyond measure. So let your heart be troubled not, and as Moses said to the Israelites before they were to enter into the promised land, as they likely wrestled with fear and anxiety over the journey it would take for them to get there:

"Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the Lord your God goes with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you.” -Deuteronomy 31:6 NIV.

 

Who we think we are. Who God says we are.

Identity. One way that the American heritage dictionary defines the word identity is as follows: "The set of characteristics by which a person or thing is definitively recognizable or known." At it's core, identity is simply an answer to the question, "who am I?" I believe that this question is generally the driving force in a person's life and will lost likely determine the path they will follow: a path determined by ones identity, or a path in search of one's identity. I think that regardless of whether we start with a positive or negative sense of identity, we all want to know that our life means something in this world. A life without meaning, to most people, would hardly seem worth living. In this post, I'd like to take a look at some of the general things that influence who we think we are, and most importantly, what God says about who we are.

I think that we initially derive a working definition of our identity based on our surroundings when we are young. We receive direct and indirect messages from those around us, whether it's our family or whoever is taking care of us, that reveal our value and purpose to those we are entrusted to. If we are lucky, we learn that we are loved by our family, and that we were planned with purpose. Perhaps in some cases we weren't planned, but our family most definitely found purpose and joy in our existence regardless. Although no one has a perfect childhood, the person in this set of circumstances will most likely have far less struggles if they have a stable home, and are made to feel loved and valued as a child.

So what about those who were less fortunate, and weren't validated in their existence, and may have even been told repeatedly that their coming into the world ruined a parent's chance at leading the life they wanted? What about those who experienced traumatic events or types of abuse, and internalized a message that they exist solely as a punching bag, or for the pleasure of others? Where is hope for those who feel as if their life has no meaning, and and are reminded every day of their feelings of insignificance in a life they feel is pointless? Many people in this camp will go searching for meaning and purpose.  We can look to all sorts of things to fill that void within us that is looking for love and meaning, we can use love, sex, drugs and alcohol, politics, success, fame, and on and on and on. The modern era of internet has enabled different groups of people to connect with each other in ways that were never previously possible, so we find many individuals "identifying" with these groups, ultimately just wanting to belong somewhere. When we feel rejected by those who should love us the most, we just want to feel that embrace of acceptance by someone, and that we mean something to someone.

I'm here to tell you that regardless of who you think you are, whether good or bad, the Bible has much to say about who we are and why we were created. God has already given the answer in his word, to the question that he knew all of humanity would ask themselves. If you are struggling to find meaning or purpose in your life, the Bible has the answers you are looking for. If you think you already know who you are and why you are here, the Bible has something for you too. The Bible has the answers that every person is looking for, no matter what you currently believe about yourself.

For those who felt unwanted, or that their existence was unplanned by their biological parents, the words of God to the prophet Jeremiah speak boldly to you that you were no mistake, and that you were created and known by God before you were even born. It is possible that you were unwanted by your biological family, but it's not true about God. Your life was planned, you are known, you are seen, and you are set apart with work to do for his purposes:

“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations,” -Jeremiah 1:5 NIV.

"For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb," -Psalm 139:13 ESV.

Regardless of what any person tells you or says about you, your life and your soul matter to God. You were created in his image, and you have the very breath of God in your lungs, it's what gives you life:

"So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them," -Genesis 1:27 NIV.

"...then the Lord God formed [that is, created the body of] man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and the man became a living being [an individual complete in body and spirit]," -Genesis 2:7 AMP.

To those who feel insignificant, or feel unseen by those around you, did you know that the Lord knows the amount of hairs on your head, and that you hold infinite value to your creator?

"Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? And not one of them is forgotten before God. Why, even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not; you are of more value than many sparrows," -Luke 12:6-7 NIV.

The fact that identity is a driving force for all people to search out for meaning in their life is no surprise to me. We were made to be in relationship with God, our creator. The Bible tells us that God "...has also set eternity in the human heart," (Ecclesiastes 3:11 NIV). I believe this is the part in every person that knows there is something more to life than than just living, it's about who we are, and what we were created for. God plants this longing within us so that we will search for him, because we are told that "You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart," -Jeremiah 29:13 ESV. God wants us to come to him because he loves us, he desires to be with us, and he desires for us to be free from the burdens of this world. This is the very reason that Jesus came to Earth and paid the penalty for sin that each one of us deserves, but out of his love for you, he paid that cost himself to be with you. Sin is what keeps us from God, because he is holy, pure, and righteous, and we could never come to him in our current state: full of sin and brokenness, deserving death because of it. Jesus Christ took that punishment upon himself to be with you, that's how loved you are:

"For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord," -Romans 6:23 ESV.

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life," -John 3:16 ESV.

So what does the message of the Bible have to do with finding our identity in this world? It's the message of who we are, from the one who created us. It's our true identity. In this world there are many competing ideas of why we are here, and who we are, but only one is true, and it's the only one that truly brings fulfillment in the depths of our soul. The truth of our identity in Christ is that it is so simple to understand, that even a child can grasp it. For that reason, many will reject this truth based on intellectualism, or from a drive to prove they can save themselves by their own strength and efforts. To find oneself by your own effort is an incredible burden to bear, and the burden of God is easy and light to carry, for Jesus comes alongside of us and walks through life with us, helping us to carry that load. The irony of finding our true identity in the Lord is that we only find it when we come to the end of ourself, when we recognize that we will never finding meaning and purpose in defining ourselves by the things of this world, but only in Christ alone:

"For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it," -Matthew 16:25 NIV.

The family unit is meant to reflect God's love, but is often tarnished by sin and brokenness, and does not properly do that. The further the family unit degrades in our society, and the further we get from God, I find it no surprise at all to find a growing identity crisis in much of our population. If you have believed lies about who you are, or why you are alive today, I want you to know that you are loved by God, you were put here for a reason, and those lies you thought were true about yourself, will never be true. Jesus came and died for you, just so he could be with you forever. God doesn't need any one of us, but he chose to willingly lay down his life out of his love for you, and if you were the only one alive, he would have made the same choice. If all of this sounds too good to be true, because you think you don't deserve to be loved or forgiven, I want you to know that God says otherwise. Sometimes when we have believed those lies long enough, they exist deep within our hearts, and although our mind can read truth and believe it, our heart can tell us the opposite, we call this double-mindedness. God wants all of your heart, he wants to shine the light of his truth in the depths of your heart to show you the truth about who you are, why you are here, and how much he loves you. Jesus is the source of life, he gives us freedom from the burdens of this world, and has promised to be with us always, until the end of the age. This is the message of the gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ, and it is the only source of identity that truly sets us free:

"So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed," -John 8:36 NIV.

"And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age," -Matthew 28:20 ESV.

"Every adult you see, is just an 8 year old in a big body"

"Every adult you see, is just an 8 year old in a big body...because nobody actually knows how to be emotionally mature, because it's not something you're born with. It's a skill you that have to want to learn, and that you have to practice," - Mel Robbins.

I saw this video and it really resonated with me, as it lines up well with much of what I've learned in the last few years while doing a lot of work to improve my mental health, my relationship with God, and all the people that I love. Probably one of the most significant realizations that I've had in these last few years, is that it seems that as adults, initially all of our current emotional patterns and habits were actually developed back in our early childhood. Once you start to see how the dots connect, you begin to see how it all goes back to childhood, and then you can take steps to change the patterns, if you're willing.

I remember learning about this logically during some counseling at first, but once I started to see it actually play out in reality, I couldn't unsee it. While doing brain-spotting at one counseling center, I was amazed how almost all of the memories that came up while exploring current issues I was struggling with would connect to childhood memories. We learn how to cope with our environment at a young age when most of us are defenseless to change our situation, and God has created our brains to be able to adapt to that so we can survive. When we get older though and able to change our situation more easily, we often find ourselves acting out those same those same behavior patterns that we developed in childhood. We have the ability now though as adults to look back and make the connection, and work to change those behaviors, but it seems that often many people don't want to.

For those of us that had traumatic things happen during those years, we had some extra baggage to sort though once we decided that we wanted to stop being stuck in those immature behavior patterns. In order to break the cycle of these childish behaviors, that means we have to return to the source, and if the original memory is filled with painful events and feelings, it can be a difficult task. The question I would always ask myself though if I was struggling with the idea of working through the past, was this, "do I want to continue being a victim and perpetuating this cycle within my family, or do I want to break the cycle?" When I would frame my situation in that light, and keep the future in front me and in focus, that always helped me to get my goals straight and to push forward and do the hard work.

It can be incredibly difficult to return to painful memories in our past, because for many of us it revealed or confirmed lies that we believed about ourselves. God has much to say though about who we are, because we are created in His image, have His breath in our lungs, and have an intentional purpose to our life, regardless of what we thought based on things that happened to us in the past. God uses all things for His glory, and that includes giving freedom to His children who want to pursue it. We have to first be willing to recognize that we are broken as people, and we often are not operating the way we should be because of the false beliefs we carry about ourselves. Due to these false beliefs, we create defense mechanisms to prevent people, or circumstances, from getting to those wounds and hurting us. This causes us to hurt people in return, as we often re-enact what we learned in our childhood. Once we see the pattern though, we began to connect the dots, and the more we do that, the faster we can make a choice to respond differently. Once we can see the lies we have believed about ourselves, we can take that to God, and He is able to shine light on it and reveal what His truth is about us. When we reach this point, it is a complete game changer. We have to make that choice though, we have to choose to admit that we are stuck in the past, and only when we begin to look back at the source, can we find the key to unlock the present. With God's help, we can find true healing and restoration. I have experienced it myself, and I attest to this as true.