Cleansing

P 2538 Self examination.

/ DVH

We need to learn to live our lives actively recognising any triggers or anger we have allowed in our lives, which can send us into a spin. I am talking about those moments when we are tempted to doubt that GOD IS GOOD … or we stop living by love and start living by our feelings. Your feelings will lie to you. In those shaky moments it is time to dig into the word. 

The Holy Spirit is here with us and He will help us to identify what is going on, because we can easily be misled by our own triggers, passions, and even infirmities. James 1:13-15: “When tempted, no one should say, “God is tempting me.” For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when by his own evil desire she is lured away and enticed. Then after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death.…” 

Instead of laying the blame for our mistakes, missteps and contrary actions at the feet of others, or even blaming the Lord Himself — we need to make a choice to ask the Lord to help us see past whatever we did or thought, to whatever caused it! Ask yourself questions, and include useful thoughts like: “does the Bible support my thinking right now?” Making excuses for yourself, or others, is a waste of time and energy. It leads to keeping score. This journey we are on is one of progressively growing our faith, and that includes the faith we exercise to eliminate the things that cause us to stumble.

Meanwhile, our enemy is quite capable of capitalising on pain and anger. Even those things he deliberately seeded into our hearts and minds years ago. he does this to strangle out the strength of God’s Word in our lives. It is up to us to recognise what is going on, and then prayerfully challenge those things with the Holy Spirit’s help. “So give yourselves humbly to God…” (Because if anyone knows our motivations HE does!) …then we…“resist the devil and he will flee from you.” James 4:7. Take a stand and tell the enemy he cannot send you down the plug hole of despair and guilt over things you did in your past. Even if the past was just … yesterday. Jesus Christ paid all our debts for us!

Personally – I repent, if I haven’t done that already, then I forgive myself and/or the offender, then I repair any damage done to everyone involved. That can involve me going to my brother and confessing my fault! Yeah wot fun! The thing is that if we are harbouring anger toward someone else, going to them and confessing our fault is humbling. That will probably hurt, but it has a huge ongoing heart effect. Then we pray for healing. 

To dig out any lies in our minds and hearts, we will also need the truth of His Word to be constantly hidden in our hearts.  Whether you choose to memorise scripture or not, let me exhort you that the …sword (God’s word) that you pick up in the heat of battle and USE, will not be easily forgotten. And digesting His word, by doing what it says, is one of the best ways I know to have any sword handy! Don’t just read – obey. 

It is a waste of time to say to Him, and to yourself: “I’m not mad at anyone.” It is way more fruitful to ask the Lord “Who am I mad at Lord?” In other words, let the Holy Spirit excuse you, don’t do it for yourself. When in doubt, ask for forgiveness, anyway. Think of grudges as being like a pile of dirty socks. If you keep throwing more dirty clothes on top of them, pretty soon you can’t see over the pile! Hiding stuff leads to mould growing in the corners. 

When you’ve finished sorting out your dirty clothes, ask the Lord to complete the work by cleansing you from all unrighteousness.“IF we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” 1John 1:9. Whatever the Lord asks us to do, we CAN do. He wouldn’t ask us to do it if we couldn’t. Feeling like we can’t do these things is living by our feelings and “… we walk by faith, not by sight.” 2 Corinthians 5:7. 

Self-examination in times of stress is often difficult. It is so much easier to let fly with anger than step into the Holy Spirit and gain the spirit of self-control – but doing the latter leads to growth. 👋

P 2376 Living a transparent life.

/ DVH

“Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.” James 5:16. “But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin.” 1 John 1:7

Transparency in our lives frees us to walk with each other … not to mention the cleansing effect it has as we walk along! However, our current society loves to expose people simply for the shock value. But that is not the same as choosing to live a transparent life for Jesus’ sake. Exposure in today’s world often equals intrusion. 

Unfortunately it is very easy to hide the reality of who we actually are at our house, and present a better picture to others on the outside. But choosing to live honestly frees all of us to openly trust the Lord more, and to present our faith in its true light. We are the people who live in, and value, forgiveness. It is way too easy to hide who we are and simply claim we are being positive. Lots of nasty stuff hides in there! We need total honesty when we are coming before the One ‘to whom all hearts are open’  – and if I lie to you about who I really am, I will hurt the BODY – I will stunt its growth.

Transparency is a hallmark of belonging to Jesus, because we are the people who have nothing to HIDE, so we don’t live in fear of exposure. Instead we live in reality. We know we are sinners saved entirely by His Grace. It is dumb and a waste of our time here on earth to be saved by grace, and then go on to try do our best to LIVE hiding in external works and nice attitudes. Paul talks about that in Romans and Galatians. 

Our God will never take our choices away, He wants us to surrender them, willingly. You only have to read the Old Testament to see how patient He is with all sorts of people. He dealt with them as individuals. He let them grow INTO whatever He had for them to do. It is sad when pride, plus fear of judgment, along with a fatal saving-face attitude, can get in the way of owning our own frailties – we can’t reach our full spiritual potential that way! 

Sadly, some things we choose to hide because we are ashamed about them, and other things we hide because of the way we want to appear to others. We can unfortunately, easily acquaint hiding with privacy or safety, but trying to remain safe and secure without Him being in charge, hinders our growth. Growth comes from acknowledgment, not sweeping stuff under the carpet and hoping nobody else notices the lump! Jesus is gentle and lowly in His heart – that’s our reality. Isn’t that an amazing thing to be able to say about our Saviour? No wonder we love Him!

And He loves for us to be our true selves, freely and willingly, because there is a great deal of healing in being honest and open. I am not talking about being nasty or letting your nasty feelings attack others. The idea is to be CHANGED – not just released to be a pain! This kind of life means we will learn how to accept ourselves and others, and their flaws. However, self is definitely going to die in the process of changing the way we live, because all pretence has to go out of the window. Polite and nice simply get in the way of real Spirit-given love. We use so much energy trying to look right, that in the end, we have nothing left to give away.

Owning our own frailties is so important. To live like this we have to deal with fear, which can snarl at us from the corners of our minds and emotions and tell us that those ‘other people are not safe.’ Let’s be absolutely clear. Other people are definitely not safe! They need saving too!! That’s why we don’t put our trust in them, we put our trust in Jesus, to get us through anything and everything that comes at us. We are doomed to disappointment if we misplace our trust. We may need to give other people the benefit of the doubt as to their motives, but we trust HIM, not them. Others will fail us, accidentally, or on purpose. Human beings are frail, they have faults and foibles and they can easily stomp on us without even knowing it, or thinking about it.

That’s why we need to trust the One Who knows us better than we know ourselves. I’ve found that all kinds of nasty little things hide in corners when we are not honest with ourselves or one another. It is good to forgive and forget when people let us down, but the best way to deal with others is by living in His love with His help. That Love looks like 1 Corinthians 13:4-7. This is what the Lord Jesus already looks like, and that’s WHY we can trust HIM.

I found it is helpful when dealing with difficult people, to go straight to forgiveness and not pass “go!” until I’ve done it.  At the same time I continue to cultivate the company of the One Who will never ever fail me. The Holy Spirit. Transparency and honesty help us to relate to Him, and He helps us to become who we wish we were. 👋🏻