Spiritual Wellbeing

The Breath of Life: How Do You Feel About Yourself?

Do you like yourself? How do you feel about yourself? How do you view yourself? In the eyes of those around you? Your peers? Your family members? Your employers and the other authority figures in your life? In the eyes of your Lord Jesus Christ?

Personally, for as long as I could remember, I had dwelt beneath a shadow of deep inner shame. Shame that whispered in my ear, tortuously accusing me with words such as, “You are dirty; you are worthless and deserving of punishment; you are unlovable and warrant no merit in this world.”

Proverbs 23:7 teaches us that, For as he thinks in his heart, so is he [Amplified Bible]. Like the leper in Luke 5:12, I knew (or so I thought) that I was unclean. However, unlike the leper in Luke 5, I had no idea that Jesus could make me clean, and that He desired to do so. I was lost in a deep ocean of deceit with the waves of false belief tossing me against the sharp and slippery rocks created by the lies of the enemy – Satan – along with many falsehoods from my past without God. Furthermore, I was being dragged beneath the dark surface by the undertow of lack of knowledge:

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What is Wisdom and How do We Acquire it?

We know there are a lot of broken, miserable, angry, sad, frustrated, married couples who are not living their marriage in the “ways of the Lord”. Every day they trudge in their daily routine barely able to take another day. When we are going through such issues in our marriage, such as being married to an abusive alcoholic, or married to a unfaithful man or woman we only see as clear as our feelings will let us see. This is not enough to repair damage done to the marriage.

We have to go beyond our feelings and emotions and try to understand what is happening in our marriage so we can do something about it in the spiritual way and not through how we are feeling about it. It’s difficult to do but it is what NEEDS to be done. If we continue in our own perspective by “how we are feeling” we truly do not grow spiritually and we stay within our own private little world of emotions.

This is where wisdom comes into the picture. As scripture says, we have to throw off everything that hinders us or lay aside every weight that is keeping us from seeing clearly so we can win the race; this includes how we are feeling, which may be ill will and resentment towards our spiritually sick spouse and other loved ones. Feelings are ok to have, we need to experience our feelings, but we also need to recognize when our feelings become stumbling blocks in our growth with God.

    …let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us. Hebrews 12:1

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I Am Grateful

Abba, You know our hearts. These past few days of reflecting upon where I am in my relationship with You has left me recognizing that I have SO, SO far to go!

I am very grateful that You are merciful in addition to being righteous.

I am grateful that You love us so much that You were willing to pay the price to keep us from being separated from You forever.

I am grateful that You are faithful to forgive us our sins when we ask with repentant hearts.

I am grateful that You give us the ability to turn from our sins.

I am grateful that You never allow us to be tempted without providing a way of escape.

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Our “Pet” Sins: Can a Christian be a Christian and still sin?

Romans 6:15-18 NRSV
What then? Should we sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means! Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God that you, having once been slaves of sin, have become obedient from the heart to the form of teaching to which you were entrusted, and that you, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness.

Can a Christian be a Christian and still sin? I think that all of us know that is true. Unfortunately, our churches have been teaching (for many years) that it’s possible for a Christian to be a Christian and still embrace sin. And that’s not true.

We would like it to be true. All of us have “pet” sins that we do embrace, attitudes, expectations, desires, lusts that make us feel good, that help dull the pain in our lives. And, if we are brutally honest with ourselves, we don’t want to give those up. It’s that simple.

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Motivating Addiction Recovery Program Participants (Part 1)

The more time I spend with rescue mission recovery programs, the more I’ve become convinced that the most important “gift” we can give homeless addicts is community, a place to belong. Homelessness is a state of complete disaffiliation—being cut off from all meaningful and supportive human relationships. Suc­cessful mission residential programs actually provide a supportive “family” environment where homeless addicts can examine their lives and take the difficult initial steps toward a new, sober, and productive life.

There are two other important communities that program participants must become involved with so the process of change begun at the mission continues after they leave. The first is the Church, the Body of Christ, where program graduates experi­ence fellowship with other believers and spiritual nurture.

The second is the recovering community where involvement with support groups for recovering addicts give them a place to continue personal growth through mutual sharing and encour­agement with others who have overcome addiction.

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Do You Love Jesus Christ with Sincerity? (Unanswered Prayer)

Grace be with all them that love our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity. Amen. Ephesians 6:24

People email us and tell us that they are praying every day, seeking God’s will for their marriage, reading all the articles on the ministry, going to church, and yet nothing changes in their marriage. Some of these people become very discouraged because they want to see positive change in their spouse and marriage. Where are the blessings?

For God giveth to a man that is good in his sight wisdom, and knowledge, and joy! Ecclesiastes 2:26

Wisdom, knowledge and joy are blessings given to us when we live our lives to please God and not ourselves. Do you have Godly wisdom, knowledge and joy in your life?

There are several reasons why we do not see blessings in our life and marriage. You see, we are not on our own time schedule; we are on Gods time schedule, meaning, no matter how often, or how much you

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Strength through Confession (a Prayer)

Father….

I come to You this day with my head down. I claim You as Father because You created me in Your image (Genesis 1:26). I claim You as my Daddy (Romans 8:15). And I claim You as Savior (Jude 1:25) and as Holy Spirit (John 14:26).

I come to Your Throne boldly because I know grace is there (Hebrews 4:16). And right now Lord, I really need Your grace (John 4:6). It comes to me free from You (Ephesians 2:8,9) and I sense the stirrings of that grace within me. That grace makes me want to put on the attributes of Your Spirit (Galatians 5:22,23) in a way that others can see You in me (Matt 5:16).

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Be Imitators

1 Corinthians 11:1 RSV
Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ.

Could you say this to another, younger Christian? Could you have a Christian live with you, observe you, watch you, and then trust, if they imitated you, that they would be imitating Christ?

I think that, initially, all of us want to say “yes,” but if we think about this much, if we really meditate on this, wouldn’t we more likely back off? Do we really live our lives in such a way that others can imitate us and know that, in doing so, they would be pursuing the narrow path?

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I am God!

My children, I am the Creator of ALL, and ALL power originates with ME!

There is no power in heaven or on earth that is able to thwart My purposes for your life as you yield to Me. NONE!

Have I not promised that as you seek Me, you will find Me, when you seek Me with all of your heart? Have I not said to ask, and you will receive? Ask then, and let your hearts run wild and your imagination run vagabond, for you cannot plumb the depths of My planning and provision for My own.

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Breaking the Old, Negative Grid System

At MSN I can go to “maps” and, after clicking there, enter the address of my first home ever — in Washington D.C., my hometown. Once I have a map of the city up, I can find Southeast by crossing the Anacostia River and then find Good Hope Road. Soon I am in my old neighborhood via the “birds eye” feature of MSN maps. I can zoom close — so close it is very real. And there is the old neighborhood, seemingly unchanged after 50 years, as if time stood still.

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