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How to Get off the Ground when a Foot is on Your Back
I have fallen on my face again! It seems that position is almost permanent. I know there are things I can do to stop this from happening but I cannot see them I only feel the weight of the ones throwing me down. It’s a mystery to me why this keeps happening; I am doing my best. This time I am down longer before I am able to get up again and I know the longer I am down the harder it will be to get back up but that knowledge is useless. As I make another attempt to get up I swear I feel something holding me there this time!
Have you felt this way? You are not alone. Every Christian who attempts to do the will of Elohim has been in this position. We cannot see what is holding us down but can certainly feel it! We use both our hands to push ourselves up but it is of no use! We are stuck there because we just cannot muster the strength we need to change the situation. Every ounce of our strength is required to breathe. Soon enough, breathing dirt is the only thing we know. We are accustomed to lying down so we don’t try to get up anymore. My lovelies, you are exactly where the Devil wants you to be. With no effort on his part at all we just get on our face! We have developed some industrious skills while down on the ground, to breathe and to maintain this position comfortably. He has effectively taught us how to throw ourselves on the ground with the blink of an eye. How was he able to teach us this trick and how can we break the cycle?
Dogs aren’t the Only Animals who Learn Tricks!
The Devil knows the world better than we do because he has been in it longer than we have. He knows the Bible better than we do because he was in the world when the Bible was written. His tricks are ancient and his wiles are common. He roars around like a lion after each and every one of us who profess Jesus as our Lord and Saviour. Hell was made for him and he is intent on bringing some earthly souls with him. He has developed some very good tricks to train us and he will not stop coming after us until Jesus comes to fulfill His Words.
Every action we take is from a learned behavior. Ecclesiastes 1:9 tells us there is nothing new under the sun meaning nothing from today, yesterday or tomorrow has failed to happen before and if it has not happened it has been spoken by Elohim. The tricks the Devil teaches us have been taught before and he will teach them again. We need to know, there is no temptation that has seized us except what is common to man but Elohim is faithful to not allow us to be tempted beyond what we can bear (1 Corinthians 10:12-13). Temptation is what the Devil uses to trip us until we fall on the ground from the weight of our sin. James tells us our evil desires, conceived through temptation, gives birth to our sin (James 1:14-15). This sin is what knocks us to the ground because we have not developed the skills we need to see the path Elohim has provided for our escape (1 Corinthians 10:14). The skill we need the most is discernment in this case. We need to discern the tricks of the Devil faster so we can get up faster when we fall.
An Eye for the Tricks
To see the tricks of the Devil we need to know the character of God. The more we know God the faster we will recognize the Devil. When we develop eyes to see God’s character we will see the devil at work against Elohim. To know the difference we need to know the truth! God’s truth can only be found in His Words. Keeping His Words in our mind is the only way we will be able to get up faster when we are down and avoid being thrown down again.
Our Muscle to Get Up Faster
We need to develop endurance muscles to be able to get up when we are weighted down by our sin. The only sustainable muscle capable of lifting us up and keeping us up is our brain. We can develop our arm muscles, have large pectoral muscles and sizable glutes but none of those will lift us onto our feet with more sustainability than our brain. The way to get this power into our brain and build this muscle is to know God’s Word line for line, precept by precept. Memorizing God’s Words not only gives us the power to lift ourselves up it has the power to keep us up. Planting Scriptures in our brain and using the power now in our mouth to push us off the ground is the most effective way to get up and stay up. It takes effort to memorize Scripture but it is the only way to sustain the power to walk away from temptation and make the devil flee. Start small by memorizing the smallest verse, “Jesus wept!” then move onto something bigger. One day you will be able to memorize full Psalms. When we affectively start using God’s Words to fight the Devil we will spend more and more time on our feet and less time on the ground breaking in the Devils dust.
Our Work does not go Unrewarded
Fear not because Elohim is faithful to reward us with the crown of life for those who love Him and endure the testing through trials (James 1:12). Knowing God’s character and memorizing His Words will never go unrewarded. The reward for this lifetime is going more and more times without breathing dirt but in the next life the crown of life. That crown is your ticket into the New Jerusalem where God is our light, the road is made of gold and we will be with Jesus every day for eternity. This is my prayer for you and for me so let us be overcomers that we may be found in the Lambs Book of Life and go into the City.
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I’ve Gone into Shafts for the Gold Mine!
I do not know how many times I have picked up a self-help book completely excited about what I would learn only to find out it was what I learned in the last book. If that is the case why do I read so many of them? Why bother to read any at all if they say the same thing? It’s for the nuggets! Did you know there are nuggets of gold in every book that we read but the Bible has a big advantage over all those books; it is the gold mine! All the other books are in the shafts leading to the Gold Mine! I willingly go into the shafts mining for nuggets knowing they will all lead me to the ultimate gold mine.
At this moment around my desk I count five books with bookmarks in them. Each one of them is meant to help improve my life because that is what I am all about! My focus, in reading these books, is about improving my life by changing the way I approach decision-making and problem solving. We can be sure of those two very things; each day we make decisions and each day we solve problems. Those are the two things that also hang us up and get us into more trouble than we bargained for.
At first I was gleaning huge nuggets from the self-help books and my life was improving significantly. I was mining every piece of gold I could get from those books and applying them to my life. These authors are geniuses. I became debt free because of Dave Ramsey and Mary Hunt. I made significant strides in my thinking patterns thanks to many women authors especially Beth Moore. Even though the authors I listed are Christians I don’t shy away from non-Christian books and authors such as Napoleon Hill, Dale Carnegie and the like. Seems I had a fondness for self-help books Christian or otherwise. I had heard the Bible was the book of Life but to be honest I thought they were talking about the verse that tells us that Jesus is the Life (John 14:6). How could a book about Jesus show me how to improve my life?
What I didn’t take into account is our awesome God who knows all and sees all. He continually impressed me with the Words in His Book. I told you in a previous post (blog post) that I write life skills workshops to teach women using the Bible. I decided I would research the Bible, before I actually read the whole Book, to see if each of the topics I was going to teach about was somehow, miraculously, talked about by Elohim. I called the workshop Leading Yourself to Success (2005) having criteria I wanted to follow. First, I wanted them to see themselves as a success right where they were, then begin to change their thinking from negative to positive (James Lehman teachings), discover who they are, set boundaries and goals and finally commit to the change. I knew this to be a task but I started writing and every time I made a point I looked for proof in the Bible that my point was valid. I could not believe my own eyes; the Bible already spoke of every point I made. The workshop became a secular representation of how God wants us to live.
I had found my way into the gold mine through the many shafts. My nose went straight into this Gold Mine every time I needed information about life. Each and every year I live I read other books only to find my way back to the Bible for where the information actually originated. I have discovered every self-help book on the market is published because God ordained it therefore in each one of those books we will find the nuggets we need to bring us right back to the Gold Mine – the Bible.
Don’t stop going into the shafts because they all lead to the Gold Mine! Every written work published is meant to bring us back to God! When you look at these books, meant to help us, we can always compared them to the Book of Life and find multiple similarities. Make sure you set your mind to read the Gold Mine to test this theory for yourself. You will be amazed how our ELOHIM has used secular writers to bring us back to Him. Go to Proverbs first to see wisdom in her full display then find the Gospels (Matthew; Mark; Luke; John) to meet Jesus. Not one day will go by with regret for spending time learning from God Himself, I can guarantee it! If other folks can do it and live a better life as a result so can you!
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Becoming an Overcomer is Easier than you think!
Revelation Chapter 1, 2 and 3 call us to be overcomers. Have you read it? Take some time now and read it before reading on. They are hefty chapters to read but describe what our walk, as Christian’s, should look like. For a glimpse of your reward in full colour for eternity, should you choose to be an overcomer, read chapter 21 and 22 as well.
I have been a happy person most of my life because I make the choice to be happy. That absolutely, doesn’t mean I don’t get sad or angry or depressed because I do. I go through a process that is very helpful to me to overcome the bad thoughts, the bad habits and the bad actions I will take that I KNOW I am going to regret later! Jesus was an overcomer and we are too! It is easier than you think but it does take practice and perseverance!
Practice Recognizing Your Mental Status
One of the things I struggled with most of the time was failing to recognize, in a timely manner, my negative mental status before I did something stupid. With practice I was able to recognized it and change the way I was feeling/thinking! Mind you, it took some time to be able to do it but I persevered and am pretty quick at it now. I have gone from days/weeks to minutes! Memorizing 2 Timothy 1:7 really helps, For God did not give me a spirit of fear but of power and of love and a sound mind. [Modifications mine] Power and love and a sound mind are ours to have because we have the Spirit living in us.
When my mental status is not good I would do my very best to recognize it as quick as possible and begin saying, “I do not have the spirit of fear in me but power and love and a sound mind.” There are other verses you can memorize such as Philippians 4:8; Proverbs 4:23; Proverbs 3:5 but 2 Timothy for me was fast and powerful. Recently, I have begun praying (Focus on Doing My Best Blog) over everything I do and I cannot tell you how much that has changed my mental status as well.
The only way we can change our thinking is to change our thinking! I know that sounds simply said but it is the biggest truth you will ever have to recognize. I know right now you are saying, “I cannot control what is in my head.” The Father says you can and, from experience, with full confidence I can say it too! Replace the negative thoughts filling your head and you will change the thoughts filling your head. Philippians 4:8 will be your train of thought if you make it so.
Practice Your Plan Prepared in Advance
Once I got mediocre at recognizing my down turn in thinking I discovered the need for rules of engagement during negative mental status days. I knew it was going to take some time for me to recognize it and change it so I needed a plan to avoid the regrettable things I would do. During the good times of thinking I knew that I would come upon one of those times when my thinking would spiral down so I devised a set of rules to save me. Engagement rule one was the most important rule for me: avoid any major decisions. Number two was no purchases above $25. Another rule was to avoid social outings if possible. I persevered at these rules and made new ones when warranted because I absolutely abhorred hurting people with my words or actions. It was during the implementation of these rules that I started writing life skills workshops (About me) to help me overcome.
I had nothing better to do in these times than to cry out to God. When you implement ways to assist in overcoming God starts talking. He revealed so many mysteries to me. Jeremiah 33:3 came to life to me (Read about that) and it will for you too. I cannot tell you enough – go to Elohim in prayer about this and He will help you recognize quicker and reveal to you what you need to do to overcome the negative and avoid the undesirable behaviours.
Practice Seeing the Insignificant Until it Becomes Significant!
The insignificant is the significant in this case. I was starting small to celebrate every single time I did something against what my self-serving soul wanted me to do. Every single time I made an advance in the direction of a sound mind I celebrated. I could see change almost every single day. I argued less, hollered less, spent less money, gossiped less and I cannot be sure but I think I hated people less too. I made a habit of seeing every insignificant step I made so I could document my progress. I needed to see my progress because I knew I would give up if I didn’t.
Each of us has to see our progress, as insignificant as it is, to remain encouraged about where we are headed. Job had heard of God, like we have heard of others who succeed at this, but Job went through all manner of negative mental statuses before God allowed him to ‘see’ Him. When Job was at the most receptive point in his struggle, God allowed him to see how deep His love is for Him and the world. When we persevere at seeing the insignificant, we can celebrate each one of them until we see the significance of God all around us. I cannot tell you how truly amazing that actually is, but as an overcomer, you can find that out for yourself.
You Can Do It Too!
Each day I dealt with my negative mental status, it became clear to me that using Scripture and God’s testimony was a major game changer. I tried in the past to use pithy sayings and quotes from people I admired but nothing changed my thinking faster and more permanently than the Words of God and the testimony of God. David said it perfectly in Psalm 27:13 I would have lost heart, unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. This fact has given way to the person I am today and what I want to accomplish in His will. I am convinced you can use Scripture as well to mould your mind into the sound mind that God created in you. With practice and perseverance recognizing your negative thinking, using rules to control it and celebrating each success you too will be an overcomer and go beyond Heaven.
