A little bit hurt but a lot more free...

We do not see pain & suffering as productive. We want to stop all pain & suffering immediately; we do not want anyone to feel any unpleasantry ever. We have this idea that following Jesus, living life, should be painless & comfortable. When adversity comes, & it will always come, we react in fear, dread, anger, frustration, & the like. The enemy knows how we will react to discomfort. He has been studying humanity for so long. And we are really quite predictable. Jesus said that in this world we will have tribulation, but take heart, He has overcome the world (John 16:33)! Gods way is always the way of suffering. He used the suffering of HIs own Son to save humanity. Jesus willingly suffered so that we could be free, NOT so that we would never have to suffer. Romans 5:3,4 (AMP) says, "with joy, let us exult in our sufferings & rejoice in our hardships, knowing that hardship (distress, pressure, trouble) produces patient endurance; endurance produces character, hope, & confident assurance (of eternal salvation)." God never leaves us in our suffering, He is right there with us. He will never tempt us beyond what we can bear, He will always provide a way out (1 Corinthians 10:13). WE have to make the choice to think differently about sufferings & temptations in order to get out. The enemy is allowed to crush us for a time so that God's purpose can be fulfilled in us, in our intended purpose. What the enemy means for evil, God uses for good! Suffering is meant to test our faith.

Neural pathways in our minds are formed early on in the way we are raised & things that happen to us that lead to how we decide to react/respond to uncomfortable things. Our brains get wired to think about things a certain way. We tend to get stuck in our way of thinking because it makes sense; its comfortable. Changing our thought process is hard & uncomfortable. Comfort is quite the crutch. Everything that we consume, television, movies, social media, even our food is designed to form our thought processes. The Word of God is the thing that sets us free from such programming. It allows us to think clearly, rather than falling into the deep ruts of our mind that have been formed over time. Much of the time, demonic spirits are sitting within those ruts, speaking to us, deceiving us, leading us to continue in our wrong thinking & keeping us from our destiny in Christ.

I have never really been able to have hopes & dreams of doing things without having the thought that I was being selfish & seeking my own glory. I kept sabotaging & rejecting myself before anyone else had a chance to do it. I, & the ruts of wrong thinking in my mind, have been my worst enemy. It appeared that no one supported my writing; maybe that's true, maybe its not, but the enemy has been using that thought to keep me from pushing forward. I know that I know that God called me to write. God gave me the desire & the ability to write. His yoke is easy & His burden is light (Matthew 11:30), so to step into my calling to serve Him will be something that is easy for me. He opens doors no man can shut & closes doors no man can open. For years I agreed with those neural pathways, those ruts in my mind that caused me to pre-reject myself & my calling. I had no idea what I was up against, & kept asking Him why others could accomplish & succeed in their dreams but I could not. He had already given me the tools & the keys, & I knew what I was supposed to do, but could not even imagine myself succeeding & doing something I love to spread the Gospel & share my faith. I authored & published a book last year & I have started my next book, but didn't know what was next for me until recently. It has been a fight since the Lord revealed to me what He wants me to do. He gave me the dream, He put it in my heart, He gave me this idea, that idea; this ability, that ability; this thought, that thought. But every step of the way the enemy has attempted to thwart God's calling on my life by wrong thinking that was a STRONGHOLD on my mind.

What was that stronghold, you ask? It was a spirit of worthlessness that was in my soul since conception. I was conceived illegitimately, out of fornication not within the covenant of marriage, to a dad who hated me. This demon of worthlessness was likely a generational spirit. With it came false humility, confusion, rejection, mental illness, entitlement, insecurity, & arrogance. Jesus said that when a spirit is sent out of the "house," it can come back with 7 worse spirits (Read Matthew 12:43 for more about this story). Perhaps all demons come in with 7 other spirits so that the purpose of the enemy can be completed. There were many confusing times because I could feel within me these spirits & how they were making me feel, but I could also discern the girl God called me to be, the person I really was, though I didn't fully recognize what the truth of the matter really was. "A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways (James 1:8)", & man, was this double-minded.

The Lord revealed all this to me very recently & I became angry. I had been carrying this burden my whole life. I immediately came out of agreement with worthlessness & cast it out. I told him to take all his cohorts as well. The Lord allowed me to sit with these spirits, these emotions that they created in me, these neural ruts in my soul, one last time so I knew exactly who they were & what they felt like so I would recognize their presence, not only when they come back at me, but their presence in others so that I can help them. (Don't worry, I will have another post about how worthlessness has deceived a generation.) The Lord had tried to reveal this to me sooner but I could not pass the test that allowed me to form new neural pathways to think differently so that He could show me. It took 2 months of changing my mindset, to think differently, so He could reveal the truth. And yes, it was incredibly difficult. While it was a little bit painful, I am a lot more free because of it!

We will face test after test, difficult thing after difficult thing, until we pass the test. I noticed a pattern in my life, things that kept happening in the same way as they had before. The only thing about the situation that could change was how I chose to respond. That is how I began to change & how I was able to finally pass this test. Many people never pass the tests because they refuse to think different about a situation. They remain predictable, therefore easy to manipulate & control by satan. Their life is a mess, they are miserable, yet they refuse to take any kind of responsibility, continuing to blame everyone & everything. Once we take responsibility for self, we can begin to change, learn, & grow. We can see things differently. I could have blamed everyone else for not supporting me or my dream, but nothing man could do would stop what God had planned for my life. In order to see things differently we must stop doing what we've always done, thinking how we've always thought, feeling how we always felt. Our feelings are important & relevant, but if we rely on them, especially if they are wrong & come from an unholy place, they are quite deceptive. When we do pass the tests, we come out closer to God & closer to who He called us to be! And a lot more free!