The battle belongs to the Lord.....

Every day something other than God threatens to control me. It is a reality of life and what we must face, endure, push through to get to the end of the day saying we accomplished A, B, C. For some of us, the pressure to perform, to please, to anchor ourselves in what we do and how we do it is almost overwhelming. We are very hard on ourselves, we are hell bent on not just the satisfaction of knowing we did it and can check it off the to do list, but to hopefully hear someone say, “Wow! You went above and beyond! You are amazing!” Why is it that the God who created us, established in us upon our receiving His salvation, that we are loved, cherished, highly favored and beautifully purposed, is not enough? Do we realize when we adopt this mindset, this way of living, what we are saying with our lives and to our God? Without realizing it, we are setting ourselves up for immense disappointment and dissatisfaction. This is not the mindset that God intends for His children. The funny thing is, He knows and understands why we behave the way we do. He gets us. It is only human, to want to hear we’ve done well in this life from our family and friends, our peers and colleagues, our leaders and mentors. I don’t like admitting my struggle, but it is a very real battle that takes place in my mind. I don’t like asking for help, I don’t know why it gets in my head that somehow this is an indication I am weak and incapable and that will result in that particular person seeing me as weak and incapable. Well, it doesn’t take long for me to hit a wall when I realize I can’t go any further and in fact need help to accomplish the task I have before me, so I have a choice to either ask for help or waste time stewing about how frustrated I am because I am stuck and I’d rather not stoop to asking for help. The battle becomes even uglier when we have had words spoken to us without thought of impact, such as “I don’t need the distraction”, and “I’d rather not have us looking incompetent”. The perception and intent others have when they speak to us is not often received that way, is it? Those words “distraction” and “incompetent” stick personally, and threaten to haunt our mindset in our approach to the tasks yet ahead that we must accomplish. How do we stop this maddening mind battle? We call upon the Source, the One who set us free and established the Holy Spirit in us the moment we came into relationship with Him. We must choose to stop the battle before it completely takes us over, and release it all, ask God to take what has trampled us in this life, and infuse us with His good and perfect strength and peace. He is good. No matter what we must punch our way through day to day, He is always good and His purpose is great …. but we must choose to trust Him. When we stop the maddening battle in our minds, by breathing deeply, speaking the name of Jesus, praying and speaking the truths of scripture, determining our mind to be set on our Father God, we can stand with confidence and kick all that threatens to control us to the curb. No guilt, no shame, just release the battle, struggle, the ick we weigh ourselves down with---job stress, parent worry, marriage struggles, financial struggles-and trust Him!

You have a choice, you always have a choice and nobody can make that choice for you!

Depend upon Him, or depend upon yourself. The result is either freedom or frustration. (Daily Hope with Rick Warren)

“Do not let sin control the way you live; do not give in to sinful desires …. Instead, give yourselves completely to God, for you were dead, but now you have new life. So use your whole body as an instrument to do what is right for the glory of God” (Romans 6:12-13 NLT, second edition).

I’m not typing this, saying this, or thinking this because it is easy. It is not. Life is hard. It will always be hard. But God is good. He is always good. I know from personal experience, as I am walking through this battle right now, the result of choosing it is much more freeing.

We put ourselves in a prison when we choose let the battle control us. I am choosing to trust Him. I am choosing to depend upon Him. Join me in the battle. I am praying you choose Him too. We are all in this together.