Lot's Wife : How Not to Look Back

But Lot's wife looked back as she was following behind him, and she turned into a pillar of salt.

Genesis 19:26 (NLT)

 

Source: via Mijoi on Pinterest

So I had written a post before this and I deleted it. So, I'm not going to retype it. We'll just start here. Lot's wife became a pillar of salt. God really was focusing me on this. This account in the Bible always bothered me a bit, I think because I never gave much thought to it. But tonight, God was speaking to me about this. About how she looked back. Why she looked back. Why we shouldn't. And how I do this in my own life! Here God is trying to set me free and here I am trying to hold onto my shackles like some shiny Tiffany bracelets. The problem is, we don't see it like He sees it! And what good is it if He sets us free yet in our hearts we delight and long and savor SIN! Sin in the heart is still sin.

There is no magical formula. I don't claim to give one. But here are some things I will share with what I feel God has outlined for me in hopes that this might also help someone else.

 

1. KEEP LOOKING FORWARD/DON'T LOOK BACK.Take EVERY THOUGHT CAPTIVE. Do not remininsce on old boyfriends, movies, old friends, old places you used to hang out at, etc that God called out as sin, bondage and delivered you from.  And we CAN do something and should do something about those phsycial things lying around that reminds us of these times. Do you still have pictures of your old boyfriend that God said was an unequally yoked relationship? Get rid of the pictures. Still hanging out with the friends that caused you to get put in jail? Maybe it's time for new friends.  If you're like me, I have always listened to a lot of music growing up in a musical family. I remember my life in music as in what was my favorite song at that time. There are certain bands or songs that I cannot listen to. It reminds me of specific people or specific times. Rather I CAN but I choose not to. So I cleaned out my ipod and chucked a whole lot of cds. Yes, money down the drain!! But we have to decide what freedom is worth. We are setting our minds, our thoughts, and our hearts against Him when we long after these things. Going back to those places are not for them to be "enjoyed" and "longed after" because that doesn't glorify Jesus to savor in your sin. It does however glorify Jesus if it is for a testimony of His goodness and His mercy and love!
2. IGNORE PEOPLE'S SO CALLED WISDOM. How many times have I done something that I KNOW God told me not to do but I did it because everyone else is doing it? This usually happens when that thing is not "bad or evil " in  itself . But the thing is a personal relaitonship with Jesus involves our heart. So if something just as neutral as a book is causing you to sin...then we must cut it off. We can't follow the crowd. You are not to please them but God. (this is not to say people can't offer you Godly advice, but we know when God tells us to do something and then we're just talking our way out of it! ) 
3. PRAY and SEEK THE LORD. Let's be honest. We cannot make those longings dissappear by ourselves. Because what we truly want is a heart change.  Yes, these above things will stop you from feeding them. But only praying and seeking the Lord will be the nourishment we need spiritiually.  As a result  it will change our hearts and fill us up and satisfy us. Only then will we stop longing after those things we tried to feed off of like the Samaritan woman and only found it was so dissatisfying. When she encountered Jesus she left her water jar and ran off to tell everyone about the Christ. Spending time with Jesus WILL give you new desires and reading His Word will renew your mind. And of course , PRAY. Pray that Jesus gives you His sight and feelings on this sin.  Lot's wife looked back like she was missing out on something good but if she saw it like God saw it I'm sure, she wouldn't have looked back. Pray that God transforms your mind to see whatever it is in the same way He sees it!  And also because sometimes you just find yourself looking back sometimes, you can even pray for the Holy Spirit to convict you immediately when you start to and for you to be oh so sensitive to it.and make you aware of it.

 

I have not mastered this myself and do not claim to be perfect. I am walking trying to learn more of Him. I do believe that Jesus will answer this prayer if it comes from a sincere heart and He will see these acts of faith though.

 

Let us remember Lot's wife.

 

xoxo Mila

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Stand and knock at the door - Be Faithful!

So I really should be doing my presentaiton right now. But I wanted to do a quick post first!I just got back from attending an Al-Anon meeting. Our assignment my professor gave us was to just to go visit, check it out, and basically write about our experience.

What an experience! These women were not down and out but full of so much joy! Beautiful! Radiant! Real! Grateful! Extremely friendly. Honest. Vulnerable. They showed up faithful (years!) to walk the journey of healing.  I was so blessed by this experience and feeling renewed in  faith as I know God heals hearts and I can't help but thank Him for this reminder. Because this is for me. It's something I constantly nee dto be reminded of.

He heals.

There's hope.

Someone once told me (in relation to prayer and God answering prayer) : "Keep standing at the door knocking - be faithful!". And that phrase popped into my head in that meeting.

 They stood and knocked and they waited. And they're waiting. God heals. I want to look at that and see a miracle. Not just some everyday occurence. Because I think it's a miracle that we can recover from hurt and pain no matter how large or small. Thank you Jesus for Reminding me always of your truth.

Stand at the door. Knock. Be Faithful:

The LORD is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit

(Psalm 34:18)

The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me, because the LORD has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners

(Isaiah 61:1)

He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds

(Psalm 147:3)

And just when the Accuser conveniently  challenges you and reminds you of how that applies to everyone elses' wounds (wounds we ALL have) ,

shut him down with:

For nothing is impossible with God.

(Luke 1:37)

Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us"

(Ephesians 3:20)

Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.  For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!

(Matthew 7:7-11)

this song was playing as I was typing :), just thought I'd share

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think.feel.live. part 2

So how do you take it to Jesus?

This is something that I have SUCH a hard time with and am finding myself doing this much more often. With a humble attitude, I just get along with Him and confess my emotions and declare that I don't want to hold onto them any longer. But I don't just stop there but instead I ask Him to help me to understand why why I feel that way. What is causing me to feel that way. More specifically what lie am I believing? Now, this takes humility in itself because regardless of if it was "someone else's fault" we don't have to be controlled by others actions. And we must be willing to acknowlledge that. But when we ask Him for revealation He WILL tell you. How do I know? In James (James 1:4-8) it says we can ask for Wisdom. So I think this very well qualifies as that. We can believe that He will show us but we may just have to be patient.

 Jesus also promises that He will do whatever we ask if we pray accoridng to His Will (1 John 5:14-15) . Is it His Will that we are conformed more to His image? Is it His Will that we are not held captive to our emotions? Is it His Will that we no longer believe LIES? Are your motives right (ie to not blame the other person )?

I know for me it is so easy to sit back and wish I didn't feel that way about someone or couldn't stop thinking about this that happened or that which happened. But I felt God saying do you really want to get rid of those emotions? Really? I had convinced myself that it was kind of a lost cause assuming that you can't really just make yourself stop feeling. This is true, we can't always just switch off an emotion. But what God showed me is that we must not only pray for help in this area BUT we must do what His word has said BY FAITH. His word says to take every thought captive. God's been showing me that as long as I keep on thinking those thoughts then those emotions will keep on coming. So see , here is the correlation between our thoughts then fuel our emotions. God's been showing me to stop pouring fuel on the flame by no longer ruminating on the offense/situation/etc. and instead pour water on the fire! Turning to the Living Water will quench that fire. It does take time but it works! And God has repeatedly given me understanding in situations to why I feel this or that way (and in response repentance.)

It's often hard think in the moment of intense emotions to think that we'll ever not have those feelings. But that's a lie. Jesus came to set the captives free and wants us to live a life by the Spirit glorifying Him.That's Truth. We can't spend time worrying about when or how. Just trust. Sometimes it's instantly, maybe tommorow. Maybe a steadfast submission to Him in that particular thing and one day you realize you don't feel that way anymore! Eitherway, He will do what He says He will do. He always stands by His Word. Just trust Him and don't worry about the How.

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think.feel.live. part 1

think.feel .live  

Do we believe this?

That thoughts lead to feelings that lead to a way of life?  Literally that what we think on can control the path we take?
Our thought life matters. Our emotions matter .It's so easy for us as women to stuff our feelings away because it's so easy to think that Jesus doesn't care about how we feel. Totally not true! He cares about the brokenhearted! Jesus wept! But, worshipping your emotions is a WHOLE different thing. If we put our emotions on a pedestal in place of Jesus this is where it becomes distored. We as humans are emotional creatures and emotion can be a great thing! Bad emotions also can be helpful to us growing and experiencing a closer walk with Jesus. They can help us to know Him better, for us to humble and submit ourselves to Him and so forth. However it's HOW we choose deal with our emotions that can be so detrimental. We cannot avoid emotions but we sure can make a choice to deal with them in a healthy manner.

What exactly do I mean by healthy? Let's start by looking at the unhealthy way . An unhealthy way to deal with emotions is to be bound by them, to be in bondage and be controlled by them. So ultimately, the healthy way would be the oppsite, to be free and be controlled by the Holy Spirit.

As I've found, there's two ways to deal with emotions:

• Ruminating
• Taking a look with Jesus

What's the difference? Ruminating is exactly what it sounds like! It's repeating and meditating over and over again. Thinking about what that person did to you and re-experiencing those emotions. You often just feel angry all over again! You think about MORE things to be upset about. Your imagination gets the best of you and you start thinking things that may not even be true!  The alternative to this is being willing to take a look with Jesus. In order to do this you must humble yourself and invite Jesus into this process. And by inviting Him in you're decalring  that you don't want to offend Him or quench the Spirit and are yet again letting Jesus have it all.

to be continued...

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