The Exploder Who Shames Herself.

Those days where you are so close to the edge of being unglued the littlest things can nudge you over. All the trying to stay calm is just adding to the tension. That’s what makes raw emotions so complicated. They come from out of nowhere. In any situation when these raw emotions will ether move outward or inward; but we can do better.

We can all describe those days where everything just goes wrong, you are late, everyone is rude, and you’d rather just go back to bed and re-do. You are worn thin with your time, energy, and patience. When this happens we are often on the verge of becoming unglued if not already.  Before we become unglued on our husband, children, co-workers, or friends we can stop and see the downside of this reaction.

Sip the shame so you won’t have to guzzle the regret. -Lysa

By stopping and “sipping” or seeing what this blow up will cause can save us from having to be filled with regret. We do not want to explode on others, but we also do not want to stuff.  Remember the balance between the two is soul-intergrity where our honesty is godly.

Finding my soul Integrity in God’s Perspective

We have to start by looking back at Ephesians 6:12.

12 For we are not fighting against flesh-and-blood enemies, but against evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against mighty powers in this dark world, and against evil spirits in the heavenly places.

The person you are mad or annoyed at is not the enemy here. In God’s economy people don’t stand on opposing sides of the conflict scale, People stand on one side and Satan stands on the other.

When we dump hurt into one anthers lives we aren’t leveling the conflict scale. We are elevating Satan’s side of the scale. Satan loves when we do his work for hi by dumping on each other. Instead of letting loose on this flesh and blood annoying person, use this opportunity to shame Satan back to hell. Give grace when they do not deserve it using the power of Chris!

After explaining that Satan is our real enemy, reminding us to put on our spiritual armor each day, and reiterating the absolute necessity of prayer. Paul says one more thing.

19 Pray also for me, that whenever I speak, words may be given me so that I will fearlesslymake known the mystery of the gospel, – Ephesians 6:19

This verse is in the exact place it needed to be. After we remember Satan is the enemy instead of the person in front of us we must carefully consider the words we speak to this person. Some Christians will pull scriptures out to suit their needs but not God’s. We need to find a non-emotional, clearheaded moment to think of what to say.

Crafting My Response Template

Lysa came up with a template to deal with these potential unglued moments.

1. Begin by honoring the one offended.   We won’t feel the other person deserves it and they don’t! BUT we don’t deserve God’s grace and we get it daily. Honor them as a person…. a person God loves.  Honor their good qualities.
2. Keep your responses short and full of grace. The wordier we get, the greater risk we will slip into defensiveness.  If something needs to be clarified, keep it concise and wrapped in grace.  A line to acknowledge the expressed hurt. A line to clarify the intentions. A line of gentle honesty about the issue. If an apology is appropriate a line for that. A line asking for grace.
3. End by extending compassion. Chances are this person is hurting for reasons that have nothing to do with this situation.  If it is possible to end on a sincere way do so. They could use the love, but nothing fake or forced.

Don’t every harsh word needs an email or response. Ask God before you do so.  Even in face to face issues remember this: honor them, keep it short and wrapped with grace, Extend some kind of compassion.

There is a big difference between a reaction and a reply. Reactions are typically harsh words used to prove how wrong the other person is. A gentle reply turns away wrath.

Choosing a gentle reply doesn’t mean you’re weak; it actually means you possess a rare and godly strength. 

 

Adopted by God

Ephesians 1:3-14

Praise for Spiritual Blessings in Christ

³ Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. ⁴ For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love ⁵ he^[a] predestined us for adoption to sonship^[b] through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will— ⁶ to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves. ⁷ In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace ⁸ that he lavished on us. With all wisdom and understanding, ⁹ he^[c] made known to us the mysteryof his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ, ¹⁰ to be put into effect when the times reach their fulfillment—to bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ.

¹¹ In him we were also chosen,^[d] having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will, ¹² in order that we, who were the first to put our hope in Christ, might be for the praise of his glory. ¹³ And you also were included in Christ when you heard the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation. When you believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, ¹⁴ who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession—to the praise of his glory.

Adopted

Pastor Brad has been talking about adoption at church and our church body is really on fire for adoption. Since I am an imaginative person when I think of God adopting us in I think of Brad’s children or some of the other families children. How amazing it must of felt to been adopted by these wonderful loving spiritual parents. To feel like you were abandoned and then found! To feel lost and unloved, but also know that these two people loved you so much; even when you did not come from their womb, enough to bring you into their family and call you theirs! They have to have that feeling of there must be something special about me for them to want me. There is something special about every person on this Earth. We are all His hands and feet and we all deserve to feel that love and security. God offers us that through Jesus. Through Jesus we can be in God’s family. He can be our father our Abba. 

Abundantly

I like to read the scripture in other versions to see something else pops out at me. In the message bible something did.

 V7-10 And not just barely free, either. Abundantly free! He thought of everything, provided for everything we could possibly need, letting us in on the plans he took such delight in making. 

Not just free; Abundantly free! Not just saved Abundantly saved! Not just covered abundantly covered! I like the thought of that. I used to say I just want to be  happy; now I expect to be abundantly happy because that is what God says I deserve. I should expect to be abundantly happy because He has provided everything I could possibly need to get there. He has mapped out how to obtain that happiness in The Word.

He has His eyes on Us

^11-12 It’s in Christ that we find out who we are and what we are living for. Long before we first heard of Christ and got our hopes up, he had his eye on us, had designs on us for glorious living, part of the overall purpose he is working out in everything and everyone.

As a parent now I think about me having to watch my children struggle. Could you imagine watching your children make wrong decisions after another; degrade themselves, think badly about themselves, or be hurtful to others?! Everything we teach our kids not to be …..  and imagine a brick wall between them and you….. Too tall to climb.. to strong to bash through….to deep to dig under… Just with a peep hole for us to whisper through. Please come back to me… please you know this is wrong… come to me my child. All the while all you want to do is hold your child… even though they have been doing so much wrong… you just want to stroke their hair… look into their eyes and tell them you love them and no matter what they do you always will.

How hard this must be for our God…. To see all we do wrong, but not be able to get through to us. But when He does!!!!

Think back or forward to when your kids were in grade school. Mine is n 1st grade and when they walk out that door of their classroom and they look around for you and BAM there’s mom!!!! Her eyes light up and she comes running; THAT is the most amazing feeling ever. To jump on me and give me a hug and tell me as fast as she can about her entire day. I wonder if this is how God feels when we come running to Him? 

What’s Next?

Ephesians 4:1-16

² Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love.

¹¹ So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, ¹² to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up ¹³ until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.

¹⁵ Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ.

Hebrews 10:19-25

²² let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full assurance that faith brings, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water. 

²⁴ And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, ²⁵ not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.

So what do we do now that we know all this information in these last 30 days? These scriptures show we do what we should already be doing. Working together to bring people to the Lord. We are in the business of saving souls; we should not take that job lightly. If we need help we go to our teachers for guidance; whom God set out for us. Together we all grow in Christ mature in Christ and guide others to do the same.

Prayer Luke 11

Luke 11

Jesus’ Teaching on Prayer

The people ask Jesus to teach them how to pray. He tells them a prayer and then explains to them that God will always provide.

⁹ “So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. ¹⁰ For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.

He then speaks about why would God give you something you do not need. If we fathers on earth can give even when we are in sin imagine what God can do!!!

¹¹ “Which of you fathers, if your son asks for^[f] a fish, will give him a snake instead?

1 Chronicles 29:10-20

¹⁶ LORD our God, all this abundance that we have provided for building you a temple for your Holy Name comes from your hand, and all of it belongs to you

Psalm 63:1 

A psalm of David. When he was in the Desert of Judah.

¹ You, God, are my God,
earnestly I seek you;
I thirst for you,
my whole being longs for you,
in a dry and parched land
where there is no water.

Nehemiah 1:4-11

⁹ but if you return to me and obey my commands, then even if your exiled people are at the farthest horizon, I will gather them from there and bring them to the place I have chosen as a dwelling for my Name.

Matthew 6:7

⁷ And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words.

Matthew 18:18-20

¹⁸ “Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be^[a] bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be^[b] loosed in heaven.

¹⁹ “Again, truly I tell you that if two of you on earth agree about anything they ask for, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven. ²⁰ For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them.”

Ephesians 1:16

¹⁶ I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers

Ephesians 6:18

¹⁸ And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people.

Hebrews 1:4-11

⁸ But about the Son he says,

“Your throne, O God, will last for ever and ever;
a scepter of justice will be the scepter of your kingdom.
⁹ You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness;
therefore God, your God, has set you above your companions
by anointing you with the oil of joy.”^[e

Hebrews 4:16-18

¹⁶ Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.

James 5:15

¹⁵ And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise them up. If they have sinned, they will be forgiven.

Revelation 5:8

⁸ And when he had taken it, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb. Each one had a harp and they were holding golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of God’s people.

Authority Eph. 1-2

Ephesians 1

Praise for Spiritual Blessings in Christ

This chapter is all in need of being highlighted!!! Every word in the bible has being, but this book is speaking to me!

We know that we were thought of before creation and our life is already planned out by God. He wants us to come to Him and be adopted into the family by the sacrifice that Jesus made on the cross. When we read the gospel we are included as the people. This is the reason we give thanks and remembering Him in our prayers.

This power that raised Jesus from the grave is the power that God is reaching out for us to take. How could we turn away the most powerful thing ever created?!

 ²¹ far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come.

Not just better than the rest FAR above all rule. Just like He doesn’t just provide He provides more than enough.

Ephesians 2

Made Alive in Christ

Just as Jesus died and was buried; we were dead and buried in our transgressions and sins. We were all in sin at one time or another following the world’s desires and thoughts. God loved us so much that He made us alive with Christ, raised us from the grave and seated Jesus and us in the heavenly realms

⁸ For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— ⁹ not by works, so that no one can boast. ¹⁰ For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

Jew and Gentile Reconciled Through Christ

¹³ But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near by the blood of Christ.

In these times the Jews and gentiles were separate and when Jesus died it brought them all closer because Jesus was now in us not just a blood line or birthright we were all invited in His family by His shed blood.

¹⁴ For he himself is our peace, who has made the two groups one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility,

²² And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.