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January 3 - January 14, 2020
Do you want to be right or reconciled? Do you want to be hurt or healed? Do you want to keep being the victim or start becoming whole?
You have to release what is behind you and reach for what is before you. If you will reach for a new day, God will begin, little by little, to release you from the past.
Life is an adventure in forgiveness. It is all about releasing and reaching. Release the past and reach for the future. The only way to do this is to love like you’ve never been hurt. This means loving so intensely that it overrides all your natural instincts for bitterness and revenge.
Love is the answer to the broken home. Love is the answer to the addict. Love is the answer to fractured relationships. Love is the answer to being offended. Love is the answer to heartbreak. Love is a weapon that can shatter division and rebuild what has been broken.
You have to love like you’ve never been hurt. You have to refuse to be bitter. You have to refuse to get angry. You have to refuse to get even. When you love in this way, God will raise you up and use even the worst that has been done to you for His glory.
“But I’m shot, Colonel,” the young man protests. “Everybody’s shot! Let’s go.” Friend, you are not the only person to have been lied to. You are not the only person to have been betrayed. You are not the only person to have been abandoned. You are not the only person to be left behind. And you are not the only one who is trying not to give up.
I don’t say this to minimize your pain. I say this to encourage you to keep moving forward. Sometimes the people we have loved the most can hurt us the most. But you still have to get in the truck and drive.
Billy Graham is often quoted to have said, “It is the Holy Spirit’s job to convict, God’s job to judge and my job to love.”
I have noticed that when people struggle with unforgiveness, it shows. This is an absolute: Hold on to a grievance or hate as if your life depended on it, and I will show you emotional, spiritual and even physical decay.
Research has consistently shown links between the mind and body. What we think about manifests physically. According to the Mayo Clinic, holding a grudge has a negative effect on the cardiovascular and nervous systems. One study has shown that people who thought about an offense regularly experienced high blood pressure, elevated heart rates and increased muscle tensions.3
It is not up to me or you to hold someone accountable who has wronged us. It is up to God. Do not overcome evil with evil, but rather overcome evil with good (see Romans 12:21). Give God your anger. Give God your desire for vengeance. Allow God to be the judge and repay where repayment needs to take place.
As you read this chapter, I wonder if an image has repeatedly come to your mind, specifically the face of someone who has hurt you. This is God showing you whom you need to forgive. I ask you today to join the 70 × 7 club. Do not forgive just once or even seven times. Commit to a lifestyle of forgiveness. This will change your life. Whatever wrong has been done against you, you have obsessed over it long enough. Move on. One of the enemy’s most successful strategies is to get you to focus on things that do not matter anymore. Why spend the only life you will ever have trying to justify the
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But I have good news for you. Shame does not have to lead you. Love can. Love Yourself First This love must first be directed toward ourselves, because how we love ourselves affects how we love others.
I like to say that we need to feel good about ourselves, though not in a narcissistic, materialistic or selfish way. I am talking about an unshakeable inner confidence based on what God says about us, not a distorted self-image based on what the devil likes to throw in our faces.
When we let lies overrule love, it affects those around us. We tend to take out our frustrations, lack of self-worth, shame or guilt on those we love. We cannot possibly love like we’ve never been hurt if we do not love ourselves.
Self-esteem is not the goal. God-esteem is. It’s not about what you think about you, but what God thinks about you.
Therefore, we need to feed our minds with the good stuff. When you binge on negative thinking, replaying the hurt someone caused you or the hurt you caused someone else, it becomes a habit. That habit will then reap bad character. Once you establish bad character, it will affect your destiny. When you start believing the enemy’s lies about who you are, you begin to destroy your destiny.
If you have a hard time loving yourself because of something you did, think about this: If God is willing to forgive you, you should be willing to forgive yourself. If you refuse to forgive yourself, you are holding yourself to a higher standard than God does. That is pride at an extreme!
Father, I forgive and let go of all the mistakes and sins in my life. The lessons have been learned. I forgive everyone, and especially myself. Starting today, I choose to walk in love, and I thank You for the strength and grace to do it. Amen.
I want to challenge you to consider fasting from criticism. Do this for a minimum of 24 hours. Refrain from criticizing the government, your neighbor, the strangers who post on social media, your church or your spouse. Proverbs 18:21 (MESSAGE) tells us, “Words kill, words give life; they’re either poison or fruit—you choose.” Negative words create an atmosphere that will suffocate or choke out a life-giving spirit. Commit to speaking good things. And if you can’t say anything nice, just don’t say anything at all.
When we live with unresolved anger, the enemy gains ground in our hearts. We give the enemy authority. Just as the devil thrives in division, he also works well in an environment of anger. “For where envying and strife is, there is confusion and every evil work” (James 3:16 KJV).
God vows to take vengeance on His enemies; what is most critical for you is how you deal with your hunger for justice. So manage your anger. Be slow to respond. Keep your spirit in check.
Keep in mind that peace is not the absence of trouble. Peace does not mean that everyone will like you, or that you will never experience resistance. Peace is standing in the middle of a storm when lightning strikes a few inches away, thunder claps in your ear, your eyes are blurred by pounding rain, you can barely stand straight—but you choose to be still and not panic. You choose to trust God. You choose to be at peace in the midst of a storm.
Marriage is not a test run. God did not design this covenant for you to play house and hope for the best. Jesus tells us that outside of adultery, physical abuse or abandonment, we are called to stick it out . . . for better or for worse.
Cherise and I have a real marriage, and we lead real lives just like yours. We have had some real knock-down, drag-out arguments, just as you have. It is called being a human with a mind of your own. But we determined in our hearts a long time ago that in those times of disagreement, hurt or anger would not define us. Nor would they end our marriage. We were going to stick it out through thick and thin.
Watch your words because they become thoughts. Watch your thoughts because they become actions. Watch your actions because they become habits. Watch your habits because they become character. Watch your character because it controls your destiny.
I did not feel that selfishness was an issue when I was single. I have learned over the years that, like all great challenges in life, marriage does not make you who you are; it reveals who you are. It is what we do with what we learn about ourselves that makes us more tender or harder of heart.
When it comes to our marriages, we must be on guard. We must proactively protect the gift God has given us. In order to do this, we must respect one another, take responsibility for our actions, romance our partners and resolve to stand amidst the storms life throws our way.
Fight for What’s Left A pastor friend of mine spoke at the funeral of a seventeen-year-old boy who was killed by a drunk driver. The mother of the child was sitting on the front row next to her two remaining children. Her grief was unspeakable. In this challenging situation for a pastor, my friend shared the story of a woman named Rizpah in the Bible. Rizpah had two sons. During a time of famine, both of her sons were handed over to the Gibeonites as punishment for their father breaking a covenant of peace. The Gibeonites put them to death by hanging. As their lifeless bodies swung in midair,
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Reo Hatfield explained that “after Sept. 11 he wanted to make an official statement of peace between the two families to show that if the most deep-seeded family feud can be mended, so can the nation unite to protect its freedom.”1
Jesus is the only foundation that can secure your life, your home, your marriage and your family against the inevitable tides. No other foundation is going to stand.
We will pass on to our kids only what we wear, not what we profess. I can say that Jesus is the priority in my life, but if my family never sees me wearing that priority Monday through Saturday, then it does not matter. I will not pass on what I said. I will only pass on what I wear.
I believe we are most vulnerable to temptation, to doing the wrong thing, when we can justify it the best.
Most people think the greatest temptation Jesus ever faced was when Satan approached Him after His forty-day fast in the wilderness. I believe it happened just before He was crucified. When Jesus was praying in the Garden of Gethsemane, He knew that in only a few hours He would be beaten, tortured and hung naked on a cross. He was in anguish as He prayed, sweating drops of blood. “My Father! If it is possible, let this cup of suffering be taken away from me. Yet I want your will to be done, not mine” (Matthew 26:39). After He prayed, Roman soldiers swarmed the Garden and arrested Him. Trying
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Cherise and I will always have total access to everything, including each other’s passwords.
I want you to think of yourself as a Monuments Man or Woman. You have been given valuable treasures to protect. Your marriage is a valuable treasure. Your children are valuable treasures. Your loved ones are valuable treasures. And God has tasked you with fighting for them. The bulldozers of hell are coming. They are rumbling toward you to topple the broken walls of your family. You can either let the enemy wipe them off the face of the earth, or you can stand in front of the ones you love and say, “In Jesus’ name, I’m going to fight for my family!” Don’t let hell take your treasures.
I wonder if you have suffered a loss. Maybe your husband just left you. Maybe one of your children passed away in a tragic drunk-driving accident. Maybe your teenager ran away. Maybe someone you love committed suicide. I want you to read the next few words carefully and slowly. God is still the God of what’s left.
Are you in the wilderness? Lean on God, your beloved, and He will walk you out of that place. He will prop you up on your leaning side just as He did the Caston family. I read somewhere that 80 percent of couples divorce after the loss of a child. Debbie and Wayne are not part of that number. It has not been easy, but they have learned to lean on God while dealing with unspeakable pain.
Trust Him today. Love Him like you’ve never been hurt. Whatever you are going through, whatever has happened, whatever loss or pain you feel in your heart, this is no time to quit. Be encouraged. If you continue to trust Him, God will not let you fall. He will not let you stumble. He will not let you wobble. He will walk you out of your desert standing tall.
God’s will is for your family to unite. He wants to break down walls that have caused division. He wants to reconcile differences. He wants you to love like you’ve never been hurt before. God is calling you to a place greater than where you are.
When the enemy comes against you, he is after something. He does not just pick on you to pick on you; he is after the spoils. He is after you. He is after your spouse. He is after your children. He wants to take you and the ones you love and infect them with bitterness, unforgiveness, anger and offense. Know what you are fighting for.
A quit option is not built into a godly covenant marriage. It is for better and for worse. It is in sickness and in health. It is for richer or poorer. It is till death do you part. I am enjoying the best time of my marriage right now. Cherise and I have been married thirty years. We have been through many ups and downs, but through the years, we hung in there. There comes a time in every marriage and family when it is easier to quit than it is to endure. But if you keep tapping, praying, forgiving and loving, you will enjoy a great reward.
There was no quit in Paul. Instead, he said, “I focus on this one thing: Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead, I press on to reach the end of the race and receive the heavenly prize for which God, through Christ Jesus, is calling us” (Philippians 3:13–14).
Does life have you in a checkmate? Do you feel trapped? Can’t see a way out? Know this: The King always has one more move. Always.
Your job is to keep yourself in the love of God. To keep a good attitude. To keep your spirit lifted. To hold on to the promises of God. And when you do this and the enemy whispers, Checkmate, your spirit will respond by saying, I don’t think so!
Opposition can cause you to face things and do things you could not have done, had you not had the opposition. Opposition will make you pray. Opposition will make you come running to God. Opposition will make you increase your faith. You may need to start seeing those who offend or hurt you as an opportunity for God to take you higher.
