Category: Choosing Courage

Well good morning everyone! And welcome to our last positive. Influence Trait : Self-Control. A few months ago I was sitting in church and our pastor Justin was talking about self- control and how self-control wasn’t really about us being in control of ourselves, but rather the Holy Spirit being in control of us. And when that happens we are free from the “try harder and do better” mentalities we all have.

I wish I could explain to you what happened that day. It had been an incredibly rough few months and I was teetering on the edge of what felt like insanity! The amount of anxiety I was dealing with was terrible. (we had no concept yet that the anxiety was based on extremely low iron levels) And each day was just another day of me striving to try harder and do better- BUT I was failing. The anxiety had gotten so bad that I was convinced it was the food I was eating that was causing my heart to race- I was hardly eating anything.

Truth sets us free

When Justin spoke this truth and I realized that I was living that life of ” try harder and do better” I was set free. Did it mean the anxiety left? NOPE NOT ONE BIT. It actually got worse. BUT because I had yielded my control (the food I ate- which was rooted in fear by the way), I experienced PEACE.

Something strange started to happen- As I relinquished my control over certain areas I began to experience these traits.

What happens when we “try harder to do better”

This isn’t to say that I have arrived because my goodness I have not. There are moments that I struggle with ALL of those traits and it becomes glaringly obvious that I am seeking my own way, “that I am trying to do better and try harder.”

• Those days aren’t full of love- because I don’t have the ability to love in my own strength.
• I cannot choose joy when I don’t have a grateful heart for all that Jesus has done.
• Peace doesn’t show up when I am fretting over how much better I can be and how much harder I need to try,
• Patience is turned to impatience because I haven’t surrendered my ways over the ways of Jesus.
• Kindness is lost in the fervor of doing better, just checking things off the list in las mode ( have you ever noticed how unkind people get when it’s all about checking things off their to-do list?)
• Goodness is is drowned out when we seek our own ways over God’s ways. God’s ways are good my ways are mediocre at best.
• Faithfulness becomes unimportant because it’s no longer about God but all about me and those who have been unfaithful to me.
• Gentleness becomes a thing of the past because well harshness has won over.
• And when all of those things are lost – my emotions, behaviors and desires are all out of whack. We are no longer a controlled self.

That’s what it comes down to

Not that I have self- control but that I am a controlled by the Holy Spirit! We have come full circle!

And my heart is light because I know it’s no longer about checking this list off. I cannot do this without the Holy Spirit. If I want these to be markers of my walk with God I HAVE to yield complete control of r my life to him. There are so many things we want to hold onto that we believe we need to do on our own. But that is a lie from Satan. We are NEVER called to be lone rangers on this journey we call life

And when we recognize this- our lives begin to change radically. AMD THAT CHANGE takes the eyes off of us and puts it where it rightly belongs! ON JESUS- And That my friends is the most powerful positive influence you can have!

Now it’s your turn.

This perhaps is the hardest t choice you have to make. Hardest because surrendering your thoughts, emotions, desires and rights is so very hard. But when you start to do so ad you quit striving to do better and work harder, the most incredible sense of freedom happens.

So, ask yourself “what am I holding onto?” “what am I trying harder to do better in my life?”

Then ask God to change your heart- give him all the junk you are holding onto ( this isn’t a once and done thing either). Sometimes we are on a minute by minute yielding of my own way. Give Him that “do better and try harder” life style and rely on Him to change us.

Thank you for joining me on this journey! As we talk about the Power of your influence we are going to take a bit of a break from traits. We have gone through all of the positive traits so far and in a day or so we will jump into the Negative Influence traits (Hint we have already talked about them).

Check out these links

Write 31 Days 2018 Influence Posts

Choosing Courage 100 Day Writing Project

Write 31 Days 2021 Link up List. (Scroll to the bottom)

Good morning everyone and welcome to day 9 of the #31days2021 writing challenge . We are going to focus on the positive influence trait of faithfulness. As I have been prepping for this post I struggled with the fact that we are generally unfaithful people- we a wishy-washy. We get distracted so easily and we lose sight of our priorities and what is the most important,

When I think of faithfulness I think about how faithful God is to us.BUT because God is faithful we are called to be faithful as well. And that got me thinking about who we are to be faithful to.

Faithfulness in a nutshell

There are two groups of we should be faithful too.

• God
• People

HA! that takes care of everyone! But seriously though those are who we should be faithful too. But before we can talk about what exactly that looks like, we must first understand WHAT faithfulness is.

Faithfulness

The definition of being faithful is remaining loyal and steadfast. In light of this we see that we are truly a very wishy-washy people. And the interesting thing is the only way we can do this is by denying our selfish ambitions.. (are you beginning to draw the same conclusions I am as we dive deeper into these positive influence traits?).

So what does our faithfulness look like ?

To God

A number of years ago I was in the middle of a bible study. And even though I KNEW what devotions are (even though we “know” stuff sometimes it takes a while for it to sink in and when it does be become responsible to apply it to the best of our abilities.) I came to a deeper understanding of what devotions meant.

So let’s talk about devotions.

Devotions I know I have talked about this a couple of times in the past. But I think we toss around the word “devotions” or “devos” without fulling understanding what exactly it means. Having devotions is the outpouring of being DEVOTED to God When you are devoted to someone or something is means that you are very loving and loyal…..Hmm there’s loyal again.

Loyalty

Loyal means giving or showing firm and constant support or allegiance to a person or institution..

I know that life happens and schedules are busy but it’s during those times when we say even if I am crazy busy, my relationship with God is too important to me to let go of , so I will still take the time to spend with him. Sometimes that means a few minutes and other times that might mean an even bigger chunk of time. But that is what being faithful is about! Making that choice to be loyal even in the middle of the mess- even in the middle of the busy- even in the middle of the hard. It is the attitude and commitment of “even if….I still will…”

And then there the people.

People

People are hard. It’s because of that selfish ambition we keep talking about. Whether it’s theirs OR our own.

People hurt us and we hurt people. We let our own circumstances get in the way and we forget that our friends and family have their own hard things. And it’s easy to get frustrated and assume intentions and blah blah blah. It’s easy to get lost in the all of the emotions that come with selfish ambitions.

But we can choose to not harbor those emotions and frustrations and see things from others perspectives. Choosing to be loyal and still show care and concern even if it’s not reciprocated. That’s being faithful. Why is this so important? Because that is exactly what God does for us! Remember a few paragraphs ago when I said that things get in the way with our walk with God? Well even when we become less faithful with our relationship with God- he NEVER stops being faithful to us.

Do Unto others…

We all want our friends to be faithful to us…even when things are going bad for us. SO we should be faithful to them when things aren’t going so well for them. BUT a huge problem stands in the way. ENTITLEMENT (AKA selfish ambition.)

Sometimes we get so clouded by what is going on in our own lives we lose sight of our relationships. And if our family or friends don’t seem as interested in our problems as they once did we get offended or frustrated that they have become too busy for us. We forget that we can’t assume we know what is going on in their lives. We forget to ask them how they are doing because we feel forgotten. And we forget to treat them how we want to be treated. And before we know it we have lost those relationships.

Being faithful to our friends and family requires setting aside all the emotions and hurts …And saying even if…..I still will. ….

I will still Choose

• love,
• patience,
• not to be jealous, boastful, proud or rude
• not to demand my own way
• not to be irritable
• not to keep a record of wrongs
• not to rejoice about injustices
• to rejoice when truth wins out
• not to give up
• not to lose faith
• to be hopeful
• to endure through EVERY circumstance

Now there’s a picture of what true faithfulness for those we care about! That’s the definition of true love! I don’t know about you but I look at that list and I see shortcomings and failures. I know I have let people down in many of those areas.

AND YET…..

Things come full circle when I realize that despite ALL of my shortcomings and ALL of my failures, God is still faithful and he forgives me and takes those broken failures and turns them into beautiful redemption. He is in the habit of redeeming broken things and turning them into something completely beautiful. And that makes me want to be more faithful than ever before.

We can trust him with those tings…BUT we have to choose to! We have a choice to be faithful to God and to those we love. We have a choice to keep our commitments to them.

Now it’s your turn

At each turn along this journey we come face to face with hard questions we need to ask ourselves. It’s hard heart work. But it is absolutely necessary if we want to grow in the Fruit of the Spirit,

Are we willing to set aside our own hurts and pains and ask God to help us be faithful to our friends and family? Are we willing to say even if things don’t go my way am I willing to be faithful to God and to those I know and love?

And are we willing to say Lord not my will but yours AND mean it?

Let me know what is your biggest struggle in the comments below.

Check. out the Links

Write 31 Days 2018 Influence Posts

Choosing Courage 100 Day Writing Project

Write 31 Days 2021 Link up List (Scroll to the bottom)

Good morning everyone. Can I ask a question? Besides that one! When you think of the word gentleness, what comes to mind?

When I think of the word gentleness I think of BABIES!!! These tiny bundle of a blessings come into the world completely helpless and fragile. It’s absolutely necessary to be gentle with a baby. You can’t toss a newborn, you cannot swing a newborn. You need to cuddle and care for a newborn. You need to watch over and feed a newborn very carefully. Gentle touch soothes a crying newborn and a soft word calms a fussy little one.

But somewhere along the line we loose that gentleness. We let irritation, anger and annoyance come into play. We forget that gentleness is a necessity not just for a newborn- gentleness is required for EVERYONE. It is one of the attributes of a believer who is growing in their walk with God.

What you need before you have gentleness

• LOVE- You cannot have gentleness without first having love. Love IS the ground work for Gentleness
• JOY- believe it or not JOY is huge – Joy encourages our gentleness
• PEACE is the root of our gentleness. It dives deep from our love and gives our gentleness strength.
• PATIENCE is the backbone of our gentleness It gives our gentleness stability
• GOODNESS is the REASON for our gentleness.
• FAITHFULNESS keeps us gentle, even when it is hard.

Gentleness is the practice that leads to self-control (Yep that comes tomorrow).

Gentleness is an outpouring of all of the previous traits of a believer. And that gentleness seen in some believers is the greatest positive influence believers could ever have. Imagine of ALL believers had and practiced this kind of gentleness.

A quick study of the word gentleness/gentle in the Bible will land you in Proverbs,

Proverbs and Gentleness

Verse 1- A gentle answer deflects anger,
    but harsh words make tempers flare.

This is the other thing that pops into my head when I hear the word Gentleness- this verse has been HUGE in my spiritual walk!

Verse 4-Gentle words are a tree of life;
    a deceitful tongue crushes the spirit.

Verse 28- The heart of the godly thinks carefully before speaking;
    the mouth of the wicked overflows with evil words.

In Light of verse 4 and of the godly attributes listed in Galatians 5:22-23 This verse just goes on to speak of gentle words. And these verses come from just one Proverbs chapter- Chapter 15.

So many times we have this idea that gentleness is all about a soft touch but when we look at the Bible we see that most of the time gentleness is mentioned it’s about our speech.

And it is starkly contrasted with harsh speech Hence verse one of chapter 15.

We have a choice to make

Like all of the preceding traits we do have a choice to make. Are we going to deflect anger or are we going to fan the flame of it?

That’s a very hard heart question and one we have to take very seriously because our words are so influential. They can build up or they can cut down. They can encourage someone to reach their dreams or they can poke holes into the hearts f those who trust us. We have great power- we just need to choose how to use that power- The power of our influence- the power of our words AND our actions.

So what needs to change? We will ALL need to grow in this area throughout our lives. But what choices and changes can we make now to change our influence from a negative one to a positive one.

I am so glad that you have joined me today and I pray that these posts have been an encouragement and a challenge to your heart!

Check out these links

Write 31 Days 2018 Influence Posts

Choosing Courage 100 Day Writing Project

Write 31 Days 2021 Link up List (Scroll to the bottom)