You Want To Have A Great Relationship With God
I believe each one of you wants to have a great relationship with God, that is why you are reading this blog. You are looking for tips or encouragement to help you grow as a Christian.
Today, I will focus on one thing that I believe will not only help your prayer life, but will also make you smarter. The concept is pretty easy to communicate but takes militant effort to put it into practice. I believe you can and want to do it.
I Wanted To Suffer?
In describing this trick, I am going to share something that many of you may not relate to. Some of you may categorize me as troubled. But, I still want to share this in order to give hope to those of you who do understand.
The other night I woke up to a knee in my spine. Apparently I was snoring and after many failed attempts, my wife gave more effort to getting me to stop.
I was startled, a bit in pain, and to be honest, I was frustrated. She wasn’t aiming for my spine, and it probably wasn’t as hard as I remembered. But, even though I knew she didn’t intentionally hurt me, I was having a hard time letting go of my displeasure.
There were thoughts that were coming into my head that wished my back would be in pain the next day to make her feel bad for how she woke me.
That thought struck me as odd. I was willing to accept pain in my body just so she would feel bad for what she had done. Writing this out for all to see is embarrassing because I can see how unwise this is.
Unforgiveness Makes Us Unwise
Still, in our anger and unforgiveness, we often make unwise agreements that are more detrimental to us than the other person.
Some people attempt suicide just to make other people feel bad for what was done to them. I would assume that some of the school shootings are done by people who are willing to throw their lives away just to somehow get even with others. Unforgiveness really is a self-inflicted prison.
Forgiveness can be a tough subject. If you want more to read on this subject, check out How to Stop the Pain by Dr. James Richards and Total Forgiveness by R.T. Kendall.
Do You Want Your Leaders To Succeed?
Have you ever been in a meeting where the final decision didn’t go the way you had hoped for? Some of us immediate have desires of the project or decision will fail just to prove that our direction was better. The failure we are hoping for could bring more work on ourselves or it could ruin the company, but we still want it to happen just to spite those that voted against you.
You don’t think you do this? When was the last time a president or other political person won that you didn’t vote for. Did you want to see them succeed? Or, were you secret rooting for their failure?
Don’t you know that you will feel the effects of the failures of our political leaders? Do you want that to happen to yourself?
As Christians, we need to be vigilant in forgiving other people. Forgiveness helps us make wiser decisions, decisions based on love for others and ourselves.
Satan Plays Off Our Unforgiveness
Those terrible thoughts are not coming because you are a terrible person. We have to remember not every thought that comes into our head is from us. We have an enemy that wants to steal, kill, and destroy us. The thoughts he throws at us are to hurt us and those around us.
When we have unforgiveness, it is difficult to recognize his lies. His lies play into our unforgiveness of others and make it difficult to distinguish what is real. Unforgiveness leads us to bad decisions and keeps us from prayer.
Forgiveness Makes You Smarter
Ask God if there is anyone in your life you wish would fail. Confess that unforgiveness and tell God you are willing to change. Say a pray for their success, even in spite of those decisions or actions you disliked.
Don’t you want that same mercy given to you? Pay it forward and renews your prayers for others. You will clear your head of negative thoughts and provide clarity in hearing God’s voice. You will notice your decisions will become smarter.