Dear Friend, I felt I needed to take you on a little side-trip in my last post. I am trying to leave behind the remnant of the old me, to clothe myself in my identity in Christ, and that requires me to confront the lies that reverberate through my mind and heart, and to recognize that these are not part of the new person I am in Christ. In Luke 11, Jesus talks about how an unclean spirit can return to the place it was driven from, and I feel like He was saying we have to fill that space with HIM if we are to remain free of whatever evil we are evicting from our lives. Because, we go back to what we know! It is so frustrating to me that anytime I am in a period of testing, trials, or grief, I have a tendency to revert to those old coping mechanisms. I don't think I'm alone in this. Everyone has a different set of habits through which they try to find comfort, and mine is compulsivity. When under stress, I have a tendency to overspend, overthink, overcompensate, and overeat. There are probably other things I do, as well, but these I am very aware of. Pursuing other things in an attempt to satisfy deep emotional needs is a spiritual issue. The need in my heart for comfort, security, identity, confidence, validation was not designed to be met by anything in creation, but within my relationship with the Creator. He will fill the empty spaces, but first I must ask Him to reveal them, invite His correction, and then forsake them and allow Him to remove negative behaviors from my life and replace them with Himself.
All that I need, all that I truly want is found in Him, and this journey I am on is about finding Him in this struggle against compulsive behavior in my life, and finding myself satisfied in Him.
I want to encourage you to do some introspection of your own. I'd love to know your thoughts.
Blessings, Friend