One of the hardest things to do is to retrain your mind. You can do something a certain way for so long that you have a hard time adjusting when things change. If you have seen the movie “Shawshank Redemption” one of the things it talks about is “institutionalization.” This is when people get so used to being in prison that they would rather stay in prison, because they know how to navigate within the walls, rather than have their freedom. They can’t quite wrap their minds around the change of not keeping to the same schedule, or being told what to do all the time, or having a certain job.
In a similar way, we can believe lies for so long that we can’t even accept anything else. I have worked with a married couple, where the husband was verbally abusive to the wife. He would call her all sorts of names, and they would fight back and forth all the time. However, when you would tell him he had to stop, or tell her that she shouldn’t take that, she would defend him or even say “well I deserved that, I shouldn’t have egged him on.” It is crazy!
Well, Satan has many lies out there that people begin to believe and can’t get over. There is the lie of “God won’t forgive you,” the lie of “the people in that church are judging you,” the lie of “God didn’t create you, you're just a random mistake, and more. Everything Satan lies about is meant to hurt your relationship with him. God is creator, God is knowable, God is unchanging, God is merciful, God is just, and God is the holder of truth. Yes, sometimes what God says in his word can be hard for us to hear, but if we are willing to renew our minds, we can begin to bring ourselves into line with how God is calling us to live.
In a similar way, we can believe lies for so long that we can’t even accept anything else. I have worked with a married couple, where the husband was verbally abusive to the wife. He would call her all sorts of names, and they would fight back and forth all the time. However, when you would tell him he had to stop, or tell her that she shouldn’t take that, she would defend him or even say “well I deserved that, I shouldn’t have egged him on.” It is crazy!
Well, Satan has many lies out there that people begin to believe and can’t get over. There is the lie of “God won’t forgive you,” the lie of “the people in that church are judging you,” the lie of “God didn’t create you, you're just a random mistake, and more. Everything Satan lies about is meant to hurt your relationship with him. God is creator, God is knowable, God is unchanging, God is merciful, God is just, and God is the holder of truth. Yes, sometimes what God says in his word can be hard for us to hear, but if we are willing to renew our minds, we can begin to bring ourselves into line with how God is calling us to live.