repentance – Sarah Guldalian

Be Healed.

When you surrender to the Lord, invite Jesus to come into your heart and do a healing work in your life, just watch Him. He will do it.

And, when you walk through this process with the Lord, and the Holy Spirit brings you healing, be healed. Be healed.

Leave it. Leave it all in the past. And move forward in your purchased freedom — a heavy price fully paid by Jesus.

In John 5, Jesus healed the leper. Then, He told him, “Pick up your mat and walk.”

Though his identity had been tied to being under, though his identity had been tied to being sick, overlooked and forgotten, Jesus healed Him and told him to get up and walk out of that history — out of that identity. It was time to move forward.

In John 4, Jesus saved an adulterous woman from being stoned to death by an angry mob. When every condemner had gone, Jesus said to her, “Neither do I condemn you. Go, and from now on do not sin anymore.” He saved her life, and then He called her to walk into a new life — a life no longer plagued by her sin and her shame.

I feel convicted that, for some of us, including myself, we need to understand the moment we are in – the healing we have been given by God – and we need to make a deliberate choice to leave our hurt, heartbreak, feelings of rejection, feelings of victimization… we need to leave it in the past.

If you have invited the Lord in to do a healing work in your life, and He has healed you, be healed.

In Ecclesiastes 3, it says, “There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens… a time to weep and a time to laugh … a time to mourn and a time to dance … a time to tear and a time to mend.”

For some of us, the weeping has taken place – maybe even for decades – the mourning has happened, taking from us long enough, and the Lord has come in to heal us, bring us laughter, and bring us dancing. He has healed us. So, let’s be healed. Let us enjoy the freedom He bought for us.

If you gave Him your past and He has healed the past, quit telling the story. It is another person’s story — not your own. It no longer belongs to you, and you no longer bear the weight of sharing it.

I shared a story the other day of the past, and it felt so odd to me, so alarming. I felt like I had hijacked someone else’s story and was parading it as if it was my own. I was so confused by how unsettled I felt by telling it, when it is historical.

I asked the Lord why I was so bothered, and He revealed to me that it is because He has healed and restored me — that story no longer belongs to me. I surrendered it to Him, He released me of it, and it is now gone. I am a new creation, the old has passed, and I am made new. Therefore, it is not my story to tell.

Working with the Lord to be healed is a beautiful thing. When we go to Him and ask Him to reveal truth to us, He will. He showed me very specifically what part of my history is gone, because I am healed, and what I need not speak of any longer, because I am healed.

Perhaps, like me, you have surrendered hurt and heartache from your history. However, because it became your story, you adopted it as your identity. But, I believe that the Lord wants me to share with you what He has shared with me:

You are no longer sick.
You are no longer in shame.
You are no longer a victim.
That person no longer exists.
Those stories no longer belong to you.

You are free.
Walk free.
The Lord is writing a new chapter in your life and giving you new, beautiful stories to replace those with.

I love you all.

Repenting

Pride is a sin. Vanity is a sin.
Sin separates us from God.

Pride separates us from God.
Vanity separates us from God.

Pride makes it about me instead of God.
Vanity compares me to others and puts me above others, above God.

I repent for pride in my story. I repent for the times I took glory for things God had done for me and in my life.

I repent for vanity – for the times I put my reputation and others’ perception of me above my love for our relationship, above my love for the Lord.

As I look back on my life, on my career, I see where I had pride. I see where I had vanity. And it repulses me. I am repulsed by my own sin.

I don’t need consoling. I need to call it out for what it is so that it stays far, far away from me.

It is by the hand and graciousness of God that I have ever had any cool opportunity and the provision we have needed to pay our bills and supply for our family.

I will be honest… pride can reverse itself, as well, making me want to hide any neat thing I have ever done now, to share any stories or even my gifts sometimes, because I am afraid I will get some of the glory. But that too, I am realizing is pride, because I am keeping the praise under wraps instead of giving it outwardly to the Lord for what He has done in my life.

So, today, as I look ahead to a big, new year, where I will need to use the gifts, lessons, and experiences God has given me to lead as I am called, I surrender my pride. I surrender any false humility. I surrender sin and the shame of sin.

I cast off any stumbling block that has me at the center and relinquish it to God… thanking Him for the opportunities I have had, as well as for the discipline He has provided me to make me a worker who can be used in the field… because, as long as we have ourselves at the center, instead of Him and others, we can’t be used in the Kingdom of God. And I want to fulfill the call the Lord has for my life.

PRAYER

Thank you, Lord, for every blessing and opportunity you have bestowed upon me to be a blessing to others and to provide for my family. And, thank you, Father, for disciplining me over these past 8 years to make me usable in your Kingdom.

You are so gracious and so kind, Father. I surrender to you, Father. I give you both my pride as well as my shame, and I thank you that you have created beauty where my pride and vanity had produced ashes. I thank you that you discipline those you love, and that you love me so.

Help me be more like you so I can be a part of your Kingdom work to the effective measure you have intended, in Jesus’ name.

“My son, do not make light of the Lord’s discipline, and do not lose heart when he rebukes you, because the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and he chastens everyone he accepts as his son” (Hebrews 12:6).

The Positive Side of Rejection

Here is something beautiful I have learned from something difficult:

When you have gone through a form of rejection, but you turn to God, you come to learn that, no matter how people see you or respond to you, you will always be good, as long as you go to God.

So, instead of living your life – your calling – with reservation, you live it with boldness, knowing that – whether they reject you or not – you are going to be good as long as the Lord is behind it, and that — holding back out of self-consciousness can cause you to lose far more than rejection can.

So, next time you feel led to do something by the Lord — something bolder than you naturally feel comfortable with — move ahead confidently in that, knowing that the worst outcome of putting yourself on the line is rejection, but the best possible outcome is obeying God and fulfilling your calling.

And, when you are willing to get out of your way to go God’s way, there is absolutely no telling the supernatural, unexpected fruit and blessing that can result.

A practical example?

You feel led to share about Jesus with a friend (or even stranger), but you are afraid to because they might think you’re weird or reject you?

Remember that you are making it about you when really it is about obeying God and loving them.

The worst outcome is they shy away from you, but the best outcome is that they receive Jesus, experience healing and joy in their life, and spend eternity with God!

We really have to love people more than we hate the idea of being embarrassed.

Humility

When we feel the need to defend ourselves, we puff up like a puffer fish — quills out. But when we learn – really learn and trust — that God is our protector and our vindicator, we can release that pressure, because we are confident that He will work everything out on our behalf. He always does, even when it means rerouting the difficult into something beautiful. (He gives us beauty for ashes.)

When we make Jesus the Lord of our life, we can release our attachments, our pain, and our fear to Him. We are then freed up to focus on doing our part — what He has called us to do as His disciples — love others and shine the light of Christ in the world around us.

For a while, I had to overcome a tendency to become defensive. I had been blamed for some things I had not done, and so I reacted with defensiveness out of fear. I somehow believed that the right outcome depended on the sharpness of my tiny quills. But, somewhere along the way, all of that pressure built up, I got exhausted, got to the end of myself and had to surrender to the Lord — asking Him to work, to have His way, because it was all too much. And, guess what? He worked. He made the tragic into something beautiful. And I saw that He defends and advances me more than I ever could.

I learned that, in my hurt and rejection, I had built up pride as a protection. But after a while, I began to see that this prideful protection was actually protecting me from the good, not just the bad — pride was blocking me from peace and blessing. Ultimately, I learned that surrender is the beginning of God’s amazing work that frees me up to just love and shine.

I admittedly work hard. Hard work is a beautiful attribute I learned from my parents, but I have learned there can be too much of a good thing. There is a tipping point — it’s the law of diminishing returns, because sometimes I begin to get tired doing too many things, and I can sense a temptation to get defensive again. But I also remember, in that moment (usually!), what the Lord has taught me: That He has me. I do not need to puff up to defend myself. He is my defense. And, honestly, sometimes that perceived threat was birthed from my exhaustion. There is far more good coming at me than negative.

And, here’s the deal: Unless we surrender to the Lord, we will be futile. All of our hard work will be futile. If we have bitterness inside, our fruit might even be toxic, because pride does not produce healthy fruit. It actually kills it. Pride is like a weed that chokes out the healthy things that are growing. And, unless we purge our pride, we will be unusable.

Here are some examples of moments our pride can puff up, planting seeds that can cause destruction in our lives and relationships:

— Comparing ourselves to others, whether it be how we look, our jobs, how much money we have, how many people we know — putting ourselves above or below them.

— Getting frustrated because they didn’t do something the way we would do it.

— Getting offended by things people say that we feel does not give us enough credit or clout.

— Making things about us that are really about someone else.

— Not working with or interactiving with someone we feel the Lord connecting us to because we get competitive, thinking they are too much like us.

— Getting jealous of what others have, thinking we deserve it more than we do.

— Getting sucked into or even generating gossip.

And the list goes on.

We can’t always control the thought that pops into our head, but we can control how long it stays there. When those prideful thoughts pop up, ricochet them before those seeds take root.

God’s Word reminds us that we have a choice. We are called to tear down any thought that opposes the Word of God:

“We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ” (2 Corinthians 10:5).

Jesus tells us the greatest commandment He gives us is to love one another. So, if our thoughts are making us prideful, envious, bitter and isolated, you better believe they oppose the Word of God.

He also reminds us, when we begin to feel fear, that fear is not from God:

“For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power, love, and self-control” (2 Timothy 1:7).

By surrendering to the Lord, making Him the Lord of our life, and asking Him to make us more like Him, we stay humble and usable.

I don’t know about you, but I am not okay with forfeiting my calling, blocking blessing, and isolating myself, so I am asking the Lord to forgive me for my pride, my fear, any cowardice, fear of man, or insecurity so I can stay humble before Him and be used by Him.

If you are trusting Him for the same, I invite you to pray this prayer with me :

[Prayer] Dear Heavenly Father, I confess that my pride, insecurity and fear have at times kept me from you and isolated from community. I repent, Lord. I turn away from pride and ask you to remove any impurity from within me that would keep me from loving others and shining your light. I ask you to have your way in my life that I might be a part of your mighty Kingdom work and live a life worthy of the calling I have received, Father. I thank you for your loving kindness that leads me to repentance so that I can be all you created me to be for your glory. And where I have contributed to ashes, I ask you to create beauty. I ask you to help me produce good fruit. In Jesus’ name, Amen.