Motivation and Control

April 20, 2012 By 8 Comments

Boundaries with Darren

My wife and I used to argue with our son over his chores. We were trying to get him to do what was right. One day I had an idea. When he came home from school I told him, “Darren, Mom and I have been talking and we have decided you do not have to do your chores anymore; you can even skip your homework if you want to.” He was in blissful shock! After a pause I continued, “But you cannot have any privileges such as TV, computer, or spending time with friends either, unless you take care of your responsibilities. We love you and we are not going to pressure you or argue anymore. We’d love for you to have your privileges but they only come with responsibility.”

He tested it and we did not get angry or pressure him or shame him. We did not even close our hearts toward him at all; we were quite friendly and loving. The entire next day, however, he did not have any privileges. After a time or two the battle was over and now it is never a fight to see him take care of his chores and homework.

Gal 5:1, 2 Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage. Indeed I, Paul, say to you that if you become circumcised, Christ will profit you nothing.

What is Legalism?

Is legalism the judgmental Pharisees of the Bible? Is it the church where women cannot wear makeup? What is its underlying principal?

I believe law is based in man’s efforts and in fear. If I can make a rule about something, then I can take things into my own hands, be in control and create my own “security.” This is all fear motivated. I am afraid God will not be there for me and that is what moves me toward law.

The whole world system and man’s fallen nature pushes us toward law. In the verses above, the Galatians knew truth and freedom but the traditions of a lifetime – fears they might not measure up – and the pressure of peers, all served to push them back toward circumcision.

Once I start moving towards law, things now depend on me; I am afraid I may not measure up and so I feel pressure all the time. What if I cannot meet my own needs? What if I cannot measure up and be acceptable?

Legalism is About Control

If I do not trust someone to do the right thing, I apply some pressure. Rules are applied through tactics of intimidation, anger, shaming and fear. We make statements to our children like, “What’s wrong with you?”  A sales manager states, “Whoever is at the bottom of the sales board at the end of the month will be fired.” A minister preaches, “You are either for God or against Him; if you aren’t giving to evangelism (or the building project, or the mission trip…) you won’t be blessed;” or “Jesus died on the cross for us and we can’t even give Him our best?”

Our identities get tied into these things. Fear that our son or employee or church member might make us look bad, might hinder us from applying rules and being successful, acceptable.

How We Motivate Others

At the moment we accepted Jesus, God could have installed in us a zapper, like those electronic collars for dogs used with the invisible fence. The electrical wire is buried under ground and when the dog with the collar crosses it he gets a “zap!” He very quickly learns where he can and cannot go. God could have done that with us at salvation. We go to spread a little gossip, tell a lie or express some lust and “Zaaap!” If this were the case, I believe the body of Christ would quickly rise to whole new levels of obedience, BUT… would it be outward conformity? Would it simply be obedience based on law and fear?

Filed Under: Agape Reformation, control, Father's Love, Obedience, Spiritual Maturity Tagged With: , , , ,

Coming to the Light

January 20, 2012 By 1 Comment

By Robert

Have you ever hidden things about yourself? Maybe ways you’ve felt jealous of someone or threatened by someone? Ways you’ve struggled with a habitual sin? Maybe it’s walking around with an angry edge but never really addressing it. This can often lead to feelings of condemnation, hopelessness, struggles with loneliness, or anxieties. One night at a restaurant I observed another couple who didn’t talk or look at each other the entire meal. The husband just sat there reading a book as they ate. There was no intimacy between them. Clearly they had some issues in their hearts that had not come to the light.

Hiding things about ourselves hinders fellowship and keeps us from feeling clean on the inside.

So often we try to handle things on our own, putting up a strong front, but this is independence. Independence is the opposite of fellowship. Independence is what blocks our true heartfelt connection with God and man. What is the key to effectively deal with this? It starts with understanding how to come to the light.

We come to the light when we risk trusting someone enough to open up to them. Exposing our interior secrets and struggles to another person shines a light into the dark corners of our hearts.

Is there someone who really knows you? Someone who knows you well enough to see your patterns? One to whom you trust enough to put the walls down and allow to speak into your life?

1 John 5:7 says, “If we walk in the light… we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin.”

There are two primary things here. One, light brings us to experience true, effective fellowship wherein we feel connected and no longer lonely. And two, light is where the blood cleanses us, where it becomes effective, where our heart can truly receive forgiveness, and we feel clean.

If you’ve been in emotional pain, feeling cut off, struggling with anger or fear, take a step. Find someone you trust and begin coming to the light.

Filed Under: Emotional Health, How to Change, life skills, Spiritual Maturity Tagged With: , , , ,

What Is Darkness?

January 13, 2012 By 1 Comment

By Cyndi

We live in a world that values strength and belittles weakness. We idolize characters such as Rambo, John Wayne, and Jason Bourne. It is so easy to feel that there is no way to advance in life if people see our weaknesses, our personal struggles. So we tend to be drawn toward hiding these things about ourselves. We want to put them in the dark where no one can see them. Yet, if we can’t even acknowledge we have struggles, how can we ever hope to overcome them? Understanding what is darkness and what is light puts a huge tool in our hands for growth.

Blatant sin, of course, is darkness; however, there can be smaller, less noticeable ways where we might be living in the dark. 1 John 1:6 says,”… if we say we have fellowship with God, but we continue living in darkness, we lie and do not follow the truth.” So what exactly does this “living in darkness” mean? Simply put, anything that is hidden and not exposed. To paraphrase Andrew Murray’s definition of humility, darkness is not being willing to be known for who we really are.

If we are humble – being known for who we really are – then we find no reason to hide our past, our present struggles, or our future dreams. But being open and transparent like this involves risk. If we were to divulge certain things about ourselves, people may reject us or make fun of us, or even worse, they may not love and accept us. And it’s possible they may abandon us.

It’s much easier to stay in the dark than to take the chance of living in openness and transparency, but unfortunately, there are “friends” that tend to hang around us there. Fear, worry, anxiety, shame, guilt – all of these can be our ‘best friends’ when we’re in darkness. And there’s no peace or rest there. Only by embracing light do we position ourselves to experience growth.

We can be free from our past and live emotionally present in all our relationships today! By facing the hidden darkness in our lives, we can find freedom to be who we really are, unashamedly. Light is the place where we have the actual experience of feeling secure in our Father’s arms and live open-hearted to the world.

Filed Under: Christianity, Father's Love, humility, Shame, Spiritual Maturity Tagged With: , , , , ,

Enhancing Deliverance by Examining the Compassion Root

December 28, 2011 By 3 Comments

By Robert

Deliverance can be a powerful tool in our arsenal to help people find freedom. Nevertheless, I commonly run into people who have tried it without much result. Sometimes we have taken authority over the bad fruit but not fully gotten at the root underneath it. It is not enough for the minister to recognize the problem and take authority. The person receiving must recognize it and have peace with what happened and compassion toward those who caused pain. With a few added keys, deliverance is as easy as spreading room temperature butter.

Melanie struggled for years trusting her husband with finances. She felt so powerless and insecure when she left them in his hands and didn’t micromanage. She acknowledges there’s a problem, has prayed over it and yet still struggles. Looking back at her childhood, she has recognized that her dad had a gambling problem and many times had lost his whole paycheck by the time he made it home, putting the family through many hardships and pain. Melanie had prayed deliverance prayers and taken authority over generational iniquity. She had renounced closing her heart toward her dad. Nevertheless, she was still struggling with trusting her husband.

We worked with Melanie to examine her heart and see if she was at a place of truly forgiving her dad for mishandling finances and even having compassion on him for his compulsion. When she looked more clearly into her heart, what she actually felt was a sense of powerlessness and abandonment. Not only did it seem her dad wasn’t there, but even God felt distant when it came to finances. This gives legal ground to the enemy and renders attempts at deliverance ineffective.

As we lifted this to the Lord, God let her know that He’d always been there for her and has always taken care of her well, despite the many financial hardships from her father’s gambling.

Melanie prayed again and renounced closing her heart to her dad as well as her husband in the area of finances. It now felt easy and free. She can now trust her husband in this area.

So often we fight the fruit but haven’t fully gotten at the root. Compassion is an excellent test. When we can look at the person who has hurt us and not only feel free but even see the pain they’ve been in that has driven their behavior, we are on the road to freedom. Then deliverance becomes easy like butter.

Filed Under: life skills, Prayer Ministry Tagged With: , , , ,

North Winds Blowing

December 11, 2011 By 2 Comments

By Cyndi

Have you ever been in a Nor’easter? Here in Florida we get them throughout the winter season. Unlike the summertime when the sky touches the water on a flat line and the wind is calm and the air is balmy, the cold weather blows in with white caps streaking like a blanket over the ocean and the horizon’s straight line is now wavy from the peaks and valleys on the water.

And you know what else happens with a Nor’easter? All the soft sand on the beach blows away and exposes the shells and everything else underneath it. Herein lies our lesson. What happens when the Lord allows the Nor’easters in our lives to blow over us and the things we have hidden get exposed? How do we respond when we feel like those shells lying uncovered on the beach for everyone to see?

We all have things hidden under the sand. Most of us don’t want to talk about them, but the Lord knows they are there. The winter seasons can bring about pain and unresolved issues as holidays bring together broken families and sometimes old memories we’d hoped to forget. The strong winds lay the wounds wide open at times.

But instead of hiding our hurts, what if we brought everything out into the open? What if we were truthful with our hearts, and put things out before the Lord, asking Him to help us? Healing could finally come. An unknown cancer living in our bodies can’t be healed if we don’t know it’s there. Likewise, pushed down anger, bitterness, jealousy, or unforgiveness can’t be released if we can’t acknowledge it. Not that we do so to blame or purposefully harm anyone, but keeping things in the dark doesn’t allow the light of God to touch it.

If the Lord is blowing a Nor’easter your way, that’s okay. There are treasures to be found hidden under the soft sand. Let us know if we can be of any help.

Filed Under: Emotional Health, Emotional Intelligence, Prayer Ministry Tagged With: , , ,

Only Love Matures

November 4, 2010 By 1 Comment

Empowerment for Maturity

Understanding how maturity occurs is a very powerful tool in our hands for freedom. So many Christians get stuck “working harder” and end up battling condemnation. 1 John 4:18 says that “perfect (mature) love casts out fear.” When love is mature in us, it frees us of fear. All fear is based in some form of not believing we are loved.

Shame – Fear – Control Stronghold

There is a concept called the shame-fear-control stronghold by Chester and Betsy Kylstra. When someone is controlling (whether through overt anger or passive withdrawal) and relationship is cutoff, it is driven by fear. Fear, in turn, is driven by shame. Shame is based in lies we believe about ourselves. These lies are worded as such:  “I’m flawed,” “I’m helpless,” “I’m bad,” “I’m dirty,” and so forth. Prayer Ministry is the tool that can change this.

Love Not Law

It is love that addresses both fear and shame. So in a very real sense, all sin and shortcoming is about a love deficit. There is a lacking, a shortage, or deficiency of love. Something in my heart is struggling to believe that God is good and loving and has the very best in mind for me. Therefore, trying harder, sacrificing, and living “white-knuckle” Christianity does not mature us anymore than shaking an empty piggy bank more violently will produce any coins. Romans 7 says that the law is what stirs up the sinful passions of the flesh, not what restrains it. Knowing we are loved at a deep heart level sets us free from fears and the need to control. It empowers us to rest and to respond to the “unrest” of others with maturity and compassion. Fear will be “cast out” and love will take its place.

Filed Under: Father's Love, Prayer Ministry Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,

Accessing Provision

August 18, 2010 By 2 Comments

God is a Father that will never leave us, it is His good pleasure to give us the kingdom, we are with Him always and all that He has is ours. There is a life of serenity, of being daily grounded in His love regardless of circumstances. There is a place of living as an overcomer rather than with a slave mentality like the children of Israel in the wilderness. However, the big question is, how do we access it?

Here’s a profound truth – to receive help we have to be able to ask for it. Nevertheless, the asking can feel really vulnerable, even like something is wrong with me or I have a weakness. Why is this a struggle for so many?

Growing up with an angry father communicated clearly to me the three rules of a dysfunctional family: don’t trust, don’t talk, and don’t feel. There was no model for asking for help. Having a problem meant either ridicule or punishment. So if I can’t ask for help and receive it in a healthy way, what’s left? A victim mentality, complaining, self-pity, acting helpless, and acting out.

The way up is the way down. It is not getting stronger but getting weaker that brings the victory.

2 Corinthians 12–“My grace is sufficient for you, My power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why I delight in weaknesses… For when I am weak, then I am strong.

Filed Under: destiny, Encouragement, Personhood, Shame Tagged With: , , , ,

Marry Me or Go to Hell

May 16, 2010 By 6 Comments

What a statement! Could you imagine this as a marriage proposal? Picture a beautiful candlelight dinner on a balcony, the woman’s face silhouetted by the setting sun on the horizon, her long hair flowing in the gentle breeze. The man fidgets in his pocket and brings forth a small black velvet box, opens it up to reveal an elegant diamond ring, then looks into the soft eyes of his beloved and says, “Marry me, or go to hell.”

How about this scenario: You and a friend are meeting for lunch. You’ve been thinking about sharing the gospel with him for quite some time. The two of you are sitting at the local sub shop, patrons are noisily chatting at nearby tables, and the smell of deli meats and cheeses permeate the air.  You fidget with the words in your mind, nervously take a tract out of your pocket, place it on the table next to the half-eaten pickle on his plate and say, “Accept Jesus, or you will go to hell.”

No one has ever threatened me to do something wonderful. If we were going to Disney World, my parents didn’t have to force me to get into the car. Usually the threat of punishment was used to manipulate me to endure an unpleasant experience, not a good one. So why should we threaten people with hell if what we’re offering them is so great?

What if the gospel was presented more as a surrender to love, rather than a fear of hell? How can we ever grow in intimacy—between us and the Lord, or any other person—if the beginning of our relationship is based in fear?

Filed Under: Christianity, Father's Love Tagged With: , ,

I Love Maps

March 13, 2010 By 4 Comments

By Cyndi

I love maps. I really do—especially world maps. What I like about them is being able to see the big picture, the entire world at one time, and how things relate to one another. On a map, I can look and see how far away Cuba is fromFlorida. I can look at Colorado and see how far away the Rocky Mountains are from the Smokey Mountains. Robert was just in India last week, and I can determine from a map that he was totally on the opposite side of the world from me. Maps help me put things in perspective as to where I am.

There are times when I wish I could see the map of my whole life, from beginning to end, pinned up on a wall, but I can’t. However, I do know Someone who can—Father God. He knows all about me, when I was born and when I will die; everything that has happened in the past, and all that will happen in the future.  As the song goes, “He’s got the whole world in His hands,” and since I’m on that world, I’m in His hands.

God knows every little thing about me. For some people, this causes fear, as if He’s a “big brother” surveillance camera, waiting to catch them doing something wrong. For me it brings peace. It causes me to be at rest knowing that this world is not just some freak happenstance, and my life isn’t some chaotic randomness of time and events. No, I believe God has a map of my existence, where He can guide and direct me daily. He knows where I am in relation to everything around me, and He has a plan. Jeremiah 29:11—“I know the plans that I have for you, declares the Lord. They are plans for peace and not disaster; plans to give you a future filled with hope.” Now that’s a good perspective. I really love maps.

Filed Under: Father's Love, Rest, Uncategorized Tagged With: , ,

The Power to Take Initiative

January 10, 2010 By 6 Comments

By Robert

What would your life be like if you never procrastinated? What could you accomplish if you had the ability to step out and try anything you wanted with no fear of failure? There are reasons people get stuck in ruts. Most of us have gone down the “try harder” route so many times we have lost hope. However, it is possible to find the motivation to pursue your dreams. The following quote illustrates this well:

“A manager loses his cool and berates an employee in front of the rest of the team. He thinks his tirade was good for productivity because the rant ‘scared people straight,’ but their fear soon settles into caution. To perform at their best, the team members need to take risks, stretch themselves beyond their comfort zone, and even make some mistakes along the way. No one on the team wants to be the manager’s next target, so the team members play it safe and do only as they are told. When the manager gets docked a year later for leading a team that fails to take initiative, he wonders what’s wrong with the team” (Bradberry, Greaves, p.66 Emotional Intelligence 2.0).

Taking initiative involves risk. The only way a person can do this is if they feel safe. Often it is our parents that teach us we live in either a safe or unsafe environment. We learn early if we are free to take initiative even though we might fail.

Fear of failure is rooted here, in the family. In shame-based family rule systems, you are never to be out of control and never to be vulnerable. Somebody might get hurt. The answer to being more intentional in your life is not in trying harder. It is in dealing with the roots in your family system that creates the problem.

If this article is speaking to you, call us today for a phone appointment. We see people get free from these kinds of issues every day. (904.270.9472)

Filed Under: Counseling, Prayer Ministry Tagged With: ,
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