Have you ever done something you didn’t want to, and then regretted it?
I regret being a woman who desperately wanted men to like her. I regret not standing up for who I was. I regret not standing firm when people tried to tell me what to do.
Because I think all this produced a thick heart. Skin that is like cow hide.
And now I tend to not trust people easily, believe what they say, accept things without considering the strings attached or believe people will like me – for me.
I consider ulterior motives. I consider God’s ulterior motives.
As if he says to me:
If you aren’t good, I won’t be good to you.
If I don’t think you are serving me well enough, I’ll be distant from you.
If you don’t spend time with me, I am angry at you.
If you don’t give enough to me, I am over you.
If you don’t have something to offer the world, I’ll pass you over.
I am being frank with you today.
I am also convicted that hearts covered with protective skin are not God’s best working ground. He loves a supple heart that lays in his hands. One that, when he presses on it with just the slightest amount of loving pressure, responds.
So, I’ve forgiven those who never asked for forgiveness. I’ve asked God asked to soften my heart. And I’ve requested to hear his voice. God speaks to us today, something like this:
I won’t hurt you.
I don’t need anything back from you to love you.
I’ll love you as a good, pure and holy Father, forever.
I know where I am taking you. It is not to a place of harm or ridicule.
I don’t have plans to help and then hurt you.
It’s not what you do for me. It is what Jesus did for you.
If you take off what covers your heart, I’ll reach in and heal it.
I’ll grow you because I love you.
I care for hearts, including yours, with care.
You can trust me.
His perfect love casts out my fear.
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This hit home. I think I need to print it out and read it every day. I’m tired of not feeling good enough and seeing God as a disciplinarian. I want to know Him as a loving father.
I appreciate this post because it is where I am at and I am not sure I’m strong enough to get where you have come.
I regret having His peace as a gift and not using it, allowing worry to steal it. I regret being a people pleaser and running like crazy thinking I couldn’t keep up, when I probably was way ahead with the Lord.
With tears of gratitude I write this comment. I really needed to hear this today. Because I have now recognize that I have this dependency on men and because of the pain I have allowed them to inflict upon me, I believe I have grouped God in with them. It is so amazing, I was just crying this pain out to God, just yesterday, telling Him I didn’t feel Him near me and wondering what I had done wrong for Him to leave me (in a difficult season of my life). So, your post, I believe is God’s message to me and countless other women who are struggling in that same area. God spoke through you to me and I am humbled and ever so grateful. I, too, am going to print out and put in my journal so I can read it every day just as a reminder that He’s ALWAYS going to be there!!!!! Be Blessed!
This was perfect timing for me. My heart is hard, I have been disappointed by people so often that my heart is hard. I have been working on myself lately, trying not to worry so much of being what everyone wants me to be. I want to be what God wants me to be so then I will know I am doing the right thing and then if people don’t like it I will know that he does and that is all that matters. Thanks for your words Kelly, I feel you get it