The best thing we can do for ourselves and our relationship with God is to be vulnerable before Him. This means being honest with Him.
Please tell me, what relationship is healthy without being honest? There are none and yet we seem to think we can’t or shouldn’t be as honest with God as we also need to be with ourselves.
Our honesty solves a million hurts before they can even be formed and it is the beginning of breaking walls already created. I can hear you right now, “But God knows everything, so why do I need to be honest with Him?” It is about the relationship. It is two sided. He knows but He wants your whole heart. This means when we take a step of faith, as being vulnerable requires, He delights in us.
“But let him who boasts boast of this, that he understands and knows Me, that I am the LORD who exercises lovingkindness, justice and righteousness on earth; for I delight in these things,” declares the LORD.” Jeremiah 9:24
He delights in us as we see Him for who He is – that He is loving, kind, righteous and just.
This means taking your heartache, your worries, your thoughts, and your sins to Him! Being brutally honest because HE DOES KNOW but when we bring Him these things, we submit them to Him as well. When we lay them at His feet where they belong, unexplainable peace will follow. Peace even when we are still in the situation because He is with us.
I remember walking down a hallway at college and feeling frustrated about where God had placed me. I didn’t want to be there. I wanted to feel different. I thought, “eh I can’t be used here. I don’t even want to be here.”
I knew God knew all about my frustrations but when I prayed about it, He changed my heart. Does this mean all of a sudden that I loved my school? No, but my prayer changed after I laid my heartbreak of that season down. My prayer changed from, “Please change this situation” to “Jesus, please show me something here.”
I wanted to know why because He is a loving and just God. All of a sudden, I wanted to stay where I had wanted to hide and flee from to see just how He was going to do it. I constantly fought with thoughts about why here, but God was faithful in putting a fire of impacting others in me.
He wants to change our thoughts, but we must allow Him to. This starts with laying them down before Him.
Step 1: Know what you are thinking.
I made a promise to myself to be honest about where I was, even when it wasn’t pretty because only when I admitted the struggles, could change occur. This is why we must be vulnerable with Him. He wants to turn our heartaches into triumphs, but He won’t force His way in. He wants us to hand Him the addictions and help us walk away from them and not fall back in.
He wants to show us how to live abundantly. This also means truthfully.
I didn’t like where I had been planted at first and it didn’t change just because, no it took a change of thoughts. I had to pray continuously that God would use me and show me something there. That He would give me a mission. And WOW, He did!
Step 2: Tell Him what you are feeling and thinking.
Admitting where we are takes strength. Let me be honest with you, it takes guts.
Can we admit we are NOT strong enough to beat addiction on our own?
Can we admit we are NOT able to fix it ourselves?
Feelings are fleeting but boy, they are real when you experience them. He isn’t afraid of what you are feeling. Let truth overtake your feelings.
I told Him where I was at with it. I didn’t like it, but I chose to accept it. To trust that His reasons are better.
Step 3: Let His Word speak to you.
Christ is greater than our fears and our worries. Knowing these awesome truths led me to chase after Him. To seek what He wanted over what I did at the time. Now, I wouldn’t take it back, but you know what they say, hindsight is 20/20. He knows the beginning and the end with every in between. “A thorough knowledge of the Bible is worth more than a college education.” Theodore Roosevelt
John 10:10 says, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.”
Let us pray different, being honest and also being real means seeing Him for who He is despite our feelings and circumstances.
Step 4: Change those thoughts.
“Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.” Philippians 4:8
When we become full of His thoughts we no longer have room to despair over what the enemy tries to tell us. There isn’t time and there isn’t room.
Immediately after changing my mindset I noticed His activity at work. God burdened my heart for the things that burdened His heart.
I started seeing people EVERYWHERE who were heartbroken like I had been (maybe for different reasons but still broken). I saw people needing Christ’s love. By noticing His activity, I was able to get involved in His activity around me.
Step 5 and along the way: Praise Him now.
Praise Him for the breakthrough happening right now!
He sees us all at our very worst and loves us most there. Going before Him with vulnerability is us acting on this love. It is trusting Him to be who He says He is. Being honest is an act of faith.
Let us praise Him now for being our Savior, the One who listens and knows. The One who loves us so much that He wants to uplift our hearts in the midst of heartache. The One who wants to take our hand and lead us from the addiction. The One who calls us to bigger things than we can imagine.
This honestly was the best thing I learned in college. That even when we don’t see the why we can praise Him for the reason. Even when we don’t know we live out in trust. Trusting Him by praising Him for what He is doing that His ways are higher. Never would I have imagined myself starting a women’s ministry in college called LaceDevotion Ministries, where I now write daily devotions and encourage others to live with intention. Nor would I have seen myself as the president of a Christian collegiate organization before I graduated. Don’t place God’s plan for you in a box. More often than we realize this includes being somewhere we don’t understand.
May we declare this final verse over ourselves today:
“We are destroying speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God, and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ.” 2 Corinthians 10:5
Be honest and place every thought before Him. Let only those that can stand in His truth remain. Can we be honest? He will use you, you need only be willing.
