Who is in control? You or God...

My sister Crista gave an amazing and moving message last Wednesday during our breakout midweek session.  There were so many concepts and practicals to take away from the night, but I will try to pinpoint the ones that I felt spoke to me the most.

First of all, we all need to recognize what it means to truly be self controlled.  If we have asked Jesus to be the Lord of our lives, then 2 Timothy 1:7 tells us that we possess the spirit of self control.  It is so amazing to think that God has given us the means (his Word) to learn self control.  Being in control means that we are effective and productive.  Titus 2:11-12 tells us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions.  We have to deny ourselves, just as Jesus did, if we expect to ever display the level of self control that God has made possible in us.

I have always thought of myself as being very self controlled, and I never would have considered myself to not be self controlled until I heard Crista lay it all out for me.  The good thing is this: I can get things under control with hard work and dedication.  Sounds simple, right?  Like one of those cheesy weight loss programs you see on the infomercials at 2:00 a.m. when you should be in bed (if you were more self controlled).

Two things that Crista focused on were being self controlled enough to stop our negative thinking and to stop our worry.  While worry is my BIG weakness, I really love some of Crista's analogies on negative thinking and so I'm going to start there.

When you think about a person/place/event/situation/memory, do you fixate on the good and growth, or the bad and failures?  Do you look at the glass half full or half empty?  Being realistic isn't bad, but it isn't always good either.  God calls us to see the good in others, in situations, in life.  Philippians 4:8 tells us to think of whatever is true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent and praiseworthy.  If we are regularly fixating on negative thoughts, regrets from our past, or taking for granted everything that God has given us, we are not thinking the way that God tells us to in Philippians.  

Crista had a great little diagram that showed us how our thoughts turn into our actions.  It went a little like this:  negative thoughts turn into negative beliefs, which turn into negative feelings, and thus into negative actions.  Let's take a look at how God's thoughts compare to Satan's:

God

• True
• Noble
• Right
• Pure
• Lovely
• Admirable
• Excellent
• Praiseworthy

Satan

• False
• Dishonorable
• Wrong
• Impure
• Ugly
• Worthless
• Unsatisfactory
• Worthy of curses

I would much rather have Godly thoughts!

Now how about those worrisome thoughts?  They get me every time!  I especially hate the "What if...?" ones.  I used to regularly worry that our house would burn to the ground while I was at work.  Did I leave the flat iron on?  Or maybe the stove (even though I hadn't used it)?  Or somehow an electrical outlet would spontaneously combust.  Yup.  That was definitely going to happen.  Now that I am a Momma, my worrisome thoughts have morphed into ridiculous and terrible thoughts that no parent should have... but I'm sure we've all been there once or twice.

2 Corinthians 10:3-5 gives us a simple way out from under the burden of our crazy worry.  We need to take control and make our thoughts obedient to God.  Trust in God.  Trust in God's plan.  But how do we do that?  Crista's practicals are so simple, but we really have to make these a part of our everyday life in order to show obedience to God.

1.  Confess

• Is sin getting in the way of your negative thoughts or worry?  Confess to a sister.  Confess to God.  And obviously... stop sinning!
• Get real about your negativity.
• Get your friends involved.  Have them hold you accountable with your thoughts.

2.  Pray

• What better way to overcome negative thoughts or worry than to pray.
• Ask others to pray for you.  That's what we are here for!

3.  Read

• Read about self control in the Word.
• Research disciples who exhibited self control (Abigail, Ruth, Paul, etc.)
• Personally, I loved reading about Hannah in 1 Samuel.  Since I'm currently struggling with the length of time it's taking us to get pregnant, Crista actually suggested that I read about Hannah and her patience and trust in God.  I love her self control!
• Memorize scripture.

Good luck and much love!