This post has been brewing for some time. It has been swirling in my head over and over. I wondered whether to share it, or just to write it out and keep it to myself. But then the Casey Anthony travesty happened, and it put a face to exactly what I was thinking.
People need to stop using their past to justify their current behavior.
I have seen it in every corner of my own life, excuses for drinking, excuses fo drug use, excuses upon excuses upon excuses. It is ridiculous and angers me greatly.
God gives us circumstances. We are placed in a life with a plan and a purpose. Every single act commited upon us, done to us, has been written and known. Every wound has already been created, even before it is rendered unto our soul or body. Our life is chosen, our days known.
What is the unknown is how we are to respond to it. We have free will, after all. We can choose our own behavior. We can choose to make stepping stones from the things that weigh us down, or simply lie down and be crushed. We choose.
We choose how we treat the others in our life. We choose to kill them with words. We choose to raise them up with prayer and encouragement. We choose to gossip. We choose to physically harm. Despite what we have been shown, we can still choose how to live.
I am tired of the excuses. I am tired of the explanations for cruelty and for harm to others. I am weary of the lack of responsibility.
You have been hurt. Okay. You have been molested or sexually assaulted. Okay. You have been abused and abandoned. Allright. You have been left behind, pushed aside. Fine.
Me too.
RISE ABOVE IT.
Choose to be MORE than what you were shown. Choose to be better than what you have seen, and more than what you have been given. Choose to be above your circumstance. Choose it. Choose the life you want. Choose the person you are. And own it.
Stop blaming. Stop hurting in the name of the past. Stop pointing fingers at others for things YOU have done. STOP.
Lean into God and His promises. You weren't given a perfect family on earth? Then lean into the perfect Father in heaven. You were hurt by somebody? Then lean into the One who sees all and more remarkably, heals all.
Healing is possible. It is hard. It is grueling. But it is possible. And more than that, it is freeing.
You don't have to sit with the pain. You don't have to have the double hurt of using the past against those you love. You can give it up to One who shoulders it for us.
Let Him take it. The pain, the injury. Let Him take the reasons to inflict hurt on others. Give it over and let it go. And go out and CHOSE who you want to be.
And live it.
