Moving From Pain To Blessing: Three Keys

We all experience pain, so how do we move from pain to blessing?

To answer that question, let me ask you one: How do you perceive the character and nature of God, and do you allow Him to protect and heal your heart? You may say you trust Him, yet you may spend a huge amount of time self-protecting and taking things into your own hands. You try to protect yourselves from people who may reject, betray, or invalidate you. You try to navigate, and fix people and situations to protect yourself. If you look at what you are thinking and choosing to do in varying situations, you will realize how much of your time is spent in self-protecting.

So how do you really see God? These are just several examples of scriptures that we often don’t really believe about His character and intentions towards us:

 ^“Then Peter opened his mouth and said: “In truth I perceive that God shows no partiality.” (Acts 10:34)

“ For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.” (John 3:16-17)

“ For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.” (Jeremiah 29:11)

Many times we really don’t believe the scriptures when it says that He is no respecter of persons, that He loves everyone, and does not condemn us, and that He has plans to prosper us and not to harm us. Many of us believe this for others, but we really don’t believe it for ourselves. If we examine our true beliefs, they will emerge glaringly clear and visible in our knee jerk reactions. If we are honest we will admit we see God as fickle. “Maybe he will help us?” “Perhaps He has doesn’t good intentions through all of our situations?” “He may or may not show up in this situation.” If our expectations and understanding of God in the situation is eroded, we add another brick to the faulty core belief that God cannot be trusted and we continue to distort His true character.

More often than not, we operate in thinking patterns of anxiety, fear, and depression. These are all indicators that we are not trusting in the biblical perspective of the character and nature of God. When you have a foundation of strong belief in God’s true nature and His good intentions toward you and your world blows up, you will hold on to Him as an anchor knowing that He will get you through the storm unscathed. Is this how you perceive your challenges, or do you become negative, cynical and develop expectations that you will eventually be a victim again?

We make choices based on thinking distortions and it manifests in our relationship and life skills producing sabotaging patterns of destruction. So what is the solution to this cycle? Here are three keys to remember:

1.  Know God’s true character and nature with all of His qualities, and do not allow your negative experiences to define Him.
2. Know your identity the way God view you which is as a valuable person right where you are in all of your strengths and weakness. See yourself as unlimited in your potential. 
3. Allow these understandings to transform your core beliefs and remove the distortions that hinder, bring pain, poor choices, and destruction into your path.

By changing your thinking, your life will be transformed and you will begin to live in the abundance that God truly desires for you. Take the time today to stop and journal how you truly view God and yourself, and then take the steps required to tear down the faulty core beliefs. It will heal your pain and move you towards receiving God’s blessings in your heart.

Dr. Michele         

Copyright @ 2013 by Michele Fleming Ph.D.