Intentionality - the tool God uses to H E A L.
Lately ... I’ve felt so lost. Between a lay off & trying to figure my next steps in my
Life, the world upside down due to covid, transitioning from familiar places suddenly with no space to feel the affect, seeing sides of our country I had hoped had healed become resurrected by the hatred that had been there all along. Mentally and emotionally exhausted between partaking activism, spiritual war fare, and mental overload from information.
How do I clear my mind?
How do I purge my soul?
How do I rehabilitate my heart?
Where do I even begin?
I know JESUS... but what does that look like?
Do you get what I mean?
I thought maybe “in time”... I’ll be ok. And then I realized - TIME doesn’t provide healing. Time is only something that is just a given factor that must be taken to account.
But the cost of healing - is INTENTIONALITY.
The root of healing - is FORGIVENESS.
The fruit of healing - is LOVE.
As I began to choose to look myself in the mirror several times over the last few weeks... I had realized.. I hadn’t been intentional. I was allowing time to pass, just relying on my ever changing highs & lows of my emotions due to trauma - sustain my sanity.
Needless to say, I was capable but I wasn’t CONQUERING anything. I was determined but distracted. I “stable” but slipping. As I went on a “seek & ask” journey to elders & those I trusted as wise counsel, on HOW do you DEAL? I notice a reoccurring theme - they were intentional.
Intentional with what they were feeding their souls, intentional in seeking their own personal on going counseling, intentional in digesting they word of God... they were even intentional in dare I say the art of “letting go”. The art of forgiveness, the motion of love. The woke up every day ... and STILL chose to be intentional. Regardless of their emotion. Now when I say regardless, that doesn’t mean they ignored their emotion, but instead embraced it, exposed it to God outwardly, but once they let it echo, and they echo faded... they let it go.
What does intentionality look like for me?...
A lot of releasing. A lot of forgiving. A lot of worship. A lot of reading. A lot of counseling. A lot of laughing. A lot of choosing to believe and see the GOOD, even when I’m scared. A lot of walks in nature. A lot of raw dialogue with God, even if it means I admit something about myself He already knows but I’m scared to say.
When I do these things.. I’ve noticed a few things come after:
Correction - an open space for God to come in and let me know what I need to do to change.
Invitation - once I accept the correction, my heart is soft & moldable. See God resist the proud but He gives grace to the humble - James 4:6. There’s an invitation for me to come closer when I’m humble, bc there is no resistance in me - there is no resistance from Him. And then comes #3.
Instruction - An act that can only be given to a humble & contrite heart. Why? Bc when you’re humble, repentive, non resistant - you’re able to HEAR wisdom & actually obey it. God can now trust you with the NEXT. And then the fourth is the normally one of the top things we hope to always have as “young people”....
Direction. This is just the fruit from everything above. You can’t get it without all the pieces before it. ❤️
And ALL of these things - require INTENTIONALITY.
What does intentionality look like to you?
It may be one thing, it may be few things, it may be many things... but whatever those things are, you’re responsible to pursue them.
Freedom lies on the other side of your intentionality. Healing lies on the other side of your intentionality.