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"I have since found that our loving God simply won’t allow us to remain in a place where we are able to get that fulfillment anywhere outside of our total reliance on Him. . He simply can’t stand to see us suffer the effects of grasping for counterfeit ways of finding fulfillment outside of His provision."
As quoted from the book "Victor - Breaking Free From a Victim-Based Society" by John H. Hovis Page 123.
I have found it amazing how things that use to work for me when it comes to feeling good about myself simply stopped working in my life. It can be so frustrating when the systems, habits and formulas that I use to make it tolerable when troubling times hit no longer bring to my life the kinds of fixes that I so crave. This fact has put me in places where I have questioned God’s love for me. After all, if he really loves me, why would he take away those things that use to make me feel OK about myself?
I have since learned that there is nothing wrong with God’s love. It is my understanding of what love really means that needs constant adjustment. This world is such a terrible teacher when it comes to the lessons that we need to learn about love.
The loss of my coping mechanisms is actually a sign that God loves me. Why would a loving parent ever let his child rely on something false when it comes to anything as important is knowing who we are? It would be unloving of God to let us remain in the place that this world could ever give us the kinds of fulfillment that only He can provide. Then why does God let our coping mechanisms work for a while? I believe he does that out of love also. The Bible says this about the issue of how we cope with this world.
…but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. 1 Corinthians 13:10-12 (NIV)
You see, we are all children of God. Just like any child, we mature. We grow into something that is based on what we are now but is different. We never outgrow being God’s child, but our child like ways grow into ways that are more and more like our Father.
The coping mechanisms that use to work for us worked because God loved us so much he couldn’t stand to see us hurt by removing those mechanisms. Had he taken away those ways of coping in our youth we would have suffered unnecessarily. As we have matured, God knows that we can handle the truth better now than before. We don’t need those coping mechanisms like we use to. Sure we would like them to continue working, but God’s love for us is such that he knows it is time for more of the real thing. He is that real thing.
Finding fulfillment in what we do, in our family, even in our church service is a temporary fix to a problem that is more profound than can be fixed by worldly efforts. We need something more than a quick fix. Thank God he loves us so that he allows our quick fix ways to work for a season. It is when the season changes that it is time to be a part of that change. Rejoice that your coping mechanisms don’t work any more and know it is because God sees you as able to handle more of a real relationship with him now more than ever before.
It’s OK to mourn the loss of that coping mechanism. It has served you well in the past. As you go through the mourning process, know this, the best is yet to come. We will never be fully fulfilled by God until we pass from this life to the next but we can find a greater level of fulfillment in who he is in our lives as we grow in relationship with him. Know that He is there loving you through the process of growth we all are on as his children.
If you wake up today to find that that thing that you use to do to make you feel OK about yourself or about the situation you find yourself in doesn’t work like it use to hang on tight! Your first reaction might be panic, or fear, or anger or doubt. Those are real and valid feelings that need to be dealt with from the place of a victor, not laced with victim thinking fallacies. Hang on to the fact that you are the beloved child of God and let Him be how you cope with this world that tries so hard to get you to doubt the victor that He has made you to be.
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