It's Our Choice!

[Dr. Dorothy E. Hooks, PsyD]

Let’s STOP using God and others as scapegoats - STOP blaming God and others for what’s going on in our lives!! Let’s STOP playing the blame game that Adam and Eve played, after THEY CHOSE to disobey God, and listen to the serpent (Genesis 3:11-13 NLT)!! NOBOBY CAN MAKE US DO ANYTHING WE REALLY DON’T WANT TO DO – ESPECIALLY THE enemy – WE HAVE AUTHORITY OVER him!! WE are responsible for our OWN lives, NOT GOD!! God IS NOT IN CONTROL OF OUR LIVES OR THIS FALLEN WORLD – GOD DOES NOT USE US LIKE A PUPPET – PULLING OUR STRINGS TO MAKE US OBEY HIM!! God HAS done His part, when He sent Jesus to redeem us, and NOW, WE must accept what Jesus HAS done, to be able to walk in the ABUNDANT LIFE Jesus HAS given us – God is not going to force us to accept Jesus or love Him!! God WILL NOT violate our free will, by making us do anything!! The CHOICE is ours!!

 

What’s going on in our lives, is no one’s fault but our own – if we disobeyed God – hear me by the Spirit!! I KNOW that God, being the GOOD GOD that He is, has warned us about different situations, just as He did Adam, but we too made a CHOICE to disobey Him, and go our own way, and when the consequences came, we blamed God for letting it happen, we blamed the devil for putting the thought in our heads, or blamed others by saying, “IF he or she would not have done this or that, I would not have done such, and such!!” But we don’t blame ourselves; we don’t say, “God told me (I had a “gut feeling” it was wrong – which was Holy Spirit giving us a warning) I should not do that, I should have listened!” And then go to Father, and thank Him for forgiving us, since Jesus HAS ALREADY dealt with our sins, past, present, and future, God has ALREADY forgiven us!!

 

PAUSE: I want to pause a minute and tell you all about a time when I had “a gut feeling,” and other people also told me not to do what I was about to do. Before I married the last abusive husband I had, those things I just mentioned happened to me. I KNEW I was NOT supposed to marry that guy, but I disobeyed God and married him anyway which cause me to go through over 3 ½ years of what I perceived to be hell on earth – it was HORRIBLE. And if God would not have protected me, I would be dead today!! That guy was the worst husband, out of all the other ones I had, and God let me knew, after He brought me out, that the devil sent that guy into my life to destroy me!! And NOBODY BUT GOD KEPT THAT FROM HAPPENING!! Even during the abuse, God kept trying to reach me, speaking to me directly and through others but I still would not listen!! God DID NOT leave me – He was RIGHT there with me!! I KNOW God will keep His promises, He made to us - no matter how long it takes; His Word does NOT go out void!!! God gave me a promise on June 28, 2006, and He did as He promised; this is what He told me He would do: He would strengthen me and settle me; trust in Him, He was going to bring me through this (the abuse)! And God did just that!! About four months after God gave me that promise, He told me, “ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!!” Then GOD HIMSELF took that guy COMPLETELY out of my life in 2006!!

Even though I disobeyed God, He STILL loved me and helped me!! That’s the kind of loving Father we have – He loves us in spite of our shortcomings – God DOES NOT look at our shortcomings, but He sees Jesus when He looks at us!! Jesus HAS paid the price for our redemption from sin, sickness, disease, infirmities, pain, shame, guilt, sorrow, and EVERYTHING else that would come to steal, kill, and destroy from us, and gave us HIS ABUNDANT LIFE – ALL WE HAVE TO DO IS ACCEPT AND EMBRACE WHAT JESUS HAS DO!! But we cannot do either if we don’t KNOW God, Jesus, Holy Spirit!! That’s where studying the Bible comes in so our minds can be no longer conformed to this world but be RENEW with the Word of God (Romans 12:1-2 NLT)!! Let’s continue!

 

Let’s just STOP with the blaming!! As long as we play these blame games, we will NEVER become who God called us to be – we will continue to go around and around in the wilderness, like the children of Israel, and miss out on God’s promise land for us here!! God has given us EVERYTHING we need to live here on this earth, pertaining to life and godliness (2 Peter 1:3-4 NLT)!! Because of Jesus, we have been given VICTORY OVER EVERYTHING we will EVER face while we are on this earth!! And we cannot know God’s promises for us, unless we CHOOSE to OBEY the Word by studying it and ALLOW the Word to renew our minds!! God’s promises for us are “YES” and “AMEN!” (2 Corinthians 1:20-22 NLT)

It’s up to US, it’s OUR responsibility, to get into the Word for ourselves, and ALLOW the Word of God to TRANSFORM our minds, CHANGE the way WE think, to pray for wisdom, knowledge, and understanding from Holy Spirit as we read, and to have an intimate relationship with God, so we can learn how to be REAL disciples of Jesus and live the ABUNDANT LIFE, Jesus died for us to have!! Otherwise, when life happens (and it will, Jesus told us in this world, we WILL have tribulations BUT to take heart, because HE has overcome the world - John 16:33 NLT), we won’t know how to trust God by standing on His Word. If we don’t do our part, and partner with God, by CHOOSING to study the Scriptures, we can’t blame the Pastor, or anyone else, that those things are happening or that we don’t know what to do - we can’t say, “They didn’t teach me anything” or say, “If he/she would have told me that…!!” What we can say is, “It’s my responsibility to allow the Word of God to change my way of thinking, to transform my mind, not anyone else’s. And I am going to do better, beginning right now!! I am going to dive deep into the Word and find Scriptures to help me with the current situation. Asking Holy Spirit to help me; lead me to the right Scriptures and teach me what each Scripture is saying to ME!! And I am going to make a plan, for my daily quiet time with Father, and begin reading the Scriptures, listening for Father to talk with me, asking Holy Spirit to direct me where I need to start reading in the Bible.”

 

It’s time WE take action to do what God called us to do!! Because we can’t obey God when we don’t know Him, and if we don’t know Him, we can’t trust Him!! And we MUST trust God to have faith in Him; have faith in His Word, and in what Jesus has done for us!!

 

It’s our choice whether we are going to take action to become responsible for our lives or keep playing the blame game. It’s time we got real with ourselves, and God - God already knows our hearts, He wants us to come BOLDLY before His Throne of Grace and ask Him for help (Hebrew 4:16 TPT)!!

 

I don’t know about you, but I am not going to wait to make the decision, to study God’s Word, and ALLOW the Word to transform my mind, so I can become a REAL disciple of Jesus! I am asking God to help me now; help me be more consistent in studying His Word!! Are you going to wait, or join me? Let’s go to God NOW, and ask Him to help us, become a REAL disciple of Jesus!!

 

I pray you all had a BLESSED Christmas! Happy New Year to you all and your families! May God BLESS and keep you all, and your families!!

 

Rev. Dr. Dorothy E. Hooks

[Jane M Pope]

Thank you for those words.  It is so easy for me to try to blame everybody else for what I do or do not do at times. Most of the time I do know better but go ahead and do it anyway.  I  know I am still loved but I feel as though I am disappointing God.  Pray for me that I would fight harder for what I know I should not be doing (saying).