If the counseling we're receiving,
pro or amateur -- through books, seminars, personal sessions, is not giving us the emotional health we're wanting, I suggest we might want to change strategies. An alternative strategy, is to stop trying to fix ourselves, or trying to find someone to fix us. To try and fix ourselves is to try and fix our human-wisdom, which sadly, controls our emotions. Human-wisdom is lord, not Jesus. Trying to fix our human-wisdom seems like a fool's errand.
SovereignShepherdJesus has created us, just as we are, not just from birth, but through all the experiences SINCE birth, up until today. The motivation to change who we are, requires human-wisdom, and is rooted in pride, not humility. Humble Christians are content -- accept themselves just as they are, and look to Jesus to make any changes going forward, rather than taking matters into their own hands -- human-wisdom-dependency. We human-wisdom-dependents are confident we know what's BEST. Jesus-dependents haven't a clue what's best, and trust that their Savior DOES, that He HAS delivered and WILL deliver, the best.
The biggest idol of everyone I know with mental illness, is normalcy -- having normal emotional health. Every idol is rooted in human-wisdom, which is the cause of all unhappiness, as far as I can tell. And a lack of self-awareness keeps us from even recognizing the problem.
How does a self-deceived human-wisdom-dependent become a more-self-aware Jesus-dependent? What's helped ME, is paying attention to my thoughts, feelings, reactions when I'm alone and undistracted, hoping the Spirit will EXPOSE to me, the sin/idolatry to which I've been blind, so I can CONFESS. Ahhh. Fresh sanity. And when confession does NOT lead to fresh sanity? I find there is more unrecognized-and-therefore-unconfessed sin/idolatry caused by my human-wisdom-dependency. I can ASK for the Spirit, claiming the promise of Luke 11, that if we ask for the Spirit, He'll give us the Spirit -- fresh conviction of sin that produces fresh faith. Ahhh.
-- Dave McCarty, GospelFriendships, who gets zero credit for the way Jesus has been dragging him along unwillingly in the sanctification process, growing him at times, in self-awareness and self-acceptance
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