I’ve recently been in a fog. I’ve never really had writer’s block, which is something pretty amazing after the past four years of writing here. I was contemplating not doing a post this week, I missed my early Patreon post schedule and was about ready to just take a week off. Then I realized that there was a mix of circumstance and spiritual attack. Last week I ended one of my favorite series I’ve written, all about having spiritual victory. It seems only fitting to then the next week fight some spiritual attack. This season in life has also been super busy, each day seems to be filled with projects, planning, and small moments of rest in the evenings. Spending time with Danielle and my family has really been the biggest driver keeping me from not getting lost. In this season of busyness, my quiet times are often rushed and not as filling as I usually have. In times like this, I feel inadequate. That I’m not doing enough or feeling like I’m not good enough. I can start to internalize this, and then everything that happens around me just hits again and again, with the whispers of “I’m not good enough,” plague me. I want to be open because I think often we have days like this. We feel like we are overlooked, that we aren’t living up to our potential, or because one bad day will cause us to fail. The truth is, we aren’t made to work enough to be used by God, we are simply people made new through the love of God.

This post is a bit different from the average Monday blogs, but I wanted to make sure I never stop writing. God has given me this passion, and I don’t want to let my fears get in the way of my potential. This is something I have been praying about over and over. We cannot let the fears of our circumstance blind us from the plan God has made in order to use our potential. 2 Corinthians 5:17 says, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, they are a new creation. The old has gone and the new has come.” No matter our past, the mistakes and heartache, God has made us new. You are made new by his love for you.

Connect with your creator.

I’ve been learning this over and over. Without my connection to my creator, I suffer. The daily troubles I face become unbearable and leave me with nothing but no-win scenarios. I struggle living out of the spirit and my anger creeps in. I wrote about this last week and got pretty vulnerable. Anger is not good for me, nor is it good for any of us. When we don’t live in the relationship that God wants from us, we begin to die. The hits hit harder. The pain gets stronger. The loss is larger. The fear is more real. We can try all we can to be in the battle, but we will not win. I talked about my current struggle in the search for what’s next in my life, it has grown bigger and bigger, but in the midst of this challenge I am choosing to connect with my creator. I was designed with purpose and I will not walk away from my calling, this passion in my heart to reach out and raise up the next generation to be the church. Not a church system, but the church as it was meant to be about, reaching the lost and raising leaders. I will choose to connect with my creator because he is the one who has made me new.

Be willing and open.

Following Christ is not easy. It’s probably harder. You have been called to something greater and there are forces trying to hold you back. From people saying you can’t make it, telling you that you don’t have what they are looking for, that your past makes it impossible for you to achieve your calling; these are lies. This is not what God says, God’s word tells us that by his blood we are made new. God qualifies the called. God says that you are enough. God has redeemed and restored your past. Anyone who tells you differently is probably God saying that this isn’t the door you should enter, because it would be foolish for you to be overlooked. We have to make a choice. We have to be willing and open to where God takes you, to be ready for the door that he calls you to enter, not the door you think will help you. Your plan, and my plan, without God leads only into more hurt and struggle. Be willing and open, because God has made you new and has a place for you.

In Jeremiah 2:13, it says, “My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water.” This is a warning for each of us. We cannot go through life without our savior and we cannot do life on our own. God wants to make you new, he wants you to be a cistern that holds much water. I find that this writers block is due to the hurt I’ve been feeling. The struggle that my soul has been going through. It feels as if I am clawing my way out of every situation after being put down for so long. That mindset has made me broken, struggle at the way I see myself and perceive my giftedness. My word for the year was “gifted,” because I wanted to have a reminder that God has made me for more than my circumstance. I am made new in Christ and I will not compromise to complacency. I will not let Satan in. I will not let my spirit become prideful and forget my past experiences. I will not let others tell me what I am because they did not form me before I was born. I am a child of God.

On my bathroom mirror I have this written on it, and I will have this be the last part of this post. It’s a reminder that I think each of us need every day: “I was made in the image of God, and because of that, I am beautiful and awesome. I am not my past, I am so worth loving not matter what has been done to me, and I am never alone.”

-Joshua Thomas