The 90 day commitment for sobriety from all sinful acts of sexual integrity is amazing. I have been laser focused on my need to keep my thoughts disciplined. Discipline is a strength of mine in my flesh, but it has never been a strength which it comes to the addiction of porn. My only successful discipline has been to stay with the struggle and keep it at bay and commit to never hiding it. So, keeping that in mind, as I read today’s devotional in the 90-day book, its entire focus was praising God.

I know a good deal about the need to praise God, but as I was journaling I was reminded to “praise God in the storms of life”. II Corinthians 12:9-10 says: “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, I am strong.”

When I first read about praising God I thought, “Yes, of course, I will praise Him but I won’t lose sight of the discipline I need to keep in place. But, that wasn’t the message. The message was only to praise God. The more I thought about it, the more God was revealing to me that His Strength is provided when I praise Him, not when I discipline myself. So, letting go of what I thought was the right thing to do was my assignment for today. Do only what God commands–PRAISE HIM!

God has been very clear this morning with His message for the day. Today is to be a day for soul cleansing. As I was in counsel yesterday with a client, we were tackling a time in her life many years ago which left deep rooted scars never acknowledged at the time. She is now a widow and needs to uproot the damage. The work God did for me through my own counseling has been very helpful in assisting His work with this lady.

Yesterday afternoon I found myself being tempted to step into the sin of viewing porn. I’ve hated this addictive desire but roots seem to still be there. As I was journaling earlier I asked God to go deeply into my soul and address once and for all the roots of seed planted from the sin acts done to me so long ago for (even though it seems sick to write this) this is what the temptation was about. My devotional addressed the topic of soul cleansing and then in my bible reading I read in Psalms 35:1-5: Plead my cause, O Lord, with those who strive with me; Fight against those who fight against me. Take hold of shield and buckler, and stand up for my help. also draw out the spear, and stop those who pursue me. Say to my soul, “I am your salvation.”

In the 90 day book I’m doing presently, the topic today was performing the surgery God waits to do for soul cleansing. I am so humbled and now ready to trust God for this. I can’t begin to put into words all that this means to me. But, what I feared for most of my life, God does for His Glory and never for my shame. How merciful and loving our Father God is!

My bible reading has me reading the Psalms at the present time. I know I’ve written in times past about my attitude towards the Psalms in my past. I use to think they were a series of complaints with some niceties now and then. However, the more I awaken to the fullness of God living in me the more I enjoy and deeply appreciate all that they are saying. Trusting and Believing God to be the answer to all of life’s woes has become something I have learned to know is true for all of us–including me.

I have a good friend who is out-of-state presently with his wife. They have each lost a sibling recently and are having to close out estates and clean out each one’s homes. It is a miserable time for them for the siblings weren’t living for Jesus and the homes are a mess. They keep finding more and more stumbling blocks including the texts I’ve already received this morning. When I reminded my friend that he is not there alone, God is bigger than all of this and has answers which haven’t been seen as of yet, he responded with a big thanks. We are a team player when we reach out to God and other trustworthy friends.

I lived so long in isolation believing the lies of the deceiver. Helping others see and trust God’s Light is a privilege and humble honor as each day comes. Just as David was reaching out in many of his Psalms, God is wanting us to do exactly the same today.

There is nothing like the beauty and silence of the early mornings and experiencing them with their CREATOR. Today is one of those days where I just want to take a moment longer to stay in this beauty. Don’t interrupt it and don’t move for one might disturb the silence and sensing the Strength of God Almighty in it.

I will be spending a good portion of today in my garden and yard. This brings joy to my heart. Planting so much of the garden now that the fear of frost is almost past, brings about a satisfaction that I get to experience each and every year. I know that most people just shake their heads at this deep passion of mine to get my hands into dirt and watch God’s magic come to life as seeds turn into everything the earth produces. I just have to tell them that they have no idea what they are missing! The JOY of life isn’t just the life of flesh, it also includes the life of a garden!

There are some points about living life for Christ that should be “no brainers”, but I keep finding new tidbits that I awaken to which surprise me that I didn’t already live knowing them. I am talking about the selfishness of sin.

I mentioned a few weeks ago about a 90 day commitment I’ve challenged some men to do about addressing their addiction/s. I have been taking myself through this book/devotional also having started it a couple of weeks ahead of them so I could be sure I’m recommending a sound piece of work. There is no question in my mind regarding the book’s soundness. It is one I’d recommend to anyone. Each day one commits to sobriety for 24 hours and prays to God for His Holy Spirit’s strength and then connects to his accountability person giving him the same commitment one gave to God. He then initials the commitment and dates it.

Yesterday afternoon was a time of struggle/battle for me. As I was journaling about it this morning God showed me what I started to write about: the selfishness of sin. The battle of porn I’ve always connected to my brother’s sexual use of me for so many years. However, this morning as I was journaling God pointed out that yesterday’s struggle was my own. It may have begun from sexual use in my childhood years, but the current struggle is my choice. My eyes had turned from Him to the potential lust of sin. It was there I needed to make a decision–my choice. Of course I’ve known this for MANY years, but the reality of it this morning sunk in as my struggle within the 24 hours. I decided whether I would step in or turn away and put my eyes on God surrendering the struggle to the Holy Spirit within me. Seeing this selfishness within me (that is part of my flesh) was powerfully effective. The last thing in the world I want to look like is selfish. Boy, do I love this God we get to serve! He truly is THE TEACHER!

Today my younger brother and I are the same age until my birthday July 1. We get to be twins for almost two months! That’s always been a family joke.

I’ve had 4 new people start counseling this week. Each one has had a very unique story filled with a great deal of consternation and strife. In each case they are close to their “wits end”. This morning I was reflecting on these with God when He instantly reminded me of the line Celebrate Recovery uses--“God takes our mess and turns it into His message.” I needed to hear this from Him. It makes Faith, Trust and Hope come to life when I remember this truth.

The amazing thing about what God does with our mess when we allow Him into it is He begins to remove the torment. God takes what has been tormenting us and turns it into relief as we release our hold on it and give the hold to Him. Learning how to shift my own past from my expectations to God’s expectations has been nothing but humbling and amazing. It is such a delight to watch God now do this for others!

My devotional today told a story that truly resembles living life each day as a believer in Jesus Christ. He told of swimming in an area of the Mediterranean Sea where riptides were prevalent. He was a youth and strong swimmer so he wasn’t concerned. When he noticed he had been caught in a riptide he simply began to swim against it only to be towed further into the sea. It was then he remembered to swim parallel to the pull until the pull dissipated. That was when he could swim back to shore. In telling this story he compared the riptide to our flesh which pulls us daily into desires of the flesh unless we know not to fight the pull “of our own flesh”. We always lose and get pulled further into the sinfulness of our flesh when we fight of our own strength. We have to use our spiritual wisdom and choose to not fight it but use the wisdom God provides in His Word for fighting temptations which lead to sin.

I have fought my own sinfulness on my own for such a long time that I had thought Paul’s message to us in Romans that “we do what we don’t want to do….” Romans 7:15, was a curse that could never be broken until death. However, putting into place the wisdom God provides us about seeking Him, surrendering ourselves and telling someone we trust will allow us to do the swimming parallel until we are out of the riptide’s pull. Then, we are free to swim to shore. Amazing wisdom!

Yesterday had some challenging moments in it which not so long ago would have led to intense temptations to “give comfort”. I’ve lived for years with Satan’s lies coming at me telling me that comfort is just a tap of my phone away. Of course if I followed his temptation I would then find myself steeped in the guilt and shame that followed. This was not the case yesterday. The challenging moments were followed with surrender and processing with God.

In years past I wouldn’t allow my emotions to be felt so I’d stuff them. Emotions were something that caused my dad to explode with abusive actions and words. I would never allow myself to do that so I couldn’t feel or else I might be “like dad”. God has certainly brought me to a different place today. He wants me to feel emotion and to acknowledge that they are real and have purpose. Yesterday’s emotions were first felt. As I processed them with God He gave me words to express them. He even gave me words to understand the purpose of them.

It seems odd now to look at the day yesterday and find that living in the flesh, as we all do, coupled with God’s Spirit allows us to not let the flesh own us. The flesh we have was never created to be sinful, and we don’t have to choose sin today no matter what the circumstances. Wow, God is AMAZING!

Have you ever noticed how faith, trust, hope and words of this nature grow in importance and understanding as we continue in our walk with God? My devotional today brought this out with great clarity. When I compared what these looked like to me when I was in my young years, they were words that I used to get through my childhood. When I left home for college and then started my life of “independence”, I found I needed to continue to use them. When I was in my childhood I thought getting through it would give me freedom. However, when I got to college I found I had the bondage of my childhood so I shifted my faith, trust and hope to the “freedom of living” with no one knowing. As life went on I found that this way of living had its own punishment. It turned into nightly nightmares and withdrawing from social gatherings and more.

Freedom comes from sharing and learning how as James 5:16 tells us. The sharing needs to be with someone you trust because that is when we begin to truly heal for the prayers of who we tell are “powerful and effective” as this verse tells us. So, how does simply telling one’s story give freedom? Well, it starts with faith, trust and hope in what God’s Word tells us and He then performs His miracles of healing. We can never know this if we don’t take the first step and then the next, and then the next….

God is Amazingly Wonderful when we start this journey of obedience to His Word.

Well, the pots are done and their beauty has only begun. I will enjoy watching the young plants as they grow into their fullness and provide the beauty intended. Somehow I think there is a metaphor in this. God plants His Holy Spirit within us as we accept His Son Jesus into our lives to be our Savior and Lord. However, if we do not water and nurture this new life it will stay dormant until we do.

Knowing the truth of God’s promises is the start of a glorious relationship with Him. Believing these truths for oneself is the next great step. Disciplining oneself to build the relationship with God through worship, reading His Word and prayer are the nutrients of this growth. At some point in time the discipline one needed to use to start the relationship turns into a desire/a passion that never feels like a discipline at all. The outcome??? JOY–sheer JOY!