5 Things I Did That Transformed My Walk With God
After being a lifelong Christian I took a good look at my walk with God and realized that I had him on the back burner in my life. I never doubted he was there for me or his existence, but I had a hard time "hearing" him (or what I wanted to hear from him) and I was so consumed in anxiety, depression, and everyday worries. I realized that I needed to change my focus, and since then Life hasn't been the same.
Some things that I realized out of this was 1) I had been lost for a long time, 2) God was speaking to me, I just wasn't hearing, 3) Once I started listening I became set free.
Now let me share with you what exactly it was that I started doing, that helped me get past Lukewarm, and closer to God!
Stop Doubting
People are always talking about how they want to live a life in accordance to God's will, and that they have surrendered their life to Him, but what does that really mean?
Most people define faith as believing without seeing, and I grew up hearing that and I believed I had really strong faith. The problem with this mindset though is that I would pray to God and ask him for help, say amen, and then I would go crazy thinking about the situation I had prayed about, and was always wondering whether God was even doing anything rather than just leaving in God's hands.
Faith is believing God can, Believing that he is greater than our anxiety, fear, and worries. The Bible says how even the demons believed in God, but they didn't have faith in him or follow him, and that's all the difference, sometimes we go around thinking that if we pray about something that we have left it in God's hands, but Faith is praying about it, leaving it in his hands (trusting he will work it out), and then not allowing fear to consume us as we did before, or else we continue to doubt.
A good example of this is in Mark 9:16-27, it wasn't until the boy's father told Jesus to help him overcome his unbelief (aka doubt) that Jesus was able to help the boy.
Doubt is the greatest stumbling block, but once we get past that and rely on God and fix our eyes on Jesus Christ, only then can we be forever free of our chains holding us back!
Reading The Bible
Once I actually started reading and studying the Bible was when I finally started to know God. The Bible is inspired by God though the authorship of writers, or in short Its the literal word of God written down by many different men who were chosen by him, which is why its crucial as Christians that we actually connect with God and read his word on a regular basis and then from their its easier to let him work in your life!
I always start my Bible studies by asking God to speak to me through his word (the Bible) and to help me understand the message that he had for me, and then I would read and let him speak to me! I enjoy taking notes so that I can reflect on what I had learned, and on occasion I had asked someone close to me for clarification on certain topics or questions that I had and that was also a great help!
Prayed With Thanksgiving
In practically all of the books (letters) written by Paul in the New Testament start by him talking about Thanksgiving. Paul was never shy of praying to God with Thanksgiving, and I realized that most of the time I would pray to God when I was asking him for something, but after reading those letters, I realized I need to start thanking him more in prayer, and that has really helped reset my mindset on prayer!
Taking Every Thought Captive
Psalms 139 talks about how God knows us, our mind, our hearts, and with that our thoughts. We need to stray from offensive thoughts and make them right. It is amazing what happens when you replace your rude thoughts and speak life in the things you think and speak.
The things that we say and think are things that come from our hearts, so if we have junk coming out of our hearts, we need to take them captive and set them straight in Gods direction.
"Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting. Psalms 139:23-24
Abstinence
I find abstaining from things so that you can focus on God has really helped me at times. At some point when I started this new walk with God I had realized that I had been obsessively feeling the need to listen to one in order to do anything, and when I realized that, I started abstaining until I felt like I was in a better mindset and wasn't feeling dependent on them or constantly obsessing over them.
Sometimes we find ourselves idolizing things very quickly without thinking about it. When we pinpoint things we idolize and then abstain from it, it can refresh our minds and really help us to focus on the glory right in front of us. Things as simple as reading, TV, social media, food, likes, and many other things can quickly become the idols in our lives, but imagine if the one idol in your life was God, constantly thinking about him, being excited to read his word, sharing the gospel, and worshiping him. What would you or should you give up for God?
I hope that these tips helped you, and I pray that you continue on your walk with God!
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