Joyce Meyer - How Do I Let Go Of The Pain Of My Past? (08/18/2019)
This teaching focuses on the determination to enjoy life through our identity in Christ, not external circumstances. It emphasizes that new life in Christ makes us "new spiritual clay" for the Holy Spirit to work with, requiring our yielded obedience. A key insight is that Jesus’ once-for-all sacrifice means we can fully receive forgiveness and stop penalizing ourselves with guilt.
Ginger: You know, there is no doubt that our past shapes who we are. And we can get stuck there, reliving our pain over and over. Or we can make another choice. Let me introduce you to a sweet friend of mine from Paris. Listen to what Melina had to say about the most difficult time in her life. I love Melina's honesty and I think a lot of us can relate to feeling that way at one point or another in our life. But thank God, Melina's story does not end there. She asked the question that so many of us ask, "how do I let go of the pain of my past"? This is a great question for Joyce to tackle because she has certainly been there herself and she understands how difficult it can be. She also knows that you can let go and discover the life that Jesus wants you to have. Today, she answers that question. How do I let go of the pain of my past?
Determined to Enjoy Your Life in Christ
You know, you need to be determined that you're going to enjoy your life. I mean, really just dug in determined that you are going to enjoy your life. And let me tell you, enjoying your life is not about what you own. It is not about what you own. There are a lot of miserable rich people in the world. It's not about whether you're married or not. It's not about having perfect children or even having the perfect marriage. Enjoying your life is about knowing who you are in Christ. Because I'll tell you what, if you've got it right inside, then you can pretty much handle anything on the outside.
But if it's not right on the inside, you can't even handle little things that come against you on the outside. Everything is like the straw that broke the camel's back when you're all messed up inside. But God loves newness. We have an opportunity for a new beginning. I think when the Bible says, "if any man be in Christ, he's a new creature," I think that means that we become new spiritual Clay. You know, if somebody is bald, they don't grow new hair because they were born again. I mean, if somebody's 30 pounds overweight, they don't wake up skinny because they were born again. But we're made new inside. We have a brand new opportunity. And then if we let what's in us help us, it can help us with all those other outside things.
Faith Requires Action and Time
You know, the Bible says that all things are possible with God. What is impossible with man is possible with God. But I want you to listen to what I'm getting ready to say. It doesn't say that all things are positively going to happen with God. And I think sometimes we think because there's a promise in the Word that no matter what we do, we should just... "Well, I believe that. I should have that." Well, you know, true believing provokes obedience. And so when God says, "whosoever will" can have the promises, that all of these good things are for "whosoever will," it doesn't just mean whosoever has some kind of a mental ascent. "Well, yeah, I believe God wants me to have a good life, so therefore I should have a good life." No, it means I believe God wants me to have a good life, and He's going to show me how to get there. And I'm going to take steps of faith.
Now listen to me, and don't get discouraged when I say this. And it's going to take time. And it's probably going to take more time than I thought it was going to take. And it may be harder than I thought it would be. And it may cost me a few things in my life. But I am determined that I am going to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus died to take hold of me. And if He died for me to enjoy my life, then I am not going to go around with my head hanging down, being miserable all the time, because every little thing in my life is not exactly the way that I would like it to be. Amen.
We don't just float around on the glory clouds singing the hallelujah chorus because we're saved. I mean, we've got real lives with real hurt and real pain and real needs and some real ugly people sometimes that are not very pleasant to deal with. But Paul said, "I am determined to know Him and the power of His resurrection that lifts me out from among the dead, even while I'm still in this body." Now, Paul was talking about a resurrection power where you can have an absolutely, really enjoyable life, even though everything in your life maybe is not going exactly the way that you would like it to go.
Learning to Yield to the Holy Spirit
We have to learn how to work with the Holy Spirit. God's got a good plan for us. We have an opportunity for a new beginning. We become new spiritual Clay for the Holy Spirit to work with. But we must learn how to yield. That's a beautiful word. Yield. I'm really starting to like that word a lot. We have to learn how to yield. Instead of being resistant. We have to learn how to surrender. Instead of being stubborn. Come on. Romans 6:13 says this, and I love it. "Do not continue offering or yielding," there's our word again, "your bodily members and faculties to sin as instruments and tools of wickedness, but offer and yield yourselves to God as though you've been raised from the dead to perpetual life and your bodily members and faculties to God, presenting them as implements of righteousness."
Now, I love that. Do you know? How many of you know what it's like to be tempted to sin? Okay. So how many of you know what it's like to resist it? And then how many of you know what it's like to just, well, you just yield to it. Okay. Well, you know what? The same as we have been tempted to sin. Once you have a relationship with God, you are tempted to do right things. Sometimes I'm tempted to give something away and I fight it off. Well, honestly, I don't do that much anymore because I know better now. But I went through that for years and years and years. God would ask me to give something away. You know, you got three coats and somebody else is freezing. And you know, you know. Yeah, I read that scripture. "If you got two coats and somebody else has none, give them one." But God, I like both of those coats. And I wouldn't know... I don't know which one of those coats to give away. And besides that, that lazy person, they ought to work and get their own coat. And you know, so you're tempted to go and apologize to somebody because you know that you said things you shouldn't have said or did things you shouldn't have done. But instead of taking the temptation to do the right thing... So just as we were tempted to wickedness, God now tempts us to righteousness. And we just need to learn to yield to the righteousness and resist the bad stuff.
The Complete Forgiveness of Christ
Hebrews chapter 10 verse 16 talks about the agreement that God has made with his people. And this is the agreement, the testament, the covenant that I will set up and conclude with them after those days, says the Lord. "I will imprint my laws upon their heart and I will inscribe them upon their minds and on their inmost thoughts and understanding." He then goes on to say, "and their sins and their lawbreakings, I will remember no more. I will remember no more." Now watch this. This is, I think what I'm going to share in the next few minutes is important. "Now where there is absolute remission, forgiveness and cancellation of the penalty of these sins and lawbreakings, there is no longer any offering made to atone for sin."
So now here's what we need to get out of this and be able to apply it to our practical life. Now, when Jesus paid the price for our sins, it was such a precious and a complete gift that there's never any more offering that needs to be made for sin. We don't have to... So let me just give you some examples. Like, when I do something wrong, and I ask God to forgive me, and I receive that forgiveness, then I don't need to feel guilty. And that's the hardest thing for us to get through our heads. Because we think we should at least beat on ourselves for a few days and think how wretched we are. I mean, it's really challenging to just receive God's forgiveness and then just go on. But Jesus said, I mean, the Bible says there's no longer any penalty that you can pay.
And here's what I've learned. I learned this from my life, and maybe some of you will resonate with this. I think that when we have not done things right in the past, or maybe... Maybe you did some really terrible things in your past. You know, maybe you've had some really terrible things done to you in your past. But there's no... You no longer, if you've received Christ, you no longer have to be penalized for that or try to keep paying for that. And what I did for a lot of years was, even though I believed in the forgiveness of God, I just felt bad about myself all the time. I took my sack of guilt everywhere that I went. And I say this, and it sounds funny, but it's true. I didn't feel right if I didn't feel wrong. I mean, I got so accustomed to feeling wrong and to feeling guilty about something, that when I really started understanding that I didn't have to pay for my mistakes, it just felt wrong. It's like, it's wrong to just feel this good. And then it took me a while to really get it, that it was okay.
God Uses What the World Throws Away
Nothing that God gives us to do is insignificant. Did you hear me? The devil always wants to make us feel little. Little. When David's brothers came to him, when he went out to the battlefield and they didn't really want him there, because they knew he had been anointed to be king and they were jealous of that. They said, "well, with whom have you left those few sheep?" They wanted to belittle him. They wanted to make him feel little. And, you know, we don't have time to go to all these places, but in 1 Corinthians 1, it says that God purposely chooses... No, we are going to go there.
"For simply consider your own call, brethren. Not many of you were considered to be wise according to human estimates and standards. Not many of you were influential and powerful. Not many of you were of high and noble birth. No, for God selected, deliberately chose, what in the world is foolish to put the wise to shame, and what the world calls weak to put the strong to shame. And God also selected, deliberately chose, what in the world is low-born and insignificant and branded and treated with contempt, even the things that are nothing, that he might depose and bring to nothing the things that are, so that no mortal man should have pretense for glorying in the presence of God."
God uses what the world would throw away as trash. Did you hear me? Don't ever belittle yourself. Even if other people do it, don't you buy into it and agree with them. You say, "no, I am a child of God. I am forgiven. I am a new creature, and I don't care what I've done in the past. I have got a good future in front of me, and I am not going to miss it." You know, I say this all the time. Please get this. I had a lousy start in life. I mean, a really sad, painful beginning, but I'm having a good finish. Amen. And that same thing is available to everyone. Not a positive, but a possibility. If you'll learn the Word of God and let the Holy Spirit guide your life.
True Conversion Means Surrender and Change
You know, we've been trying to convey to people when we do give people an opportunity to receive Christ in our meetings. And a while back I said, you know, I'm just concerned that a lot of people think they just can kind of get Jesus and tack Him onto their messes and He's going to fix them all up and they can just go on and live however they want to live. Because we see too much of that. And let me tell you, when you're truly born again, there should be a change. And I mean a pretty radical change. I don't mean perfection, but there should be a change. And we should be changing all the time and growing and becoming more Christ-like.
And I think sometimes the thing that we miss is that yes, you can receive Christ. That's all you need to have your sins forgiven, believe that Jesus died for your sins. But in order to have the life He wants you to live, you need to be willing to yield and surrender to Him. You need to be willing to also give Him the keys to your life. I don't care how smart you think you are. You are not smart enough to run your own life. And I just think maybe I should just address our television viewers for just a minute. Maybe we got some real smart people out there. Maybe some professors or maybe you got a string of degrees behind your name a mile long and you might be thinking, "lady, who do you think you are to try to tell me anything?" Well, my life's working. How's yours? I'm pretty happy. Woo-hoo!
Your History is Not Your Destiny
Mary was at the foot of the cross. The disciples were all hiding. She was there. Mary was at the empty tomb. The boys were still in bed. Mary was there bright and early. Women got the first opportunity to preach the first gospel message. You say, "well, where's that in my Bible, sister?" Well, what do you think was happening when the angel that was inside the empty tomb said to the two Marys, "go and tell my disciples he is risen." Mary didn't give up when the going got rough. She got up early and went to find her savior. She was on the travel team.
I'll tell you what. It didn't matter what she had been. And it doesn't matter what you have been. And it doesn't matter what I have been. And it doesn't matter what those of you watching by TV have been. Your history is not your destiny. God has got a destiny for you. And all you have to do is get unstuck. Tonight, you need to say, "I am getting unstuck. I am coming out of that dead place. And I'm going to live a resurrection life with Jesus Christ." Come on, give God a big praise.