Joyce Meyer - How Thoughts, Words and Attitudes Affect Your Joy

TOPICS: Thoughts, Power of Words, Joy

Point number one, when I say enjoying everyday life, the emphasis is on every day. It's not payday, or vacations, or getting a new outfit, or going to a party. It's every day, ordinary, sometimes mundane Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, driving in traffic, doing the dishes, cutting the grass, the grass grows again, you cut it again. You do the dishes, you put them away, kids get them out, they get them dirty again. You do them again. You put them away. How many know what I'm talking about? So, how many of you just sometimes just get tired of doing it all, just doing it, doing it, doing it? Well, see, here's the thing, you're gonna have to do it anyway. So, what is the point?

Now, I'm just trying to be reasonable this morning because I believe that the Bible is actually really pretty reasonable. What's the point in dreading something and being miserable about something that you're going to do many of these things every single day of your life? You say, "Well, I can't help the way I feel". But you can help the way you think, you can help the way you talk, and you can help your attitude. And that's what we're gonna talk about today, how we think, how we talk, our attitude, what's going on inside of us. Here's a good example and I know people are applying this in their life already just from being here last night. But my administrative assistant, her and her husband mike travel with us when we go out and do our conferences, and she's been sitting under my teaching now for 35 years. And she has this mentality, "Whatever you say I'm gonna go do it".

Now boy, I wish everybody was like that. But she gets busy after every message she hears trying to apply it in her life. Don't be the kind of person that just goes and hears the word, and then goes home and does absolutely nothing with it. If you do that, then you wasted your time because it's not hearers that will have the good life that God wants them to have, it's the doers. If we hear and we don't do, then the Bible says we are deceiving ourselves through reasoning that's contrary to the truth. You would agree that what I'm saying is right, but if you don't go home and put it to practice in your life, then you really absolutely wasted your time being here, totally wasted your time being here.

Now, these are things that you do have to form a habit in but she said, "Okay, I thought this morning when I got up, okay, what don't I enjoy in the mornings"? And she thought, she said, "I don't enjoy putting my makeup on". You know, there's certain things that all of us just don't, I mean in the natural you just don't enjoy it. So she thought, "Okay, I'm gonna pay attention to the teaching last night, I'm gonna make this fun". And then she thought, "No, everything doesn't have to be fun. I need to learn how to enjoy everyday, ordinary things". So she just adjusted her attitude, "I'm not just gonna do this with a bad attitude, I'm gonna enjoy doing this". And that's really all you have to do is just carry your little attitude adjustor with you everywhere you go.

Come on, I'm good at adjusting attitudes and so if nothing else, just carry your little podcast around, hook that phone into your ears and just let me talk to you all day. You will have a better attitude, trust me. Man, I had such a bad attitude when God got a hold of me and it's so nice to be able to control my attitude and not let it control me. Your attitude is something that belongs to you and if you refuse to have a bad one, nobody can make you have a bad one.

One of the... I forget his name now but one of the men that spent a lot of years in the concentration camps that Hitler built, he said, "These prisons can take away everything from me except my attitude and I refuse to have a bad one". Isn't that powerful? Do you know that you can refuse to have a bad attitude and it will totally change your life? Now, something that I'm not real crazy about is waiting. I don't like that much. I'm a person of action and I would just love to have my day planned out and go from thing to thing to thing. I don't want to be late when I get someplace but I don't want to be early so that means I gotta have perfection which I don't get.

So, I've learned how to enjoy waiting. It's almost like a game that I play with the devil. "See, I'm gonna beat you. You are not gonna get me upset. I am gonna sit here and enjoy this, and I am gonna have a good attitude". So, we're learning how to enjoy ordinary, everyday life. What would happen if you could get through a whole month and not dread one thing that you do, not complain about one thing that you do, not have a bad thought, or a bad word, or a bad attitude about not one thing that you do? How much do you think it would improve your life? Well, it's up to you. "Well, I can't help what I think". Ah... Yes, you can.

Now, some of you maybe have never been taught that you can but that's why God has you here today. We think we can't help how we feel, and you know what? I can't always help how I feel but I don't have to act according to my feelings. That's the thing we have to learn. So, we have a freewill and I don't think we hear enough about this. I've kind of decided that we need to hear more about this in the church. God created us with freewill. We are not robots. He is not gonna just make us do everything that we ought to do. Even when we depend on God to help us, we still have a part. We still have a decision to make. "I set before you life and death, choose life that you and your descendants might live". Joshua said, "As for me... you do what you want to but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord".

So, you need to make an announcement to your feelings. "Feelings, you can feel however you want, but this is what I'm gonna do". Really? Really? How many of you agree we live way too much by how we feel? And, you know, your feelings are fickle. You'll get some when you don't want them and not have others when you would like to have 'em. You feel like signing up for a workday at the church and then when workday comes, you don't feel like getting up and going. So, feelings are not necessarily evil or good. I mean you can have good ones and you can have bad ones, but we can't let them boss us around and be our leader and our guide.

I mean there's a lot of days, I mean even when I'm out doing this if I went by my feelings, I'd just say, I ain't going. I got other people on the team that can preach. I'd just say, "Why don't you just you go, I'm not feeling good today". I don't do that. I show up every time. I show up every time. I'm on that television every day when you turn it on. Come on. You don't have to wonder if I'm gonna be there some days and not some days. And we all need to be the same way. So, today we're gonna talk about how your mind, and your mouth, and your attitude affects the enjoyment of your life. I'm here to tell you that you can ramp your joy up.

Now, the second thing I want us to get is that the only way we can really do that is if we learn to do everything that we do with and for God. We do everything that we do for the service of God. So, even like putting on your makeup, "God, I put this on so I can look better for you today". Everything I do, trust me, you are glad that I've got my makeup on today and you are glad that I combed my hair. You are really glad that I worked on this for a long time today because it wouldn't have been pretty if I wouldn't have. And I'm a personal, I personally feel, and you can think what you want to, I believe as Christians that everywhere that we go, we need to present ourselves in the best way possible because we belong to God. Amen? So, we can do everything that we do for and with God.

As I said last night, even cleaning your house, and cutting the grass, and washing your car, taking care of things like that, we do all that in the service of God. It's a way of saying, "God, I appreciate what you've given me and I'm gonna take care of it". Do you know that part of owning something is taking care of it? I said, part of owning something is taking care of it. Don't be lazy on me this morning. Okay, here's a couple of scriptures in Colossians that drive this point home really good. Colossians 3:17, "And whatever you do no matter what it is in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus and in dependence upon his person, giving praise to God the Father through him". Everything, everything, everything. We don't just go to church for God, we do everything for God otherwise we should not even sing the song, "Jesus, you're the center of it all". We gotta stop singing the songs if we're not gonna go out and apply the things to our life. Amen?

And then Colossians 3:23, "Whatever may be your task, work at it heartily (from the soul), as something done for the Lord and not for men". So, you have to admit that I'm right about this. We should do everything that we do for the Lord. I'm right because God's word backs it up. And then the last thing is enjoy your life, the one you have right now, not the one you hope to have sometime in the future, not "I'm gonna enjoy myself when, I'll be glad when, I'll sure be glad when. I'll be glad when this is over. I'll be glad when this starts". Well, what about being glad right now? Would anybody like to enjoy this day or do you want to just ruin this day thinking about how you're gonna be happy when?

And I found this scripture in Ecclesiastes. Well, actually I didn't find anything. I'm sure God led it to me but... Led me to it. Ecclesiastes 6:9, "Better is the sight of the eyes, better is the sight of the eyes the enjoyment of what is available to one than the cravings of wandering desire". I love that scripture. He's saying it's much better to enjoy what's in front of you right now than it is to sit around and just have all these craving desires about all these things that you hope to have someday and in the process not enjoy anything that you have right now.

You know, when your child's 2, enjoy the 2-year-old. Don't sit around and wish they were 3. "I'll be glad when the kids start to school. I'll be glad when school's out. I'm tired of driving those kids to school every day. I'll be glad when these kids get through college. I'm tired of paying those bills. I'll be glad when. I'll be glad. I'll be glad. I'll be glad". Well, each one of those things that you're gonna be glad about later is something that you're missing that, trust me, later when you're older, you're gonna think, "I wish I would have taken time to have enjoyed my family more. I wish I would have taken time to enjoy my home more".

So three things, enjoy everyday life, enjoy your life, and do all that you do in the service of God. Now, we have really two lives. We have an outer life, and we have an inner life. We have this life that we live out here and we do things and we have circumstances, and there's this person that we show to everybody. But then we also have another whole life and it's our inner life, it's what's going on inside of us. And see, the frightening thing is, is you can smile at somebody and be thinking, "I really just can't stand you. Just get away from me quickly because I just can't stand you". And you can smile and say, say it while you're saying, "Praise the Lord". Oh, I love you with the love of the Lord. And this is what is called being hypocritical and phony.

Now, our real life, the real true life is in us and the real us is in us. The Kingdom of God is within us. God comes to live in us because that's the first place he wants to change everything and make everything brand new. Trying to change from the outside in is useless, that's following the law. That's all these rules and regulations, these things that I'm supposed do that are not gonna change me. But the Bible says, "Don't be conformed to this world, but be transformed by", what? "the entire renewal of your mind". So, the first thing for a believer to do, after they've received Christ, the first thing to do is learn how to think the way God thinks.

Romans 12:2 again says, "We will be transformed", not translated. You didn't get it, did you? When you get translated, you're here and then you're suddenly there but transformation takes a little bit of time. It's a process that happens gradually. I don't think perfectly but I sure think a whole lot better than what I used to. And I'll tell ya something else that God has done for me, I recognize now when I'm having stinkin' thinkin'. I may have it for a little bit but it's not very long and I recognize it because something doesn't feel right. You know, we need to learn to pay more attention to this... It's hard to explain so I'll just do that this like... Something's just not right. You just don't feel peaceful. You just kind of lost your joy. "I don't know why I've lost my joy".

Well, one of first things to do when you lose your joy is examine your thinking. And another thing to do when you lose your joy is think about what you've been talking about. Does anybody here still have any trouble with your mouth? I mean the mouth is like a wild animal. The Bible says in James, "No man can tame the tongue". The only way that's gonna happen is by a great deal of help from the Holy Spirit on a regular basis all the time. So, I don't apologize to you for teaching another message today on the mind, and the mouth, and attitude because it is something that we need to hear possibly two or three times every single month if we're ever gonna keep up with it.

We have gazillions of thoughts running through our head and the Bible teaches us that we are to cast down the wrong ones and keep the good ones. That's your real life, not the life around you. It's not our circumstances that really make us unhappy, it's the way we think about our circumstances. It's the way we talk about our circumstances. It's not even really the people in our life that make us all that unhappy, and I know there's a lot of people that give you a hard time.

Don't think that I don't ever deal with any of them because I do and I can tell you this, the more I think about what's wrong with the people in my life that give me trouble, the harder it is for me to like 'em and be happy with 'em. Try taking a piece of paper and maybe your spouse or one of your kids, whoever it is that's around you that's become like a thorn in your flesh, your mother-in-law, your mom, your dad, your neighbor, whatever. Don't sit there and look so innocent like you love everybody, I know you don't.

You're like... Take a piece of paper and go ahead, write down what's wrong with 'em and then next to it over here, start thinking of everything that you can that's right with them. It ain't gonna be that hard. You know, I could, I mean I can find stuff wrong with Dave and he's just close to perfect, we all know that. But you know what? If I just think about the things that I really... I mean man, Dave does dishes. He does laundry. He steams my clothes after I wear em if we're out on the road and I need him to.

Now in the other column, he plays golf a lot. He watches football a lot. One lady came to Dave at a book signing we were doing last week and she said, came to me and she said, "My husband so appreciates you. Because of you, he now gets to play golf three times a week". But if I just focus on the things I don't like, do you know sometimes people get divorces because they focus on the things they don't like? Dave and I've been married 48 years and the only reason we've made it this long is because we've both learned not to focus on what we don't like because I can tell you, no matter who you get, there's gonna be stuff on both sides of the ledger. Did you hear me? I said, "No matter who you get, there's gonna be stuff on both sides of the ledger".

One of the things that causes us so much unhappiness and steals our peace is judging other people who do things that we would never do. Not things that the word covers. If God says don't do it, then you don't do it, but just, I mean, you know, there's a lot of things I could think of. I mean, I know great men and women of God that go and see movies that I wouldn't go to see. I just wouldn't do it. I wouldn't have peace about it if I did it. I wouldn't want anybody to see me at 'em. And so I went through a period of time where that was a problem for me. "How could you possibly go see that and call yourself a Christian"? And if I think about it very long sometimes I still have a hard time with it, so I've decided to mind my own business because I'm only gonna give an account for my life.

Now I'm not talkin' about your children. You need to set boundaries for your children and make, you know, have them live by a standard, but Paul said, "Look, the meat that's been offered to idols is really nothing. If you have the faith to eat it, eat it". But faith means you can do it and not have a guilty conscience. We make such a big deal over things, and we decide what a person's heart is based on how they're dressed, how they fix their hair, do they have any ink on their body? And most of the people that really need to be in church, the church would run 'em off when they walked in. Because you don't look like I do. You don't do what I do.

And here's what we need to understand. Teach people the love of God. Teach them how to have a personal, intimate relationship with God, and then let God tell them what they shouldn't do. It didn't take long for God to tell me, to show me that he didn't want me smokin' cigarettes, and I started smokin' 'em when I was 9. Now I'm probably gonna get a few letters, but here I go, you know? I don't think it's gonna send you to hell.

Now, see, look how quiet you got. Look at that. I mean, you may not want me to do this, but here it goes. The Bible says all kinds of stuff about not overeating. But it doesn't say anything about smokin'. Now it does say don't do things that are gonna harm your body, and I don't think it's good to do, and I don't believe there's a smoking section in heaven. And I'm not recommending it, amen? And, you know, it's just kind of a stinky, nasty, expensive habit, but, here again, can I really look at somebody and say, "Oh, well, you smoke"? Can I tell you something? Havin' a bad attitude, a bitter, resentful, hateful attitude is worse than all that. You know why? Because it's what's goin' on in me, and I tell you some real, hardcore, religious people are some of the meanest people in the whole world.

I remember my aunt one time tellin' me I was gonna go to hell for wearin' blue eyeshadow. And this is exactly the kinda stuff that turns people off to Christianity. You can't do this, and you can't do that, and you can't do this, and you can't do that. And you can't do this, and you can't do that. Well, why don't we talk about the fun we can have, the joy we can have, how great it is to not have to feel guilty all the time and to not be condemned all the time? I don't know about you, but I am enjoying bein' a Christian. But you're never gonna draw anybody to Christ if all you do is judge them and criticize them and tell them everything they can't do.

That's exactly why Jesus ate with publicans and sinners, and then he let the glory and the beauty of what was in him, the God in him, the way that he lived his life, draw them to him. I'm not talkin' about compromising and doin' things that you shouldn't be doing, but I'm talkin' about realizing what is really important and what's not important. You guys are funny, man. You got quiet at all the right spots. Which just proves to me... Well, I'm right. And you understand I'm not recommending that you do any of that. I'm just saying that we need to realize what's important, and me havin' a critical, judgmental attitude about your tattoo would certainly be worse than your tattoo.

Man, I am not readin' my mail at all for the next 3 months. Lord, have mercy. I mean, back in the Bible they wore nose rings and earrings and, man, all kinds of stuff. Then we tell people, "No", this and, "No", that. "Well, Joyce, didn't Paul say that you shouldn't wear Jewelry? Didn't Paul say that"? No, what Paul was talkin' about was the way prostitutes in those days dressed, and he said, "Don't come into the church dressed like a prostitute". And I will tell you the same thing. As a woman of God you don't need to be sexy. You need to be godly, amen? And you don't need to have on something so low cut that everybody can see what they got no business seeing. Doesn't that judgmental attitude steal your joy? How many of you could just enjoy your life more if you would just mind your own business?

You know, a great scripture, I think it's Romans 12:14, "Every man will give an account of himself". See, God's not gonna ask you about anybody else. He's only gonna ask you about you, and if somebody is doing something that really is sin that the Bible covers you can pray for them. You can pray that God will open their eyes. If you're in a position to bring correction to them, which most of us are not, but if you are I believe a good friend will bring a good word of correction to somebody that's open to it. I don't think we should just pat everybody on the head and say, "Everything you're doing's fine. It's none of my business".

No, if a good friend of mine is about to get into adultery I'm gonna tell 'em, and I'm not gonna apologize for it or mince any words about it. But it's not my business how they cut their hair or how they color their hair, or, you know, whatever, how much sugar they eat, you know? Every healthy person wants to tell everybody else what they should eat. One of my sons shaves his head, the younger one, and he's so good lookin' he can get by with it. But he has just got gorgeous hair, and it took me probably at least 10 years to shut up about his hair. Listen to me, parents. This is the stuff we do that causes our kids to not want to come around. It took me a while, too, with the jeans with holes in it. That took me a while, like, "Um, you look like a rag picker. I'll buy you some clothes if you need some".

See, I come from another generation. We didn't buy our stuff torn up. We bought it new and then let it wear out, but it's not a biblical issue. Are you understanding me? It is not a biblical issue. It's our opinion, and so the thing is, is if you don't wanna wear 'em don't wear 'em, but if somebody else is gonna wear them... Now I'm not gonna let people dress like that up here. You know why? It's my deal. I call the shots, but, you know, they dress different than I did when I started, even the ones that are here. I mean, I've got some, wow, I mean, we've got some amazing worship bands, and, well, it took me a while to get used to it. I mean, one guy, bless his heart, he led worship for us for such a long time, and he's really well known, and I teased him about it, so I'm not talkin' behind his back. I mean, when he would show up, his hair looked just like he just got out of bed, like, I mean, it looked like mine does when I get up, which is not very good. And he told me one day, he said, "It took me about 35 minutes to get my hair to do this". I thought, "You've gotta be kidding".

See, there was a time in my life when I didn't know that God could anoint denim. I thought God, I thought you could only have the anointing if you had on polyester. I didn't think you could wear denim. I'm serious. You know what that is? That's a stinkin', religious attitude that just keeps people away from God. And so I'm so lost now. I guess I might as well just go with this 'cause I'm not gonna get back. How we think about things is what becomes our reality. Don't sit around and have attitudes about everybody and their business and what they're doin'. Mess with your own deal. Take care of yourself. Make sure that your heart is right before God, and let God tell other people the things that he needs to tell them, you know? And sometimes, I mean, sometimes even when people are doin' something actually, really morally wrong according to the Bible, God still doesn't want us to tell 'em. He wants to have time to tell 'em. Boy, that was a little harder.

Alright, I'll give you an example. When I was younger in ministry, a lady came to me for counseling, and she had just received Christ, and she was really excited. And in the process of the conversation I found out she was livin' with her boyfriend. Well, I could hardly wait for her to be quiet so I could tell her that that wasn't gonna work, you know, that she needed to not be doin' that. And, I mean, God spoke to me, and he said, "No, no, when the time's right I'll tell her". See, sometimes people have to get grounded enough in God, and they have to love God enough to be willing to give up a wrong thing.

Now, here again, do I think that was right? No, but God sees a person's heart. I don't know where she came from. I don't know what she went through. I don't know what the situation was in her life. God is the one that knows everything, and God is well able to bring correction to people. All he wants us to do is pray, pray, pray, and if God tells you to say something, then you say it. But we should not, "Well, I'm gonna tell you this, and I'm gonna tell you that. And I'm gonna tell you this, and I'm gonna tell you that". This has to be a word from God 'cause I still don't know where it's comin' from. Wouldn't we be so much happier and enjoy our lives so much more if we could accept people where they're at on the way to where they're goin'?

See, that's why, and to be honest with you, this is one of the things that I appreciate about my husband probably as much or more than anything else. I mean, I was just a train wreck when him and I got married, and, you know, Dave and I only had five dates and got married. It had to be quick before he found out what he was gettin'. Now I don't recommend that either, but it worked for us. Five dates, we went out five times. He said the first time he saw me he knew I was the girl that he was gonna marry, and I thought, "Well, you were either hearin' from God or had a mental problem, one of the two". But Dave has always let me be me, and the version of me keeps changing, but somehow or another he manages to enjoy the current me while I'm becoming the next me that I'm gonna be. Do you understand what I'm sayin'?

And so remember what you were like when you came to the Lord. Remember some of the things that you did that it took a while for God's conviction to come into your life strong enough for you to wanna give it up. Remember some of those things, and don't think because you've been a Christian now for 10 years that that gives you a license to now tell everybody else in the whole world what they ought to do. We all wanna give victory lessons. "Oh, yes, I used to have a problem with that. Let me tell you what you need to do". "For let him who wants to enjoy life", is that you? You wanna enjoy life? "Let him who wants to enjoy life and see good days good, whether apparent or not keep his tongue free from evil and his lips from guile". Uh-oh. You can improve your own joy by how you talk.

Proverbs 18:20, "A man's moral self shall be filled with the fruit of his mouth: and with the consequences of his words he must be satisfied whether good or evil. Death and life are in the power of the tongue, and they who indulge it shall eat the fruit of it for death or for life". So we eat our words, don't we? Some kinds of talk to avoid: excessive talking about your problems. I don't care how much people love you, they get tired of hearin' your deal all the time. Critical comments, they don't do any good anyway, so. Prideful comments, complaining, gossiping, exposing other people's problems or faults. It's called tale bearing, "Did you hear? Can you believe? I heard. Now listen, I'm only gonna tell you this because I want you to pray". And that is the worst one of all. Now we're tryin' to spiritualize gossip by puttin' a little God touch on it. The Bible says in Ephesians 4:30 that all this kinda stuff grieves the Holy Spirit.

Now one of the attitudes that will actually steal your joy probably quicker than anything else is an unforgiving, bitter attitude. I don't know who you might be mad at today, but you'd be amazed at the number of people who walked in here mad today, possibly with somebody you're mad at. Oh, Dave and I used to go to church all the time together mad. We'd fight all the way to church, and when we got to the front door, "Praise the Lord". Come on, how many of you have done it? So you're showin' this one outer life to people, this phony outer life, and something totally different is goin' on in the inside, but the Kingdom of God is in us. Christ is in us, amen? We want peace in our circumstances. He wants peace in our heart.

Do you know why Jesus could speak peace to the storms? Because he had peace in him. If you have peace in you, then the storms of life are not gonna rattle you nearly as much as they do. See, you can do one thing, you can do what you think is the right thing while thinking and feeling the wrong thing, but the real part of us that God cares about more than any part of us is the inner life. And, to be honest, this was a real eye opener for me, probably, I don't know how many years ago, 25, 30 years ago when God began to show me all this stuff about the inner life 'cause, you know, we can easily get caught up into all this outward stuff.

"Well, look at me. I'm a good Christian. I've got on Jewelry, and come to my house. I've got all of Joyce Meyer's books. And I've got all of her CDs. I've even got some of the old cassette tapes. I mean, I have been listening to her so long. Okay, I'm gonna make some coffee, and then I got to update you on some stuff that's goin' on at church". Come on. "You are not gonna believe what sister brown did. And did you see that crazy haircut that John just got? My gosh". So we think we're spiritual because we've got all the outward paraphernalia, but as I say all the time, it's gonna take more than a bumper sticker and a Jesus pin to convince the world that we've got anything worth having. "You will know them by their fruit", amen?

Attitudes, thoughts. What about a guilty conscience? That's inside you. You know, the apostle Paul said that he really worked with God to keep himself free from havin' a guilty conscience. He said, "I keep my conscience void of offense toward God and man". That's in Acts 24:16. He said, "I strive to keep my conscience clear toward God and man".

You know what that means? If you've mistreated somebody, you get yourself out of here today, and you go apologize to them. I said if you have mistreated somebody, if you've been rude to somebody, if you've been selfish and self-centered with somebody, if you've said something that you shouldn't have said to somebody, I mean, even if you have been gossiping to somebody about somebody else it would be a really cool witness if you would go back and say, "You know what? I need to apologize to you for talkin' about that other person to you the other day. That really wasn't my place to do, and I was out of line, and I ask you to forgive me". Then you'd think twice about doin' it the next time.

Question of the day
Ginger: Joyce, we have a question for you today, from Charity in Pennsylvania. And she says, "How do I help my daughter heal from the abuse of her father and even what I've put her through"? What's a good way to help a child through difficult times?

Joyce: Well, encouragement, obviously, but you know, she might need some professional help. She might need some good Christian counseling. It may take time, but for me, because I was abused, probably one of the biggest problems I had was I didn't like myself. And so, since you know, it's an awfully big subject and I can only give a short answer, I would say the best thing to do is to help the girl know who she is in Christ and that what happened to her, as far as God's concerned, is gone and buried and done, and to trust him to heal her soul now. And those wounds sometimes, do take time to heal.

You know, one of our recent book releases was, "Healing the Soul of a Woman", and of course, that would be great for her because it is a process, it's not something that happens overnight. So, I think, love, love, and encouragement, encouragement, encouragement, and just help the girl not to use the abuse as an excuse for bad behavior. Sometimes, we fall into that trap of, "Well, you know, I act like this because", but, what God put in my heart is that's why you're the way you are, but don't let it become an excuse to stay that way.