I've been thinking a lot lately about the power of the mind.
You see, I broke my leg and back in February they put in 2 plates and 14 screws. I've recently started working out more to find that there is still a lot of pain in my shin, right at the top of one of the plates. After a couple of conversations, I was convinced that the swelling I was seeing was a screw backing out. It began to hurt more, I was able to do less and found myself limping again, which I had not done in some time. I called the surgeon to schedule a follow up visit, assuming the worst.
After expressing my concerns and some xrays (which I am a pro at now) I found out that it was indeed...nothing. There was absolutely nothing wrong with my leg, in fact the surgeon said that my leg looked great and that he was so impressed with the healing that he wanted to take the hardware out at 10 months instead of the anticipated 12 months.
He then told me to "Go bang on it, run, jump and play". Since then I have upped my running, jumping and playing a bit with almost no pain. When I was told I was fine, I started feeling and acting like it!
That got me thinking about my walk with Christ. How often am I told by the world that I'm not good enough, that I don't have the will power or that I am too much of a sinner? How often do I tell myself stuff like that? I think too much we spend time trying hard not to sin. I spent time trying hard not to hurt my leg. BUT I was already fine.
Too often I think I live like I am still a captive to sin in my life, but the blood shed on the cross covered that sin already. When I began a relationship with Christ, Jesus told me that I was fine, in fact I'm more than fine, John 10:10 tells me I can go run, jump and play with the freedom that he has given me!
I don't need to "try harder" to stop sinning, I need to live more freely so that the power of the Spirit can stop my sin for me!
Now to figure out how to convince myself of that continuously.
