Feeling Bad and Beating Yourself Up Isn’t the Answer

 

“For the Kingdom of God is not just a lot of talk; it is living by God’s power.”
1Corinthians 4:20 (NLT)

“Something isn’t right in my life. I’m raising my kids on my own, they are acting out and every time I talk to my family, they’re always blaming me.”

For every choice and decision that we make in life, there is a consequence. Whether those choices and decisions are good or bad, the results will come back to us in the form of something we like or something we don’t like. This is God’s law, and it is immutable; it will not fail, and we can’t change it. Considering this, the most beneficial thing that any of us can do for ourselves is to be like Christ and think good thoughts, feel good feelings, speak good words, and do good things. Through the Apostle Paul, God says it best in Philippians 4:8(NLT), “And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise.”

Either because we don’t know God’s laws, or we slipped up and violated them, sometimes, we fall. We make a wrong choice or decision, and it takes us really far from the path of God’s righteousness and blessings. We might do something that nowhere resembles the kind of person we know we should be. As a believer of Jesus Christ, we might feel remorse for our wrong or poor choices, and that’s how we’re supposed to feel. If we do something that offends the Lord, our hearts should be convicted, it shows that the Spirit is working within us. But we shouldn’t remain in that place of remorse. Through the goodness, mercy, and grace of God, we have the solution through our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ! It is to repent and ask God for forgiveness. 1John 1:19(NIV) tells us, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.”

God knows we are going to make mistakes, and He doesn’t stop loving us when we do. He has given us His Word so we can correct ourselves and get back on the path of His righteousness and blessings. When we don’t repent for thinking the wrong thoughts, feeling the wrong feelings, speaking the wrong words, and doing wrong deeds, we are still in the cycle of sin, where those wrong things keep cycling back to us. Jesus Christ gave his life on the cross to get us out of this kind of bondage. He showed us the way to live a more than abundant life, and it begins with repentance.

The devil bombards us with negativity and consequences to keep us from repenting, because the devil doesn’t want our relationship with God restored. To repent is to recognize we’ve been doing the wrong things and then to stop doing them. Repentance is a change of behavior. It is to wake up and realize that we have been given the power and authority of Christ to overcome. This is what God means when He tells us in Ephesians 4:23 to renew our minds, and in Colossians 3:10(NLT), when He tells us, “Put on your new nature, and be renewed as you learn to know your Creator and become like him.” As children of God’s Kingdom, we can live by His power. We can overcome any situation by knowing His Word and walking in the example of Christ.  

It can be very discouraging when we constantly find ourselves repeating the same kind of sins that we swore to God we would never do again. If we remain stuck in feeling bad, we are stuck in condemnation, and this condemnation makes us continually feel sad and unworthy. It’s a cycle of reacting to our mistakes, not by correcting them through Jesus Christ, but with the self-punishment of continuing to feel bad. That’s condemnation. Repentance is recognizing the wrong action and correcting it. It’s not God’s Will that we let sadness and unworthiness takeover our lives. It’s His Will that we overcome the actions and behaviors that caused our trouble so that we can overcome them through Jesus Christ.

After my divorce from an abusive marriage, I felt sadness and shame. I felt condemned. I have no doubt that God wanted me and my child to be safe, but I still blamed myself in certain ways and regretted the choices I made. I had to seek God’s forgiveness for not knowing His Word to the degree that I could have, so that I could make wiser choices. None of us are perfect, and there are thoughts, feelings, and behaviors that lead us down the wrong paths and cause us to choose unwisely. Beating ourselves up and feeling bad isn’t the answer. The answer is growing in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, so that we can stay on the path of making good choices and decisions that please God. ■

Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV® Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

“Feeling Bad and Beating Yourself Up Isn’t the Answer”, written by Kim for https://rescuefromdomesticviolence.blogspot.com© 2021. All rights reserved. All praise and honor to God through Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior.