Why I Lived in Fear and Frustration

Too many people, whom I had looked to for advice, would tell me that this life is a life of struggle.

A struggle against sin, bad thoughts, and frustrations outside of us.

The Bible teaches something very different:

"Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us." (Romans 8: 7)

and

"Now thanks be unto God, which always causeth us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest the savour of his knowledge by us in every place. (2 Corinthians 2: 14)

We are called into consummate victory in Christ. Because we identify with Him, and He is our life (Colossians 3: 4), we can rest in the knowledge that anything we face in this life on this earth cannot hurt us:

"These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world. (John16: 33)

John would later write in his First Epsitle:

"Ye are of God, little children, and have overcome them: because greater is he that is in you, than he that is in the world." (1 John 4: 4)

If we see in anything in our lives as greater than God, and specifically Christ in us, then we are not walking in the truth, and we will end up in bondage to lies.

John later writes:

"For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world: and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.

5Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God? " (1 John 5: 4-5)

 

Why did I still find myself defeated and under the circumstances in my life?

 

I did not believe that all my sins were put away forever. Furthermore, I did not understand that sin in my flesh was still present, but that the power had been taken away, because my flesh was crucified in Christ's own flesh:

 

"4Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; that ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God." (Romans 7: 4)

 

and also

 

"For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh" (Romans 8:3)

 

Check out this wonderful verse:

 

"20I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. 21I do not frustrate the grace of God: for if righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain." (Galatians 2: 20-21)

 

When Jesus died on the Cross, then rose again, and finally sat down at the Father's right hand, Jesus did the following for all of us who believe on Him:

 

"For by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified." (Hebrews 10: 14)

 

We are perfected forever because of what Jesus did, and He has now sent His Holy Spirit to dwell within us:

 

  15Whereof the Holy Ghost also is a witness to us: for after that he had said before,

16This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, saith the Lord, I will put my laws into their hearts, and in their minds will I write them;

17And their sins and iniquities will I remember no more." (Hebrews 10: 15-17)

 

We carry about within us a witness of our righteousness in Christ, not of our sin!

 

I lived in fear and frustration because I judged my right standing before God based on my feelings and my thoughts. If my thoughts strayed, or I feared that I was not thinking about God, then I would get fearful and struggle to maintain or retrain my focus on Him once again.

 

The life of bondage which ensued from my lack of understanding, all of it was just too much or me.

 

Because I had been reared in the dreaded, evil AA cult, the only tools and habits I knew never helped me, but even brought me into greater bondage.

 

I had become so defeated and frustrated about my thoughts and feelings, I just contented myself with barely getting through one day at a time.

 

I praise the Lord Jesus Christ for the wonderful revelation about sin in the flesh, and that even the sin in my mortal body has been paid for, and paid for once for all forever!

 

I do not have to live in frustration anymore, and now I know that I never have to worry about bondage of any kind bringing me down.

 

Hallelujah!