Start Again Today...
Wednesday, May 30, 2012 at 11:32AM 
Happy Wednesday, Everyone! Susie Larson here...
And to those visiting, I say welcome! I post every Wednesday and my sole purpose is to nourish your soul along the way. Each month I give away a $10.00 Starbucks gift card to someone who posts on my blog. So leave a post, share an insight, bless lots of people, and just maybe you'll win a jolt of java for you and a friend!
Now on to my topic...
Several months ago, someone paid me a compliment that actually surprised me. A high profile woman said to me, "You are a really good writer." Her words jolted me in a way they shouldn't have. I realized I had given up some ground in my thought life with regards to my writing life.
Let me explain. My last book came out a year ago. I set book-writing aside for a few seasons to launch the radio show. Most of my author friends are primarily writers who speak once in a while. They daily practice their craft. They've honed their skill. And they are excellent at what they do. I was a speaker before I was a writer. And then I got into radio. Only a fraction of my time goes to writing. When I write a book, I spend a few months grinding it out and then I go back out on the road again. Most of my author friends can write circles around me because they spend consistent time applying themselves to it.
This past year my focus has largely been on radio and speaking. So when harassing thoughts swirled around my head like, "You can't write" "You don't know what you're doing when it comes to writing" "You have nothing to say" - instead of stopping those thoughts in their tracks, taking them captive, and putting them in prison, I simply waved them away like an irritating gnat. I didn't take care of them and as a result, they multiplied in my midst.
When that wonderful, sincere compliment came my way, it actually sounded untrue because for too long, I had tolerated a lie. I had given up ground that God had entrusted to me. I'm certainly not the best writer I know, but I'm not the worst either. No matter. God has given me something to say and I'll never hear Him clearly as long as I give any air time to that lying enemy of our souls.
Just because I wasn't in book-writing mode doesn't mean I didn't need to guard my yard.
How about you?
Have you given up some ground by not defending it against the lies of the enemy? Has the enemy crept onto your territory and tried to re-claim certain places that belong to you? Maybe related to your identity? Your future? Your calling? Your value?
Don't beat yourself up. Just rise up, raise your shield, and take back your land! It doesn't matter if God's truth doesn't feel true for you. It's still true. You are valuable. You are gifted. You are called. You are loved. You are treasured.
You have certain gifts entrusted to you and God absolutely LOVES to see you in your sweet spot - using those gifts in the very ways He planned for you. Here again is the call to be more God-aware than self-aware!
It doesn't matter if or how the lie overshadowed the truth, what matters is that you and I start again today, affirming what's true about us because we belong to God.
Lead me by your truth and teach me,for you are the God who saves me. All day long I put my hope in you (Psalm 25:5).
~Until next week
Reader Comments (7)
Thanks bunches for this!! Been listening to lies too often!
May we all remember also, the power of an encouraging word! Thanks for sharing!!! :)
O Susie, Your last 2 posts have been like God's angels meeting me with honey cakes and rest in the middle of a dark night. You brought encouragement, hope, peace, His truth spoken tenderly to a hurting heart....whispers, yet miraculously heard above the din of growing lies. I cannot thank you enough for your words and, as always, HIS!
I have been feeling this way lately in my work. There has been talk of cutbacks and many people talking about how many people are not going to be coming back in the fall (I work in a public school) and initially I thought- yeah, I'm going to have to look for something else, because I just didn't feel like I was doing as good a job as I could have. Then, people in my work place started encouraging me (without prompting from me) about my job and how they appreciated me and really felt that I should be one to come back. I had staff and others saying that they would fight for me to stay, and I cannot tell you how that made me want to weep with gratitude. It made me take a hard look at what I really was doing, and how it impacted other people, and that those thoughts I had been having about my job performance were not the truth. Now, I am confident that even if I am not going back, I will be okay anyway, because God will support me and find me something better.
It's so refreshing to hear that God loves to see me in my "sweet spot!" Sometimes I forget that he's working with me and for me, not against me. Just recently as I was talking to God about next steps of obedience he reminded me that he wants me to succeed more than I do. He's invited us to work with him and he's serious about his invitation. I'm so thankful! And I'm thankful that you are successful being the communicator God called you to be, whether writing or speaking, it blesses me!
Hi Susie-
FAR too often I find myself 'swatting the thoughts away like annoying gnats'. You are totlaly right. I need to get rid of them as they come because they take root and grow and take away the ability to be in the 'sweet spot' the way God intended.
Thanks Susie!
Thank you so much for your sweet encouragement that so many of us need to hear. I read today an email from Jason Cruise "The Man Minute" sent to my husband who spoke similarly of our need to remember our individual giftedness. (I Corinthians 12:12 / the body made up of many parts). We were made with a specific gift-mix, specific mentality, specific personality to maximize the "you" that God intended us to be. We get frustrated when we act outside of that and also discouraged particularly as women when we start to compare ourselves to others.
He had a quote from the renowned Albert Einstein which said, "everbody is a genius, but if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it's stupid". great insight for us in the body of Christ, and as wives and moms too.