I am convinced ..
Every family has an oppressor.
Every family has a direct assignment set against them to destroy them from the inside out.
Within that family, there are unique assignments placed on each father, mother, and child.
Whether you believe or not, this absolute truth has been since the fall of Adam and Eve. The first family to fall prey.
These assignments stretch back as far as the third and fourth generation while reaching toward our children and across both sides of the family’s borders (Exodus 34:7).
From the onslaught of childhood, we carry memories and moments that get twisted through time. In their full and equally partial truth (these moments and the memories of them) hold ourselves, loved ones, and many others, well beyond our family, captive.
Within the four walls of our homes, we allow, knowingly and/or unknowingly, thoughts, actions, and behaviors to direct us toward conflict and division.
We take a look around at our spouse, our parent(s), that one child or five, that one brother, sister or sibling(s), or that mother-in-law, and we somehow allow silent thoughts to wedge a gap.
This captivity is where we eventually enslave ourselves to a heart that does not easily soften. It is here where we can no longer hear the pain of those we have become divided with. In the partnership and consoling of our pain, we can not see theirs.
I may not be able to speak for you, but for me, it has felt much better and easier to come into agreement with the justification of my own heartache or injustices, than to dig into the understanding of how I found myself this far out in resistance to reconciling, to begin with.
Instead, we tend to do what comes naturally to our humanness.
We excuse our “rightness”.
We justify.
We blame.
And…
It divides.
Whether be from the lack of spiritual growth within the church body, our family’s inability to understand spiritual DNA, the thought demons at work, or the consequences of the sinful nature of our humanness, our ability to discern this supernatural oppressor has been highjacked.
But I believe something is in the atmosphere. Something holy and pure and ripe in its season.
This generation has an opportunity to rise above the chatter and chaos of what has been sent to destroy relationships.
Right now Heaven’s gates are open wide extending a gracious invitation to rise up in the authority and favor of Christ Jesus to tear down the assignments sent against you and those you love and to pull down the coveted idols allowed to become entrenched in our bloodline and embedded within our minds and hearts.
Right now, if you choose, there is a grace resting on God’s sons and daughters that will open the eyes of our hearts to see where the enemy has taken up residence.
Here are the questions I’ve used to challenge myself in this place…
Will I choose to wave my white flag of surrender and pick up the authority that has been given to me through the precious Blood of the Lamb?
Will I choose to step into finding ways to make new memories to counter the old?
Will I make space to ponder what it could look like if, at the right time, I reached out to that one person?
What could come if I entertained how to forgive what feels like and very well may be such an injustice, either that was inflicted on me or I created?
Will I choose to see how an enemy was let in to weaken the fabrics of relationships that inevitably have kept me from prayer, from believing in more, from having hope?
I think, honestly, that it is through faith alone I could possibly dare to step out and trust something good would come of this level of trust and vulnerability. In so many ways this feels ridiculously uncomfortable and even unsafe.
Here’s the kicker for me, what if unblief and buying into these uncomfortable places is what’s holding me back from taking action to dissolve the conflict at hand and become at peace with what I am not at peace with?
What if…
What if…
What if…