When hurt people leave a legalistic culture and land in a grace environment, their previous life experience may weigh so heavily on them that they interpret any mandate to live holy as judgmental. It is a challenge to give them directive counsel that requires holiness, standards, or discipline. They have one filter for hearing directive care:
“You are judging me” or “Don’t tell me what to do.”
These people have experienced legitimate hurt by others. The only kind of religion they know is a mean-spirited or demanding person who makes secondary standards more important than they should be. You want to love them carefully and courageously. https://lifeovercoffee.com/slow-down-before-you-map-your-experience-over-others/
The shocking and inspiring story of Sophie Ottaway.
Watch the full interview here: https://lifeovercoffee.com/podcast/ep-490-sophie-ottaway-engineered-at-birth-to-be-a-girl/
Focus on the Cause, not the Effect, so you can remove the cause and not be affected by the effect.
A local church’s worship value is not primarily about the music but the lifestyle because you never ask, “Are you worshiping?” The reason is that we worship all the time. God made us for worship—wired us for worship, you could say.
Worship is part of what it means to be image-bearers. Who could do otherwise? The better question is, “What or whom do we worship?” https://lifeovercoffee.com/three-characteristics-of-a-fantastic-local-church/
Whenever a person chooses sinful anger, he is, in effect, giving the other person control over him. It’s counterintuitive. In his anger, he is like a marionette, a puppet on a string.
Anger toward someone is the total submission of their thoughts, attitudes, emotions, and behaviors to the other person. It is not self-control, as governed by the Spirit of God, but someone out of control or under the control of another spirit. https://lifeovercoffee.com/podcast/ep-110-help-for-the-angry-person/
