Chapter 9

No other "gods" before me

As Ryan and I both began to volunteer at this workshop that changed our lives, I began to experience God in a totally different way than I had before.

So much so that it started to become a battlefield of the mind.

I was seeing Jesus move and work and people’s lives were totally being transformed, including mine. Yet, I would hear an old belief about “God” and it would make me so feel paralyzed. I knew that Jesus was moving and working in a way that I hadn’t seen before, and yet, it was viewed in a negative light by many fellow Christians. How could this freedom, new life, peace and hope be taken away so easily? It was like a tape would play in my mind. No matter what I would try to combat it with, the tape would not stop. I would feel deafened by it and all the negativity would try to steal the joy away from the things that I was experiencing daily. I rejoiced in what Jesus was doing, and yet, felt the negativity had a grip on me I could not seem to let it go.

At that time I was regularly going through a truth ministry process. So many things were stirred up in my heart and I was starting to feel for the first time in a long time. I needed some help to get past the wounds of my past and move forward into more freedom of my heart. Jesus began unraveling all of the lies that I believed and He started peeling back all of the layers and revealing the truth. Why did this particular thing have such a hold on me?

Jesus answered this question in the most memorable way.

He showed me what the inside of my heart might look like.

Then He showed me a picture of someone slamming down a Trojan horse in my heart.

Seeping out of it were a million different ideas about God like spiders crawling everywhere into my heart. Most of the beliefs coming in were currently not mine, but had been mine in the past. It was as if each time I allowed someone else’s opinion to come in that there was a false god that enveloped my heart. Almost like an idol. I believed these beliefs or opinions to be about "the true God" at some point in my life but was entirely wrong. I now knew that even in the Scriptures, there was no backing to these things and yet, the habits were so strong, that it was hard to combat the lies I was hearing. I could see that Trojan horse being thrown down in my heart and I watched all of those things crawling out and entangling my heart in the worst of ways. I asked Jesus to help me destroy any false beliefs about Jesus that I had learned or picked up in life. I watched as the Trojan horse and its affiliates were consumed with fire. Some ashes remained, and Jesus slowly swept them up and carried them away.

After the ashes were swept away, a new thing came in its place.

A Living Room.

Just He and I were inside. He sat across from me and wanted to talk to me each time I had a question. I could see a library full of truths He wanted me to know. He invited me to join Him there anytime I wanted to talk out a problem I was having. The peace that encompassed my heart is so hard to explain.

For the next few weeks I was amazed to find how many things I could let go of and how much easier it was to sink into that Living Room and chat with Jesus and for Him to show me the way.

What an amazing revelation.

I now pray to Jesus Christ of Nazareth, God who came in the flesh. Just to clarify the there is no other God, no other opinion of God and no other belief about God that comes even close to comparing to the one true, Jesus. My Jesus came to save me from not only my sin, but from other gods that were trying to encompass my life.

Weeding out the other voices and listening to His voice re-invented the way that I lived.