Remember

A reminder that any lasting change we get comes from the root of a thing.

I have been delivered from 2 nasty habits, sugar and oversleeping, for very long periods of time which were effortless and blissful to sustain. I was happy and at peace. Then before I knew it, I was dwindling back into a place of being bound to the habits I hated so much and that caused so much pain and collateral damage. I went from No, thank you to eating cookies, candies and pop for breakfast lunch and dinner virtually overnight.. and I was confused at how drastic the change was. Again, this wasn't an exercise in will power that I lost. I was free from the urge entirely to take even a hint of sweets and I jumped out of bed in the morning.

You might say I wasn't truly delivered in the first place then. Perhaps. But I'll tell you what God showed me this evening. I'll tell you what I forgot that was keeping addiction and failure at bay. I forgot that He was the one who was doing it. For the life of me, I could not control my sweet tooth even when I'd seen it wreak absolute havoc in my body and I've been fired from 3 jobs from oversleeping. The pain is real but what was more painful was the inability to escape the cause- the inability to just, well, STOP. So when days of freedom rose out of nowhere and with no effort on my part, I was relieved and I tried to keep it going. I began TRYING to regulate my diet and TRYING to get up earlier. This freedom arrived without conscious effort, mind you, but I was compelled to sustain it, feed it, keep it going.

I see tonight that this is where it goes downhill. It's a gift dummy and God can't operate in the same room where we keep trying to run Him over or run Him out! Either He's doing the work and freedom is a gift, or I'm doing the work and bondage creeps in. I had forgotten the nights long before the freedom came when I'd said quietly, "Sugar does not rule me. Oversleeping does not rule me, God rules me." And I'd forgotten these prayers because they weren't long or arduous or time-consuming in the slightest, but the simple, effortless words you forget the next minute and with the next load of laundry. This "prayer" occupied little space in my day. We remember what we work for, but what costs us nothing we can't accept. We naturally start working for what is free and in forgetting that our freedom was finished in Him, we run Him out and chase our freedom out just as fast.

I'm not saying there is no physical work entailed with the relinquishing of certain habits. I am saying that if will-power could save a man, the whole world should be perfect because no one with bad habits, at least no one I know, really wants to be in failure. Lasting change starts with the Root, to see the work that God is doing inside of us independent of anything we can add, and in no need of anything we can do but to stay in touch with the fact that it is happening and keep that fact in view. His work in us becomes the fruit through us. RECOGNIZE Him as vine, source, supply, ability, power, strength, sap, capacity and you will be as He is without sweat-- that is the Promise. We would do well to learn how to be as puppets and we might adopt the same indomitable smile across our faces as God-made dolls.