Family Relationship | Navigating Our Thought Life Through Social Distancing
by Amy Potts
Easter is arguably my favorite holiday of the year! It’s the first holiday after the long cold winter months. It is full of such sweet hope evident everywhere in the form of chartreuse growth, birds singing, and bright sunshiny days sparkling in the fresh rain. Every year I spend Easter with my immediate family as well as my parents and five sisters and their families. It’s just the best! All of these amazing things are nothing compared to what Easter is really about. The Savior of the world, Jesus Christ, MY SAVIOR, did exactly what he said he was going to do, did exactly what was prophesied so many years earlier. He made a way for me to be cleansed of my sins when I could not. He made a way for me to be able to live in heaven for eternity with Him! Romans 3:23-24 says: For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. They are justified freely by his grace through the resurrection of Christ Jesus. The celebration of this undeserved amazing gift of grace and mercy with all the other things I love about Easter make it something I look forward to all year long.
This year Easter was hijacked by the coronavirus. Easter, like so many other events, was simply cancelled. Cancelled in order to keep appropriate social distance and obey the governor’s orders. Our new mantra we see written on freeway over passes and bus reader boards has become “stay home, stay safe, save lives.” Such strange times!! Strange times that have changed all of our routines and schedules, caused so much unknown, and completely surrounded us by negative media overload. So much change and so much negativity that we may be seriously doubting God’s goodness right now. We may be tempted to be consumed with worry and fear and negative patterns of thinking. With all of our normal activities cancelled we are around our families constantly and may be feeling bored or stressed at not seeing our friends. All of this is completely understandable and relatable, if not entirely, at least on some level. We all really are more alike than we are different!
With at least a month to go, I want to challenge you with an opportunity to rise to a higher standard. I want you to challenge you to grow in the grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ. Challenge yourself to take your thoughts captive before the Lord. It is so worth the work you put in! When we do this our circumstances may not change even one little bit, but our perspective will.
I recently read a great book called ReNew by Julie Winter that has challenged me on so many levels to rise to a higher standard by taking my thoughts captive before the Lord. The author, Julie Winter says in the opening chapter that “Fear, depression, anxiety, bitterness, anger, hatred, envy, etc are not rooted in the kingdom of God. When these negative emotions and thoughts arise in our soul we need to quickly realize which kingdom is trying to influence us. We have authority over those thoughts.”
And we do!! Why? Because we are believers in Jesus. Jesus lives inside us to guide us and lead us. Jesus’ kingdom is the one we align with. We don’t belong to the other kingdom. That kingdom with all the fear, depression, anxiety, bitterness, anger, etc, that kingdom belongs to Satan. We have to fight for and train our minds to meditate on all the truths of Christ. Meditate on all that He has accomplished for us. This allows us to live a life of joy. The normal life for every follower of Jesus is one that is filled with JOY! Of course we will have negative emotions some of the time, but those emotions should be temporary and not our normal state of being. Joy and peace are what we inherit when we first become believers and align ourselves with Jesus’ kingdom. Therefore, joy is a sign of every believer. This is something that I have been working hard at during this time of quarantine because it does not come naturally for me.
I had a choice to make when all my Easter traditions changed this year. I could focus on all the negativity and bitterness of missing something I truly love OR I could choose to challenge myself and grow in the grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ. Rather than focusing on what is wrong and what I can’t change, I can instead be thankful with the help of Jesus to see the good. I can take my thoughts captive like Paul said in 2Cor 10:5 and have peace and joy in my circumstance.
Even though Easter was hijacked and I missed my parents and my super fun sisters, I chose to focus on what I did have, my sweet immediate family, the hope of springtime, and the amazing color of chartreuse! But the best and most important part of my Easter was still there…Jesus Christ and his saving grace! I am so thankful I have been working on this because it blessed me tremendously. Taking your thoughts captive and aligning them with God’s kingdom is a promise from the bible that is a challenge that I hope you choose to rise to because it really does bring joy, and we know from the bible that the joy of the Lord is our strength! So again I say, with at least a month to go, I want to challenge you with an opportunity to rise to a higher standard. I want you to challenge you to grow in the grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ. Challenge yourself to take your thoughts captive before the Lord. It is so worth the work you put in! I am so looking forward to meeting with you all again, but until that time comes, let us wait patiently in joy and peace!