LifeLift

To change the fruit, (first) take care of the root—

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In this talk we discuss the topic of soul ties.

Here’s why: Issues arise when we attach our hearts, for any reason, to the wrong place. When we do, bad fruit always emerges. When we connect our hearts in the right way to the right things, beauty emerges.

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Here are the main ideas of this convo:

👉 The “fruit” we see in our lives is a result of the unseen “roots.” To grow better fruit you must nurture better roots.

👉 Addiction happens when we attach our hearts—

❌ To the wrong things, or

❌ To the right things for wrong reasons

And, note: we can find ourselves “addicted” to many things. In fact, over 2/3 of the people who seek addiction help do not have a chemical dependency.

👉 The cure for bad “roots” = knowing and walking in your true identity. When we get this healthy, good fruit emerges.

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Dealing with soul ties isn’t about legalism; it’s about walking in freedom— so that nothing hinders us from embracing who we’re designed to be.

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Again…

To change the fruit, (first) take care of the root—

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Maybe it’s time to change the story in your head…

… not to deny reality, or step away from it…

… but so that you can, rather, actually see MORE of what ACTUALLY…

You see, many times we see what we've already decided we'll see. In other words, seeing is believing, yes. But, often, believing is seeing.

See how that works?

—>> If you're looking for reasons why you'll get a bad outcome, you'll likely read everything through that lenses.

—>> If you believe you're going to succeed, that you're going to have a great outcome, you'll (likewise) look at everything through that lenses.

This is especially true when past hurt is involved. If you’re looking for mortar fire or bullets or people to shun / hurt / abuse / take advantage of you, etc… well, you’ll likely see what you’ve already decided to see.

Internally, your mind will subconsciously kick into over-drive, scanning the universe for hints and clues to back up what you've already determined to be true. Then, that will become the grid whereby you view reality.

(And, the truth is that every now and then reality will actually match your perception completely, thereby giving your false impression enough credibility to continue.).

Change the narrative.

See the half full part of the glass, and that the cup is filling + flowing to over-flowing…

… not that there’s a famine of goodness, that all the substance is disappearing…

We’re designed to grow by exploring the world around us. But, we bump into painful experiences as we do. So, we create (often unconscious) rules to protect ourselves from future pain.

Some of the rules are functional (and help us), others are dysfunctional (and hinder us).

In this talk I reference three rules of human nature, related to soul health, govern how we uniquely approach the world.

Then, we’ll go farther. We’ll discuss how these rules can create ruts— both good and bad.

Functional rules = friends = help us (don’t touch a hot stove, fear of heights, walking down dark alley)
Dysfunctional = foes = hinder us (lack of trust in relationships, fear of failure, etc.)
In the the end, we eventually get more of what we expect, creating a “flywheel” of momentum.

In other words, if we don’t work through the “triggers” we discussed in the previous video we’ll find ourselves constantly living from “soul memory,” something much like muscle memory.

How does it fit with soul health?

Well, in the same way you can’t drive a car by always looking over your shoulder, you can’t drive through life by staring in the rearview mirror. Gaze back when you need to…

But live “ahead,” leaning forward…

Physical therapy isn’t for the purpose of staying physically injured, it’s for the purpose of walking in health + wholeness.

Emotional therapy is the same…

Perspective: Emotional health (in fact, health in general) isn’t so much about what’s wrong with us as it is about what’s right- and walking into what’s even better. In our medically-driven, diagnosis-prone Western world we’ve been conditioned to look at problems rather than seek solutions.

And, we’ve been trained to “fix issues” rather than walk in wholeness.

This applies to emotional health, too.

Whenever I speak to a group about emotional wholeness, many people assume that my goal is to convince people they have emotional scars which need healing. That’s simply not true.

Therefore, my goal is never for people to “get a diagnosis.” Or even to take a psych eval. I’m simply honest about my story (I took a psych eval) because, well, that’s my story.

**My goal is to help people walk in freedom. Period. **

If a diagnosis or even just an evaluation is the path to freedom, so be it. Many times, it's not, though. In fact, most of the time simply having the information is enough.

In this episode of the podcast, we talk about this ^^^ and define what PTSD is, what it looks like, and more…

The power of the mind is that you see exactly what you’re looking for…

True story-

In the book Sway: The Irresistible Pull of Irrational Behavior (now, think about that title!), Ori & Rom Brafman write about the effects of pre-existing beliefs and how they effect our ongoing belief patterns- even when confronted with new information to the contrary.

They write about a visiting lecturer, a guest teacher at MIT. As an experiment, the teacher lectured 70 economics students at the prestigious university. Now, you've gotta think- if anyone is not going to be irrationally swayed by something, it's going to be this bunch of smarties. Right?

Well, all 70 students were given a bio on the visiting professor. The bio was a page long and detailed the profs accomplishments. The students were instructed to review it before listening to the lecture.

The only difference was this:

*Half of the students had a bio that said the guest teacher was "a very warm person.”

*The other half had a bio that said the prof was "rather cold.”

That's it. No differences otherwise. The students all listened to the same lecture, and then were asked to grade the professor.

The results were amazing!

*The half that received the "warm person" bio wrote how great the teacher was. He was funny. He made them laugh. He told great stories and made things applicable. He actually made economics exciting!

*The half that received the "rather cold" bio said the teacher was aloof. He was self-centered. He was rigid, inflexible, and boring. Oh, and he was formal. Stiff. Lifeless.

Did they not sit through the same lecture at the exact same time? Of course they did. What happened?

Quite simply this: the students saw what they already believed to be true.

We tend to look at symptoms, but the Bible calls us to look at the root causes.

So, yes, Jesus said things like, “You’ll know them by their fruit…” That is, you’ll know what kind of people they really are by what manifests around them.

But, He reminds us that what you see on the outside- the fruit- is really an overflow of what’s going on beneath the surface.

John writes about this in 3 John 2. He prays prosperity and health for us (i.e., like the Blessing of Abraham). But, he says that those things directly correlate to how our soul is doing. In other words, our soul is the thermostat (not the thermometer). It controls the outside, the external…

Because of this, we have hope in this life, not just the life to come (see also 1 Corinthians 15:12-19 and Romans 6:6-11). In other words, total salvation starts now.

Two of the joys we most crave— freedom from guilt & shame and authentic community— exist in the place which seems scariest, the light. Those who are willing to “go there” discover true freedom comes not in hiding, but in realizing there’s nothing more to cover-up.

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For years— probably a decade or more— I was told I needed to share my story with others.

“There’s power in it. And healing,” I was encouraged. “Your words will set people free.”

A family member felt certain that owning my story would set me free, too.

The problem was that my story was… well… I didn’t want to confront it. I didn’t want to admit what was there, buried somewhere between all the pages. In order to share your story with others, you’ve got to admit that it is, in fact, your story.

Parts of it were hurtful, painful, and self-incriminating. Parts of it were embarrassing. They were at the time, anyway.

I was afraid that in sharing I would suddenly find myself not accepted but rejected. And, as you might imagine from a guy who reveals that he’s “defensive” on a psych eval, relationships have been a fragile thing for me. I didn’t want to deal with the “distance” with which people often inflict punishment when you disappoint them. Rather than dealing with with truth— and moving into the light— I was content to live in the shadows.

As such, I got cozy there. I made my home in the dark for decades.

Trouble is, there’s no freedom in the places we hide— just a lot of fear. Whereas we think that walking into the light causes fear and that living in the hidden places provides safety, the opposite proves true.

1 John 1:7-9 is a passage that’s come to mean a great deal to me (NIV, emphasis added):

_…if we walk in the Light as He Himself is in the Light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin. _

If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Scripture promises us that when we walk in the light (i.e., the “open”), two things happen: cleansing and community (John refers to “community” as “fellowship”)…

Are those not two of the things we most crave…

👉 A clear conscience?

👉 A community of people who, though imperfect, each hope and believe and call forth the best in each other, empowering the entire group to be who we’re designed to be?

Those two are found in the open, when we own our stuff, and begin stepping forward…

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Links

Take the PTSD Self-Check at www.Jenkins.tv/PTSD 

Learn more about the book, the video course, and more at www.Jenkins.tv/SW 

Over the past few months I’ve pondered 1 John 4:18 over and over. Here are two translations-

“There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love” (ESV).

“Love never brings fear, for fear is always related to punishment. But love’s perfection drives the fear of punishment far from our hearts. Whoever walks constantly afraid of punishment has not reached love’s perfection” (Passion).

I want to highlight three things from the verse above:

Perfect love
Casts out fear
Fear = not yet perfected in love

Perfect love

The word used in this passage doesn’t infer we’ll always love each other without flaws, rather it suggests we will love each other maturely. The Greek word for “perfect” here is th3e same world used for “complete.” Paul uses the same word in Colossians 1 when he says that he endeavors to present “every man complete in Christ” (Colossians 1:28). The word translated is telios, meaning “reaching their full potential.” Or, “fulfilling the purpose for which it was created.” In the same way Paul longed for his congregants to live their purposes, John wants us to “love our purpose.”

What does that kind of love look like?

Well, a telios love pushes fear out and makes massive space for grace.

A la 1 Corinthians 13, it hopes for the best, believes in the best, and never fails- even when the other person being loved clearly falters. In fact, this love keeps no record of wrongs at all. It actually endures and abounds all the more aggressively when sin is present (see Romans 6:1).

How did He love the Church? How mature- telios- was His love? He abandoned all of His rights and offered her everything.

**Casts out fear **

John also tells us that mature love dominates fear. It makes people feel secure.

Here’s how intensely it creates security: the same word used of “casts out” fear is the same verbiage used throughout the New Testament to describe how Jesus treated demons. When He bumped into them, they had no choice but to leave. He expelled them. He forced them to go.

Perfect love drives fear away with this same passion.

This, of course, is the exact opposite of what we most often do. Rather than driving fear away from the relationship and communicating, “Hey, come in close… tell me what’s really happening…” we actually invite fear and place it on the person like a cloak of shame.

Let’s be honest. We often like it when others have a “healthy” measure of fear, because it allows us to control the relationship, to maintain the upper hand.

The more you exercise control, the less intimacy you experience. The more you hide, the less vulnerability you share. Fear kills both intimacy and vulnerability.

That said, let’s ask another question: What makes us feel afraid?

Quite simply, we fear punishment.

John says it clearly, “Fear involves torment” (1 John 4:18).

We believe we’ll be hit with emotional (or physical) distance, abandonment, or shame. As such we hide as an act of self-preservation and self-protection.

**Fear = not yet perfected in love **

John tells us that the one who is afraid has not been made complete in love. Now, it’s easy to look at that person and say, “Hey, it’s your fault. You need to get whole. You need to get healthy. I can’t provide your emotional needs.”

There’s some truth to that. You cannot be responsible for another person’s emotional wholeness.

At the same time, however, you can create an environment in which grace abounds. And you should when you’re in covenant relationship. This means that wholeness is both their responsibility and it’s ours. In other words, if they’re afraid, YOU may be the one who’s not loving perfectly / maturely. Love may not have yet done it’s work IN you, as it’s not yet doing it’s work THROUGH you.

No, I cannot control your belief patterns and response. Yes, I can represent the presence of Christ to you, giving you space to come clean and walk into the person you were designed to be. In other words, even though I cannot “perfect” you in love I can provide space that gives you the greatest possible chance of the Lord doing that work in you- by loving you “”perfectly." And you can do the same for me.

Here’s what I’ve seen / learned firsthand:

If people don’t feel secure with you, they’ll fish for compliments and affirmation.
If they do feel secure, they’ll reveal their flaws.
Notice the shift. The first has to do with performance and reveals the relationship is on a performance criteria. They don’t know that you love them, so they’re seeking verbal evidence that you do. The second option reveals grace. They know they’re loved, and they know they have the grace to come clean.

More in the talk…

Waiting, though hard, creates sacred space where great things happen. Waiting can be a time when God does something to you so He can then do something through you.

Yes it’s a period when- many times- we wonder if God even sees us. Many times, even, we want to blame Him for what’s happening while we wait…

If we’re going to blame God every time something bad happens, we also have to credit Him every time something good occurs. This act of maintaining a divine balance sheet, a “God” scorecard, is an odd game to play. Eventually, you learn that there aren’t many tidy answers. You let go of the need to understand everything, and you simply let grace do its great work…

Over the past few months it hit me: rest is part of the rhythm of life. In the same way that good music depends on the times when the instruments are NOT being played (think about it- if there are no “rests” the you simply have noise), so also does life depend on the times when we’re off.

This is a principle that goes all the way back to Creation…

We think of our days as daylight and then nighttime. But, in the Creation story we read this refrain over and over- that there was “evening” and then “morning.” In other words, days originally began with night time, not daytime… they began with rest, not activity.

This is why Jesus was pulled from the Cross before sundown. The Sabbath began as soon as the sun dropped. That was the sign of a new day… the rest.

Here’s where it gets interesting in the Creation story…

Adam was created on the 6th day- at the end of the day. By the time he’s scooped from the dirt, God has been busy making all the animals that fill the earth (see Genesis 1:24). That is, Adam is created at the END of the 6th day.

Then comes the seventh day…

Which begins with evening (rest)…

Followed by morning (and a complete day of nothing but… yes… rest).

In other words, the first 24-plus hours that Adam was around… rest.

The story of Eve’s creation is interesting, too. God creates her from the side of Adam. He does so while Adam sleeps (Genesis 2:22).

Paul tells us that “woman is the glory of man” (1 Corinthians 11:7). That is, when we see her shine, we can presume that the man has lived his calling- that he has promoted her, elevated her, and loved her well. He shines by causing her to radiate.

It’s interesting, though. She’s the crown of Creation (the final jewel that’s created), and she comes FROM the man. Adam was required for her to be made.

Yet Adam slept through the entire process. That is, the greatest thing he ever participated in happened WHILE he rested.

What do we see?

We’re made for presence- not performance.