10 Biblical Truths to Renew Your Mind

Welcome to Life Reclaimed, a place for honest conversations about faith, healing, and real life.

We are three friends learning to walk and freedom and trust God through the messy middle.

Pull up a chair.

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Let’s dive in.

Welcome to the Life Reclaimed podcast. We’re so glad you’ve stopped by and joined us today.

My name is Kim and I’m here with my two friends, Brenda and Cindy.

Over the past season, we’ve spent time talking about what it means to become healthier, spiritually, emotionally, physically, and relationally.

As we wrap up our healthy season, we wanted to leave you with something practical.

Scripture tells us that we are transformed by the renewing of our minds.

The thoughts we think matter, the stories we tell ourselves matter.

The beliefs we carry matter.

So true.

Many of us find ourselves, discouraged, anxious, overwhelmed, because we unknowingly believed things that simply aren’t true.

So we wanted to bring to you practical ways that you can actually apply the word of God to some of your thinking.

Brenda, tell us a little bit.

We’re going to start today thinking about a story about Jesus.

Love it.

In Matthew 4 verses 1 through 11 and a lot of you may be familiar with this story.

This is right after Jesus is baptized and he is sent for 40 days on a fast into the wilderness.

Oh, man, I are we going back to fasting?

We’re going back to fasting.

So there’s an event that takes place towards the end of this fasting period.

So I want you to imagine 40 days with no food.

This is somebody who’s depleted.

He may even be feeling super alone, even though he was out there seeking his father.

I’m somebody who’s in a vulnerable state.

Sure.

And who but shows up during this state, the enemy himself.

Satan shows up.

And Satan’s goal in this story is to get Jesus to turn away from his father.

And that’s always Satan’s goal.

So Satan, the Bible tells us, is the father of lies.

And in this time, Satan attacks Jesus’s health, his physical health, his emotional and mental state, and even his spiritual health.

And he’s attempting Jesus to sin in these areas.

And each time Jesus uses the word of God to battle Satan.

Love this.

So in this episode, we want to give you scripture to battle the lies that Satan is feeding you.

And I think it is a picture of hope for each of us.

Yes.

When we can recognize the lie that Satan’s trying to feed our minds and turn us away from God.

So we hope that you can get something valuable out of each of these 10 truths we want to share with you today.

So this is like taking every thought captive, and these are the thoughts that we have and then battling them with the what is going to transform our minds.

So that neuroplasticity coming into effect the spiritual work of relying and trusting on God in his promises in his Word.

And also the, you know, deconstruction of lies that we may have believed for a lot of time that are not necessarily true.

So I’m really excited about this bonus episode.

I can’t wait.

So we’re going to share 10 truths to renew your mind.

As we go through these truths, listen for the one that stands out to you.

The one that makes you think I needed to hear that today.

Maybe that’s the place where God wants to meet you.

So Truth Number One, God isn’t finished with me yet.

And here’s the lie that we sometimes believe.

I’ll never change.

I’ve totally believed that.

Yeah.

And this may be not a daily battle.

Maybe this pops up every now and then for you as you think you’re experiencing the same emotions over and again.

But we want to give you the scripture.

Philippians 1:6 – being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.

There is so much hope in this scripture for you.

God is still working in me when growth feels slow.

And that can be hard when we feel like it’s snail’s pace.

But we want to encourage you that growth comes with persistency Yes.

Perseverance and God is right there with you.

So have there been an area of your life where growth took longer than you expected?

And I think for me, in my life, how is it that now I am in my early 50s and I am just now recognizing that everybody has a story?

I have walked through some trauma in my life and some hard things.

And I think I put myself in a, in a bubble and allowed myself to react negatively to people or react quickly.

I think I’ve shared this before.

And I at one point, that’s never going to change.

That’s just always going to be my response.

Like, it’s just who I am.

I think I’ve even been told that.

This is how you are.

Yes.

This is who you are.

And I know you don’t have to be that way.

And God is slowly changed that for me.

So, yes, have confidence.

You can change.

That’s awesome.

Wow.

That’s so good.

Have there been areas of your life where growth took longer than you expected?

100%.

And I have definitely believed this lie.

I’ll never change.

And just like you were saying, Brenda, how people have said, well, that’s just how you are or that’s just who you are.

And I can 100% relate to that because I’ve got a myriad of tapes of people who’ve said, well, that’s who you are.

That’s how you are.

This is how you react in this type of situation and you’ll never change.

In fact, I can tell you a story.

Are you ready?

Being a young dance teacher, I started teaching way younger than you should.

12.

Okay.

Never mind.

It’s fine.

But I started teaching at 12.

I had an older, probably college age teacher who also worked at the studio , who looked at me and said, you’re nothing but a two-bit dancer and you’ll never amount to anything.

Wow.

And I have to tell you, that was.

That’s horrible crushing because I’ve always wanted to amount to something.

I mean, I started teaching at 12.

I was obviously, you know, trying to be good at my craft and working really hard at it.

And so I went to school and got a degree in dance so that I could back at her, which I had never talked to her.

I mean, I lost contact with her years and years before I ever went to college.

But in my mind, I wanted to be able to say, I’m not just a two-bit dancer.

I actually have a degree in dance.

I’m very skilled at my and I know a lot of really good, important things that could keep someone safe and help them to, you know, be an excellent dancer and an excellent, I strived to be an excellent dance teacher.

And so the I will never change has been something I’ve been working on since I was young, very young.

I think it’s amazing that you can figure out the root Well I’ve thought about it a lot.

I realized young that I did things out of spite.

And because I wasn’t necessarily probably doing it for the most healthy reason, I was originally trying to pursue that out of spite, but along the journey, God one day said, she doesn’t matter.

Her voice in your head doesn’t matter.

It doesn’t matter what she thinks you are or what she says about you.

All that matters is what I think, but it took me a while to get there.

I’m glad you got there.

God works in amazing ways.

Right.

So Truth Number Two, I am not walking alone.

I love this.

Yeah.

The lie we sometimes believe is I’m alone in this.

And , you know, it’s interesting because oftentimes we’ll isolate ourselves.

We are alone because we’ve chosen to step back rather than go forward and look for people to share our life with, to help us get through a hard time, somebody that we can tell what’s going on in our life.

But we’re never alone.

God is always with us.

And if we will step out, he will provide those friendships and support that we need.

The scripture is Hebrews 13:5 – Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.”

So I know God is with me in every season.

I think the beginning part of that verse, we often don’t hear.

We hear the never will I leave you, never will I forsake you.

But I think the idea of keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have is also talking about the things that distract you and the things that you chase, which also can end up making you feel isolated and alone because you’re chasing these other things and not necessarily him.

So how have you experienced God’s presence during difficult seasons?

Well, you know, I’ve mentioned it several times in our previous podcast that it was just the worst season of my life.

And yet, I felt God’s presence through the peace that He gave me that was just not normal.

You know, somebody shouldn’t feel, you know, a piece like that.

And, and then through the people that he brought into my life for sure.

Love that.

That piece that transcends all understanding that comes straight from him and not from us.

That’s so cool.

I like it.

Truth Number Three, I can trust God with what I cannot control.

This is good.

The lie that we sometimes believe, everything depends on me.

Your scripture to battle this lie.

Proverbs 3:5-6 – Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.

So good.

I can release what I cannot control and trust God with the outcome.

You can kind of tell I got a little emotional.

Yes.

Surrender has been hard just overall to give over control.

And people ask me, how can you give control over to something you can’t see?

And my answer is because I can’t do it, but I can’t do it by myself.

And when I try it my way and try to clean and have control, it fails.

Sure.

And I know God is with me because his presence is thick.

I can’t I can’t give a better word for it.

You feel it.

I feel it.

Yeah.

And when you’re in the Word, you can feel the Holy Spirit.

What areas of life are hardest for you to surrender?

My emotions.

I do a lot of I’m fine.

Yeah.

I’m fine.

You know, I think I mentioned an episode before, you know, working on healthy emotions and learning that I am a stuffer. 

As most of us are.

So, you know, surrendering fear, surrendering, pain and anger and, yeah, overall just giving up the emotions and letting myself feel them and trusting that God’s going to hold me through it.

I think for me, my area that I have a hard time surrendering is actually also, I can do it.

I can do it.

It’s fine.

I can do it.

Right.

But I literally can’t do it without Christ’s strength, and I don’t want to do it if it’s not the area he wants me to be working in.

So that surrender of control of what I’m capable of doing and what I should be focusing on, that’s hard for me, but I’ve been working really hard on that.

How about you?

Do you have one?

Well, I think as women, too, we just take on a lot and we want to be in control of everything.

I know that I feel at times that, you know, nobody else can do it like I do it, you know?

So it’s probably true.

And then you’re just spent.

You’re completely spent.

And sometimes you just have to give up some of that control control.

And then, you know, with my heart giving my heart and my emotions, you know, to the Lord and surrendering, surrendering that to him.

Yeah, that’s so good.

All right.

Well, Truth Number Four.

Christ is enough for me.

I love this.

And the lie that we sometimes believe is, I’m not enough.

I don’t know if y’all have ever experienced that lie, but that lie I have been working on, I don’t know, since the day I was born, probably, but I’ve always believed I am not enough.

And weirdly, in my mind, I go, oh, I’m right.

I’m not enough because, but God.

Right.

So I need God to make me enough.

But for some reason, I never made the leap that I have God.

So I don’t need to be enough.

He is enough, but for some reason, that has been hard throughout my life to really connect.

And that is a lie that Satan puts in my mind mind to distract me, discourage me, put me on the floor when I should be riding high, you know, worshiping the Lord, but I literally will be taken out at the knees because that lie will come in and, you know, take a situation that probably could have been a normal, good situation , but I’ll literally ruin the whole thing because I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m not enough.

So scripture to battle that lie. 2 Corinthians 12:9 – But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.

So the renewal of my mind is my worth is not based on my performance, and that is really hard for me, but so true and so important.

So how has perfectionism affected your health and relationship with God?

So let’s just start being a dancer.

I mean, you are trained and trained and trained like a machine to be able to execute at perfection level with performance and all kinds of, you know, various other things added on top of it.

And my whole life, I’ve strived to be perfect because I need to be perfect in this part of my life.

I need to be perfect in that part of my life.

I need to be perfect in this part of my life.

And honestly, nothing in my life was perfect.

Nothing.

It was it was, very, very unhealthy and I had a lot of trauma starting very young.

And so it has definitely affected my relationship with God, because if I believe that I’m not enough and I’m not perfect, then I also believe because I’m not enough and because I’m not perfect, God doesn’t love me.

And that plagued me for decades.

And I have had to really take that thought captive and replace it with verse after verse after verse, because I don’t have to do anything to accept accept the free gift of God, that He sent a son to die on that cross, to love me enough.

I don’t have to do anything to earn that.

Amen.

Truth Number Five.

Peace is available to me today.

The lie we sometimes believe I’ll have peace when everything is fixed.

Will you?

Uh.

Your scripture to battle this lie.

Philippians 4:6-7 – Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

So you kind of renew your mind to say, I can experience God’s peace even before my circumstances change.

That’s so good.

What helps you return to God’s peace when life feels overwhelming?

Being in his word, number one, deep breaths.

Let’s start there.

Having gratitude.

Yes.

I think looking back at what God is already accomplished in chaos, how he can take a mess and make it clean. How he can bring order to chaos that you, you’ve already walked through, that he is faithful and just recognizing grace and mercy that he offers you.

Those are what bring me back. Because I can tend to, you know, once it’s all in order and we’ve had all the conversations and said all the things or, you know, did, did all of the, I’m sorry’s and, and we’ve had all the hard conversations.

Everything will be fine.

Everything will be fine.

Everything will be fine.

Fine, fine, fine, fine. Uh, it’s fine.

It’s fine.

Um, but it’s not fine.

Because inside there’s this turmoil just raging.

And I, I don’t, I can’t function in that.

I rec recognize that.

I can’t function in that.

I’m not whole or healthy in that at all.

So wanting to recognize God’s peace is available to you even before anything is taken care of.

Wow.

I love that.

You know, talking about that peace that surpasses all understanding is kind of mind-boggling when God grants it to you.

And all of a sudden you have this calm where you once had anxiety or you have this assurance where you once had stress and, you know, the whole world is falling apart.

But you all of a sudden have this perspective that God’s got it.

I got you.

It’s almost hard to explain.

Yeah.

It’s hard to accept too.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

And you know when someone has asked .

Why are you okay with this?

Or you need to do this or need to do that?

Or why aren’t you doing that?

Why aren’t you doing X, Y, and Z?

And when you have a piece about it, and that’s when you know it’s from God.

Because there’s no, you can’t explain it.?

Yeah.

I had a good friend and they went through a very traumatic problem and they went back to church that week and the church people were like, what are you doing here?

You should be at home morning or suffering or whatever.

And they were like, we want to be in the house of God.

Like, we need desperately to be in the house of God.

And I thought, man, that’s so funny, right?

Because some people will tell you, you know, go isolate, go mourn on your own after your, you know, bad experience or whatever, and then come back to the fold.

But their point of view was so different because they wanted to be in the house of God, because that peace, they needed it.

They needed that shalom.

So I think that’s part of the hope that God provides for us.

Love it.

Truth Number Six, rest is holy.

Wait a minute, wait a minute.

Is that your word for the year?

Rest, yes, for sure.

Love it.

The lie we sometimes believe is rest is lazy.

Oh, right?

But the scripture that we can battle that with is Matthew 11:28-30 – Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.

So to renew our minds, to just think that God God created me to live from rest, not exhaustion.

And I know that we talked about this because you cannot pour from an empty vessel.

Yes.

And if you keep going and going and going, if you’ve got that control thing that we were just talking about, where it’s all on you , pretty soon you’re so depleted that you’re not any good to anyone at all.

And so it’s in the rest that God can really renew us, speak to us.

We’re filled with that peace.

So why do so many of us struggle to slow down?

I don’t know if we’re the right ones to answer this question.

I don’t know either.

I don’t, I think I think it’s because we believe the lie.

We are listening to that lie.

And, you know, and it could be not just that rest is lazy, but it could also be the lie of, let me just finish this one thing.

I just have one more thing to do.

And then I’m going to do that.

And when I’m done with everything, then I’m going to be able to rest.

And, you know, I mean, I know that I operate that way.

It’s really hard for me to just rest when I can look around and I can see, you know, all this stuff that I should be doing instead.

And I think a lot of us are like that.

So, you know, just praying about it, asking God, help me.

I think it’s that awful five- letter word, the G word, guilt.

Yeah, I do.

I think I do.

I think we feel guilty.

Yes. That we’re just resting when we should be doing.

When we should be doing.

We have.

That’s the Martha story.

Yes.

And we have a laundry list of to do’s.

And I when I one thing I have learned is that the to-do list will always be there.

Yes.

It doesn’t matter if you do one thing or five things on your list, the list will always be there.

It’s continuously growing or it’s the same list every day based on where we’re at in life.

So we have to commit to God created.

I love that.

God created me to live from rest.

Not exhausthaust yet.

That’s so good.

Love it.

Okay.

Truth Number Seven, I was created for community.

Oh.

That means we’re meant to be in a group with people sharing life together.

The lie we sometimes believe, I should be able to handle this on my own, man, that independent thinking was so ingrained.

That that is definitely a lie I have spent a lot of time worried about and thinking about our I should be able to handle all this on my own .

Don’t worry.

I don’t need help.

You know, there’s this thing that talks about, I am happy to help other people.

I am not helping to happy to ask for help, receive help, or even acknowledge that I need help.

And I think that’s definitely part of this lie, right?

Oh, yes.

Yes.

I can’t handle it on my own, but I think I can.

So I’m going to keep striving, you know and not resting.

The scripture to battle this, because we want to battle this.

Ecclesiastes 4:9-10 – Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor: If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up.

We’re going to renew our mind because healing grows in connection.

It really, really does.

And when you start to realize that, sure, I could try to do this life alone, but it’s so much better when I don.’t.

It’s so much richer when I have other people around me that we’ve linked arms together and we’re moving through this life together.

So how has community helped you grow healthier?

Well, I think it’s just that.

It’s the idea that we’ve come together as a community.

We’ve linked arms together and we are walking through life, sharing everyone’s joys, sharing everyone’s heartache, sharing everyone’s hard moments and hard seasons and being able to rely on each other for when we need something.

And the hardest thing for me was to ask for help.

I’m going to give you another example.

Are you ready for this?

I was in a very hard time, hard season.

My boys were young.

I was working at this one school.

I didn’t have, I wasn’t making enough money, even though I was working five jobs.

I didn’t have enough money to cover all of the things I needed to cover.

So I had to sell my car and somebody donated a minivan to me.

And I have to tell you, I was very arrogant at the time.

My whole life, I had always said, “I’m not driving a minivan. I don’t like minivans. They’re ugly.”

Blah, blah, blah, blah.

But how grateful were we when somebody stepped in?

And what sense of humor does God have?

When somebody stepped in and donated a minivan and I kept telling myself, am I the poster child for donations?

Like, I, you know, I can’t do it.

I’m not enough.

Everybody has to come to my rescue.

But then it’s this.

It’s that I actually needed the community around me and I was being ungracious at the time.

I needed to be more gracious to be more thankful for that community that stepped up and rallied around us and not prideful and not take that journey of, I can do this on my own.

And so I started accepting help step by step.

I started asking for help.

And then I started being en able to be grateful for help.

And that was a hard, hard journey breaking down that pride to be able to ask for help.

But what a blessing for everyone who was able to help you.

For sure.

That’s what they kept telling me.

Yes.

I mean, people, they love that.

I love that.

You know, when you’re able to help somebody, it just fills your heart.

I literally had a friend say, because I didn’t want to accept something they were trying to give to us.

And I said, and he said to me, you cannot deny my blessing from God by not accepting this help.

And I was like, ooh, yes, that’s what I was just going to, I was just going to say that, you know, when people, God has gifted them to bless others, that’s what we’re called to do , to be generous and kind and caring and helpful, all those things.

Take care of your neighbor.

And so when you say, no, thank you, you’re denying.

I can do it myself.

I’m proud of you.

You’ve come a long way.

No more minivan.

No more minivan.

That’s funny.

Okay.

Truth the Number Eight.

My feelings are real, but God’s truth is greater.

The lie we sometimes believe, my feelings tell me the whole story.

I don’t know if you’ve ever believed that before.

And I feel like this is the whole take every thought captive because my feelings and my thoughts create my actions, which then determine the trajectory of my life.

And so if I’m believing my feelings, which may or may not be looking at this situation in a logical manner at the moment , it could be setting me down a path to go down a bad trajectory.

And I just need to take that thought captive.

I need to take these feelings and emotions captive and I need to start asking myself, are these true?

Is this real?

Is this actually the situation we’re in?

So So scripture to battle this.

1 John 3:19-20 – This is how we know that we belong to the truth and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence:If our hearts condemn us, we know that God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything.

I love that verse so much.

We’re going to renew our minds with this.

I can acknowledge my feelings without letting them define me.

And I’m going to take it one step further or my situation.

My feelings are valid, but that doesn’t mean they get to define who I am, what I’m doing, or where I’m at.

That’s great.

How do you balance emotions and truth?

It’s not very easy for me.

Before, I would say I didn’t.

I didn’t balance.

I went straight off of, I am a, what do they say?

You wear your emotions on your sleeve.

I am a very emotional person.

I have always been a very up and down with my emotions and everyone knows my emotions.

If I’m happy, you know it.

If I’m mad, you know it.

If I’m.

And so I don’t consider myself as emotional as I used to be, because sometimes it could be a wrecking ball in a situation, given certain situations.

My emotions were causing things that didn’t need to be there.

And so that truth of God’s word has really helped change my emotions and how I control them and being able to ask myself, hey, you’re feeling this emotion right now, but is that really true?

Is that what God says about you?

Is this really the situation you’re in or are you just feeling hurt?

It’s okay to feel hurt.

Feel it, be hurt.

But don’t let that feel of hurt.

Decide what you’re going to do next.

Decide what you’re going to say next or decide anything about what’s coming because I need to get through my emotions and back into my logical brain.

So I’m not in my limbic system because that causes me to make bad choices.

That’s those emotions that cause you to, you know, fight flight or freeze.

Yes.

And so we got to go back to what’s causing that emotion.

What’s the root?

What’s underneath it?

Yeah.

Because if you respond out of that surface motion, it’s not going to be there.

Fighting a fight, you don’t need to fight.

Yes.

You’re running away from something you don’t want to run away from or need to run away from.

Right.

Or you stay stuck in it.

Yes.

You know, you’re nervous system shuts down and then that’s where you live.

You live in that.

So it’s important to catch yourself and remind yourself of the truth.

I have actually told myself the truth true story, and I say that in air quotes, the true story of why my emotions were feeling that way.

And when I’ve compared it with someone who was in that same situation , they’ve been able to say, that’s not actually how I interpreted it.

And they could tell me how they interpreted it.

And that actually was really helpful as well to be able to say, okay, I took that maybe wrong.

Maybe my emotions were triggered from something else.

And now when I can take that other person’s comparison, maybe , just maybe, it helps release some of that for me.

Yeah, that’s good.

Truth Number Nine comparison is not my colleague.

Okay, women.

This is our’s.

Listen up, yo.

The lie we sometimes believe is everyone else is doing better than I am.

You could actually substitute everyone else is better.

Everyone else looks better.

Everyone else has better.

I mean, you could literally substitute doing better with any of those.

That’s wild.

Right.

You know, and I think to the whole social media stuff, right?

I mean, influencers, so they seem like their lives are perfect , you know, and we want to try to copy that, you know?

And that is one way to just send yourself down spiraling.

So the scripture, to keep in in mind then, is Galatians 6:4-5 – Each one should test their own actions. Then they can take pride in themselves alone, without comparing themselves to someone else,for each one should carry their own load.

That’s so good.

Yeah, it is.

Renew your mind with the thought God has given me my own journey to walk.

Oh.

And I feel like that kind of goes in hand in hand with your own gifts.

Right.

Like he gave each one of us different giftedness.

And like the eye doesn’t do what the hand does, which doesn’t do what the nose does, which doesn’t do what the feet do.

And that’s because we’re supposed to be doing it in community and we’re supposed to be actually not comparing that I don’t do it.

Working together.

But working together to fill those needs.

Right.

That’s crazy.

When I think this goes back to recognizing everybody has their own journey.

Yeah.

Yes.

And you don’t know, you do not know what somebody’s going through.

We are all so good at just showing up with a smile on our face and at church, wherever you are, you know, even I just remember our first Bible study when we hadn’t even met one another yet.

And you’re kind of surveying the whole domain, you know, oh, look at her.

I don’t know.

She’s really got it together or whatever, you know, and then as we really get to know one another, we realize every single person is dealing with something.

Yes.

Everyone.

And so don’t compare yourself to anybody.

Concentrate on just yourself and what you need to do.

And what God is doing in you.

Yeah.

Love that.

How has comparison affected your joy, contentment, or sense of purpose?

Well, I know that it’ll just completely wipe all of your joy out.

That is truth. True 100%.

Yeah.

No, there’s no joy.

And then you’re not content either.

You feel like I don’t, oh, my clothes aren’t nice enough.

Four boys, she’s so good at that.

And I’m so terrible at that.

And then it feeds right into your sense of purpose.

Like, what am I even doing?

What is, what am I contributing here?

And so, again, don’t compare yourself.

I’m going to go back to the social media.

Yes.

We’ve talked about that a few different times throughout the season.

But as women, we naturally compare ourselves.

We’re in a negative light, typically.

But social media, I think, has quadrupled that comparison.

And many of us are on social media.

Sure.

And now we’re not even just comparing ourselves.

We’re comparing our kids to their kids, our family, to their family, our houses, our cars, our events.

So they’re always on vacation or they look so happy or all these things.

And so I just want to encourage you if you find yourself on social media, maybe set a timer.

Yes.

If you find that you continue to go down rabbit holes like that, maybe God is asking you to set that down and surrender your social media because it’s not drawing you closer to God..

It’s feeding the lies and the strongholds that Satan has on you.

And I’m guilty of it.

I think we’ve all been guilty of it at some time or another and have had to set a timer or delete an app, like these things because you catch yourself feeding the lie and making the lie bigger.

Mm.

So we go from everyone else is doing it better than I am.

Well, I’m just not good enough and I can’t fix the problems.

And like you end up with all the lies just multiply.

Yes.

They stockpile.

They you’re buried underneath this pile of lies.

I also made a conscious choice.

I started going through and deleting certain content.

I’m really trying to redirect my feed.

And so I’ve been trying to add more of like Christine Kane and some of the people that you, you’ve talked about.

And, you know, when I delete something out, it asks you, why are you deleting it?

And you just let them know too much of this.

I don’t want it.

Too much of this.

And just start getting rid of those things that are telling you lies about yourself and instead replace them with life-giving messages.

Because there is a lot of good.

Oh, yeah.

Out there also.

Yeah, absolutely.

The algorithm is going to feed you what you go down the rabbit hole of and it’s going to try to manipulate your thinking in that area.

So I laugh because my Instagram is filled with with Christian speakers and the more that I listen to them, the more I spend time listening to the different Christian speakers, I get more Christian speakers added to my algorithm.

So now, my algorithm is actually kind of one of the places I’ve been able to go for a little bit of devotional as opposed to going down the comparison rabbit hole.

And I think it’s really real that you cannot know that this curated picture of this perfect moment with their family was followed up with 30 seconds later of them screaming at each other.

Right.

For sure.

We don’t know.

We don’t know.

That was a one moment capture.

Right?

That doesn’t mean their life is perfect.

So let’s not go there.

But I want to actually tag on to one more area of this comparison, beauty. .

So I know as a young girl, I would look at everyone else in the dance studio and say, well, that girl is scaryinnier than I am.

That girl’s hair is better than mine.

This girl dance is better than I do.

Her feet are better.

You know, I don’t have the turnout this person has.

So I would spend hours trying to be like these other people.

I was not born with good turnout.

My feet, I can get them as good as I can, but they’re never going to look like somebody who’s got these really uber flexible beautiful. Feet or my hips will never open for that beautiful turnout.

And so, I mean, we are limited to some of the things we have that we are born with.

That doesn’t mean I can’t be a beautiful dancer.

It doesn’t mean that my body isn’t beautifully designed.

And it doesn’t mean that I can’t make healthy choices to make it stronger or better.

But I also know that sometimes our young ladies can confuse other people’s beauty and assume that they are not beautiful.

And I just want to say that’ s a lie straight from Satan.

If you’ve ever looked at somebody else and said, there’s so much more beautiful than I am, I want you to take that thought captive and I want you to just shove it in the trash can where it belongs and stamp on it and light it in a bonfire because it is not acceptable and it’s not okay and it leads to really bad behaviors like anorexia, bulimia, or, you know, all of these other things because we’re trying to be beautiful and you don’t know that they photoshopped that girl’s waist.

Right.

So why?

Breasts.

Or anything.

Or hip.

And maybe not even photoshopped it.

They had a surgery or they had a, you know what I mean?

Who knows?

So I just want to say comparison can be on so many levels.

This is such a big, big lie.

And I think it’s definitely for women.

All right.

So Truth Number 10, God’s mercy is the new today.

And I really, really appreciate this.

So the lie we sometimes believe is I have failed again, and I’m going to take this one step farther, which is my lie, one of my lies.

I am a failure.

So not that I’ve failed.

I am the failure.

I spent much of my life with that as my lie.

And let’s think about this.

If I walk into a situation where I already have predecided that I’m a failure, how is that situation going to come out?

Not going to fail.

It’s going to fail.

It’s not good.

And so I really have to take that thought captive and ask myself, is that true?

Am I a failure?

Or have I had a failure moment?

Or have I had an error and I can actually recover from it?

Right?

So I really, really want us to think about this.

This is really important.

If you’ve ever felt like a failure or had a failure moment , do not allow Satan to tell you that’s your identity.

You are not a failure, just because you had a moment that failed.

You had a some parenting moment that failed.

You had a marriage that failed.

You had a job that failed.

None of those define you as a failure.

It’s just not true.

And the scripture for that is Lamentations 3:22-23 – Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.

We could sing that song, but I’ll I’ll spare you.

But literally, for us to be able to renew our minds and change those neural pathways, a setback is not the end of my story.

A failure moment cannot define me.

Only God has the right to define me.

How can we then respond with grace when we stumble?

Oh, man.

This is so good.

So what I am learning, I won’t say I’ve arrived.

What I am learning is when I hear that lie come in, I’m a failure.

The first thing I do is I ask, is it true?

Is it real?

Let’s look at the situation again.

Let’s look at what the word of God says.

Let’s think about this.

And then I go back to when I see God standing and looking at me in the mirror.

I’m looking in the mirror.

He’s looking back at me.

Would he say that to me?

Would he say you’re a failure?

Would he say you’re this terrible thing?

Never.

No.

He looks at me with such grace and love and compassion and kindness.

He doesn’t want the yucky things that have happened in my life.

He doesn’t want them to define me either.

But he definitely isn’t looking at at me with his finger saying, man, you are really a failure.

You never say that about me.

So if he doesn’t say that about me, the only way I can respond when I stumble is to look at myself the way God sees me.

And the only way I can do that is in his word.

I have to know His word enough to know what he says about me so that I can claim those in victory.

What do you think?

Am I think I am a failure.

Maybe some of us might hear you’re just a screw up.

Yeah, you’re just.

You’ll always be a screw up.

Yeah, you’re always going to mess up.

It’s just who you are.

You can’t get anything right.

Yep.

We hear that lie.

I’m a failure in different ways.

Yeah.

So recognize, though, that that is the enemy trying to keep you away from God and your true purpose that he has for you.

Yeah, he’s totally messing with me.

Totally.

Totally is.

And I have a choice in that.

I have the choice to allow him to mess with me.

Or I have the choice to say, m, I actually, not today.

I am not a failure.

I may have had a really bad moment, but I’m going to recover from this.

I can recover from this.

As we close today, remember this.

You don’t need to focus on all 10 truths at once.

That would be a lot.

A lot.

Maybe one stood out to you, maybe two stood out to you.

Maybe one touched a place where you’ve been struggling.

Maybe one is exactly what God wanted you to hear today.

We encourage you to write it down, pray on it, memorize the scripture.

Speak it over yourself this week.

Bust out your sticky notes.

Because transformation often begins with a single truth believed one more time.

And as we’ve talked about these truths today, you may have noticed something.

Many of the lies that affect our health point to a deeper question.

Who am I really?

Am I enough?

Am I loved?

Do I belong?

Am I valuable?

Does God see me?

Those are the questions.

We’ll begin exploring in our next season whole.

I can’t wait.

Because before we can fully walk in freedom, we need to understand who we are in Christ.

Yes.

That’s the key to unlock.

That is the key to unlock your identity in Jesus.

Let’s pray.

Holy Father , thank you for meeting us in every season of life.

Thank you for your patience, your grace, and your truth.

Help us recognize the lies that keep us stuck and replace them with what you say about us.

God, renew our minds, strengthen our faith. Give us courage to take the next step toward health and wholeness.

Remind us that you are still working, even when we cannot see the finished picture.

We trust you with our growth, our healing, and our future in Jesus’ name.

Amen.

Awesome.

Well, if you would like to answer answer the reflection of the week, which of these 10 truths do you most need to believe this week?

You can answer that question atclaim.net.

And don’t forget, we would love for you to give us a rating, a review as it helps other people find this conversation.

Thank you for joining us for this bonus episode of Life Reclaimed.

We’ll leave you there for now, and we hope you’ll join us next season as we explore what it means to be whole and discover who God says we are.

If you’re looking for something to listen to while you wait, we’re here to help.

We’ve created a Spotify playlist featuring some of our favorite worship songs from this healthy season.

These are songs that have encouraged us, challenged us, and pointed us back to God. Throughout our own journeys.

We hope they will encourage you and remind you that God is still at work in your life.

You can find it at lifeclaimed.net slash playlist.

We’ll also include a link in the show notes.

And remember, when God speaks truth, he isn’t just changing the way we think.

He’s transforming who we become.

And if you’re wondering why we keep following Jesus, even when life is hard, it’s because God isn’t finished with us yet.

Amen.

Amen.

See you next season.

As we close, we pray that you would notice Jesus meeting you in the ordinary moments of your week.

He loves you.

He sees you.

He is fighting for you.

To answer the reflection of the week, go to life reclaimed.net and you can send us an email or voicemail from there.

If you would like to stay with us, subscribing helps you catch each new conversation as it releases .

Until we are together again, may the grace and peace of Jesus go with you. 

Opening Passage

Matthew 4:1-11

Truths to Renew Your Mind

Philippians 1:6 – being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.

Hebrews 13:5 – Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.”

Proverbs 3:5-6 – Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.

2 Corinthians 12:9 – But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.

Philippians 4:6-7 –  Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Matthew 11:28-30 – Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.

Ecclesiastes 4:9-10 – Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor: If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up.

1 John 3:19-20 – This is how we know that we belong to the truth and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence: If our hearts condemn us, we know that God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything.

Galatians 6:4-5 – Each one should test their own actions. Then they can take pride in themselves alone, without comparing themselves to someone else, for each one should carry their own load.

Lamentations 3:22-23 – Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.

Scripture Reading

Spend time reading and meditating on the passages from this episode. Choose one truth to focus on this week and ask God to renew your mind through His Word.

Books

The Lies You Don’t Know You Believe by Jennie Allen

Get Out of Your Head by Jennie Allen

Healthy Worship Playlist

Continue renewing your mind through worship with our Season 1 playlist at LifeReclaimed.net/playlist.

Reflection Question

Visit the episode page to answer this week’s reflection question or send us a voicemail.