Assumptions

Take Responsibility for Your Assumptions

Our heart is the great record keeper of our lives. Every event and what we believe about those events, are systematically grafted into our heart, shaping our attitudes, actions and how we respond to today's circumstances. Your opinions about yourself, the world and God are not, as some would say, the product of your circumstances, but the product of what you have believed about those circumstances. Unfortunately, some of our assumptions, and some of what we take to heart, are not always true. If our assumptions are false, our perceptions and responses will be inconsistent with the truth as well. To take responsibility for our actions, we must first take responsibility for our assumptions.

Whether it was true or not, what we have believed about what others have thought about us plays a powerful role in defining who we are today. Our heart is so sensitive to the criticisms or compliments of others that they can mold and shape the way we see ourselves, and everything else, for the rest of our lives.

If critical and devaluing relationships with people have such a devastating effect on the heart, what happens when we believe God is angry with us? What if we believe He is disappointed in us, constantly criticizing, continually finding fault with us? What happens to the heart if we see ourselves as a disappointment to the One whose opinion is the only one that matters? Hope is deferred and the heart is made sick when we don't believe God accepts, loves and affirms us. A false opinion of God, of how He sees and feels about you, will always break your heart. Misunderstanding leads to mistrust, self-reliance and self-righteousness. The way you believe God sees you will shape how you see Him, how you see yourself, and will dominate the landscape of your Christian experience.

When the words or actions of people we thought were more spiritual told us we were unworthy, what did that tell us about God's opinion of us? When our failures told us that God couldn't accept us, did we allow that to shape how we see His love? When misunderstanding and mistrust led us to question if God was unloving or unfair, did we believe it? Did we simply accept false ideas as truth and go on to shape our lives around it? Or did we hold it up to the test of God's word, and "examine everything carefully, and hold fast to that which is good"? (1 Thes 5:21) Few of us have. Few of us have understood how important it is to take careful and forceful control of the gateway to all eternal reality-our heart.

Open your heart to God and be willing to believe the truth as He reveals it to you. Raise your expectations of the truth. Refuse to settle for anything that causes you to hide your heart from God and rest securely in full confidence of His love. He is with you and on your side. Rejoice as hope in the truth shapes how you see Him, how you see yourself in Christ, and how you respond to everything else.

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