Wholeness: replacing replacments

As I've eluded to often, people are prone to put their hope in a variety of worldly things. Sometimes people cling to these perceptions to the very end, no matter how much it fails them. I'm sure this is the Genesis of many controlling people. It's an attempt to make their perception of hope and fulfillment finally work. This ironically tends to destroy the thing that they long for, not improve it.

Yet, in other cases, longing and fear collide which leads to a total loss of hope. Yet instead of looking to the creator as they should, they redefine their original source of hope. They simply replace their source point with something else. Hoarding, pornography, and an absurd amount of pets are but a few examples. Usually, it replaces some sort of human relationship. There is still that longing for connection or that feeling of being loved. Yet, there is now that fear of being hurt as well. When we are afraid of what we long for, it can create a huge incongruence in our life; hence, the replacements.

Most alternative sources of hope have a few things in common. One, is they are far easier to control. Second, is they lack the ability to disappoint and betray us. Third, they are very tangible, easy to identify or implement. While they always seem easier and safer to the one doing the replacing, and in the short-term they may very well be. However, in the long term, they can become self-destructive if left unchecked. These things can never truly replace what we long for, nor can they give us what we genuinely need. Leading us to compound our replacements to unhealthy levels.

I know it's really easy to say, all we need is God, but how do we apply that? For a nonbeliever, this seems very intangible and abstract. Even the believers often only treat it as following a list of rules, which is a very one-dimensional approach. But how are we supposed to be righteous, if we don't know who God is? True righteousness is modeled after the very nature of God after all. This is what makes holiness relational, not just systematic. The more we seek God as a living entity; the more he will reveal the truth behind our brokenness. The better we understand our lack of wholeness, the better we understand what it is that we really need to let go of. Instead of just the cosmetic surface behavior, the legalists teach. Once God sees that we are truly sincere about letting go, then he will take it away.

So I urge you to take a long hard look at yourself. Consider what you have replaced God with, or at least settled for. Then have an honest discussion with self and God about it. Then, you find yourself on the right path to wholeness.

Has a nation ever changed its gods? (Yet they are not gods at all.) But my people have exchanged their glorious God for worthless idols. Be appalled at this, you heavens, and shudder with great horror,” declares the Lord. “My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water. -Jeremiah 2:11-13

if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land. -2 Chronicles 7:14

The Visual PARABLEist