katThis past Sunday at my church the pastor was explaining to us the meaning of the scripture Genesis 3:23 “23 So the Lord God banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken.”
What is the meaning of the phrase “to work the ground from which he had been taken?” The pastor explained this is like when someone goes back to the life they used to live or goes to do what they would do if they didn’t believe in Jesus.
He connected this scripture to the story of Lot’s wife. Lot’s wife turned into a pillar of salt when she looked back at Sodom. Lot’s wife had an attachment to Sodom. She was attached to wealth and physical things of the world; to her old life. In the same way-how many times have we had attachments to something or someone and tried to go back to that?
We must not turn back to those attachments or we will end in ruin. Our faith will die.
My pastor also said something that shook me to my core: people treat God according to how they’ve treated people in the past.
People do things according to their fundamental nature or desire. There are people who are thankful or loyal only when being treated well. If they find someone who loves them more they go elsewhere. A lot of people do that with Jesus- when they go through tests in life- they distance themselves or even abandon Jesus, and go back to the dirt from which they had been taken from. This is the heart of someone who is double minded, whose faith wavers. So we need to learn to step on the break of our hearts (this means to protect our hearts and thoughts) or eventually you’ll lose your faith. And when it’s time we need to learn to press on the accelerator of our hearts in order to fulfill God’s will for us and receive his blessings. It’s important to guard our hearts-if not we will be tempted to go back to our past, people, or things that aren’t so good for us.
Proverbs 4:23 ”Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.“
Side note, I took my mom and my aunt to a Korean spa as an early Mother’s Day gift for the first time! It was really fun going with them because they made so many funny jokes in Spanish. But know this-when you go to the spa for the first time you have to try everything in order to get the full experience! There are all kinds of rooms: cold rooms, salt rooms, and hot rooms. Life is kind of like that, I realized. But most people really can’t spend too much time in the ice-y rooms or in the hot rooms. They like neutral rooms like the oxygen room or the cooler rooms.
I also realized, keeping faith throughout our lives is like that. Sometimes we’ll go through tribulations and find ourselves in extremely difficult situations. The people who can handle those extreme environments- you know why they can handle it? Because of their heart, their character, their mentality.
People with weak hearts or mentality will say “it’s too hot” or “it’s too cold” and quickly leave and go back to the environments they are comfortable in-even if they aren’t as good for them, and could receive something better by choosing the harder path. They struggle to reach that higher level, because they want to be comfortable, so they miss out on HUGE blessings due to failure to take action. They fail to gain what they should’ve gained. People with strong hearts will say, “I can do this. I can sit here in this really hot room even though it feels like hell because I know it’s only for a moment and soon I’ll be in a better environment. This is just training. It’s helping build my endurance, pushing the limits to be able to do hard things, it’s helping me to become a better human being.”
It reminds me of this scripture…Matthew 7:13-14 “13 “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. 14 But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.” Few are those who can recognize and receive Jesus the messiah, entering the narrow gate of life. Few are those who can live out their faith until the end.
God is looking for people who thrive through difficulties because those are the people he can choose who will fulfill his history as his hands and feet; people who don’t give up or take the easy way out, who see the positive side of things.
So yeah, I realized a lot from the spa. I hope you all are encouraged to overcome any hard situations that may arise this week.
Praying for you all,
Kat <3
