HOW SERIOUS ARE YOU?

How serious are you to becoming well?

To receive help?

To walk through your journey however painful?

Those were questions I posed to myself. Many times having to remind myself over and over again, "am I serious on my walk?" Knowing my tendencies when things get too emotionally painful, I want to quit. Reliving painful memories is not pleasant.

I had to truly come to a place of being so tired of my past of shame, guilt condemnation, sadness, etc. and want so desperately to seek freedom.

Some people use the excuse of their problems to draw attention to themselves. I have seen this, I have even been this. They are not really serious at all in getting well. Only to say, "hey look at me." "Poor me, I cannot do this."

Jesus posed the question to the man who for 38 years was suffering with a disorder "How serious do you want to get well?"

This is also the question from the Lord to us, "How serious do you want to get well?"

"There was a certain man there who had suffered with a deep-seated and lingering disorder for thirty-eight years. When Jesus noticed him lying there [helpless], knowing that he had already been a long time in that condition, He said to him, Do you want to become well? [Are you really in earnest about getting well?]" —John 5:5-6

Isn't this an amazing question for Jesus to ask this poor man who had been sick for thirtyeight long years: "Do you really want to become well?" That is the Lord's question to you as you read these words right now: "Do you really want to become well?" Do you know there are people who really don't want to get well? They just want to talk about their problem. Are you one of those people?

Do you really want to get well or do you just want to talk about your problem?

Sometimes people get addicted to having a problem. It becomes their identity, their life. It defines everything they think and say and do. All their being is centered around it. If you have a "deep-seated and lingering disorder," the Lord wants you to know that it does not have to be the central focal point of your entire existence. He wants you to trust Him and cooperate with Him as He leads you to victory over that problem one step at a time. Don't try to use your problem as a means of getting attention or sympathy or pity.

When I used to complain to my husband, he would tell me, "Joyce, I'm not going to feel sorry for you." "I'm not trying to get you to feel sorry for me,"I would protest. "Yes, you are," he would say. "And I'm not going to do it, because if I do, you will never get over your problems." That used to make me so mad I could have beaten him to a pulp. We get angry at those who tell us the truth. And the truth is that before we can get well, we must really want to be well—body, soul, and spirit. We must want to enough that we are willing to hear and accept truth.

Each of us must learn to follow God's personal plan for us. Whatever our problem may be, God has promised to meet our need and to repay us for our loss. Facing truth is the key to unlocking prison doors that may have held us in bondage.

(Joyce Meyer)