When today’s struggles open wounds in our hearts, it is very easy for the enemy to pull us towards negativity and propel us into an unhealthy emotional and spiritual place. During these dark times, our thoughts and minds easily turn away from trusting God, and our positive plans and intentions seem to fall by the wayside. Yet even when we consciously give up on God and attempt to run away from Him because of our sadness, self-pity, anger, disappointment, or lack of faith, He never leaves us! God is always closer than we know, and He shares in our experiences of distress. Although God never leaves us, He has given us the gift of free will, so we can choose to continue on the negative path, which will keep us from knowing the truth and being set free, or we can turn to Him for help. God knows that the world can be a challenging place to live, because humans hurt each other so much, which affects our identity and self-esteem negatively. But Jesus, gave His life on the cross so that past, present, and future sins could be blotted out! When God says to repent, Jesus is not angry with us, but longs for us to turn around and return to Him so we can experientially live the abundant life. In our renewed relationship with God, we will learn to to work out what is in our hearts through prayer and will experience self-forgiveness and self-love, and have the power to forgive our offenders and let it go. Love defeats the darkness and negativity within us. God’s love and presence is the breath of fresh air we need to experience recovery and healing from the effects of living in this imperfect world.

“So repent [change your mind and purpose]; turn around and return [to God],that your sins may be erased [blotted out, wiped clean], that times of refreshing [of recovering from the effects of heat, of reviving with fresh air] may come from the presence of the Lord” (Acts 3: 18-19).