Issue 29: The Effects of Negativity Do You See These in Your Life?

 

One of the surest lies that negativity brings into our hearts and minds is that life has left us behind and that we can never succeed or do well with the little that we have.

Proverbs 13:23 notes that “Abundant food is found in the fallow ground of the poor…” This verse indicates that even the poorest person on the face of the planet has the potential for abundant return on the very ground upon which he/she stands.

God has made a provision for you, in the skills and abilities that He gave to you, meagre though they may seem, so that you may prosper and succeed in the important things of life. He intends for you to prosper in the things that pertain to eternity and the things that last far beyond the destroying and disintegrating forces at work around you.

God sent His Son Jesus Christ into the world to shatter the chains and barriers that hold us back from reaching our full potential. Through his death on the cross and resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ has given us the potential to enter into an eternal love relationship with God. Through Jesus we have been invited into the eternal communion or fellowship of God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. It is not simply an adoption into the family of God, but an invitation into their love and intimacy.

Negativity on the other hand, moves into our lives to rob us of the intimacy of our relationship with God. It not only creates a shadow over all that God has promised to us through Jesus, but robs us of what God has already given to us. It aims to disintegrate the life giving promises of Jesus in our lives. It seeks to rob us of the abundant life that Jesus promised to us, and the joy of serving God with all our might.

Negativity seeks to create fear and uncertainty in the area of our destiny and purpose and produce the corrosive elements of cynicism in the things that we do. Negativity tugs at our resiliency to changing times and seduces us to move against the work of God and those who faithfully serve Him. It instigates inflexibility and intolerance in our hearts and impacts the relationships that we have with others. Negativity selects our friends for us and drives us from the positive life-giving presence of men and women of God.

Negativity robs us of an inner resiliency to changing times and new challenges and takes away the vibrancy of life. Negativity takes away from the “Christian” person the abundant life, peace and joy that Jesus has given to him or her. Note that it takes away what has already been given, not simply that which had been promised.

Negative people turn the Word of God around to question why God has not fulfilled what He has promised, when they have not used what He has already given to them. They have not developed or nurtured the promises of God within themselves.

John notes that our ability to overcome external difficulties and forces arises from the presence of Jesus within us “… because greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world.” 1 John 4:4.

Brian Houston points out that “Negative people draw on negative experiences and build their beliefs and opinions around them. Then they justify their position because of what has happened to them.” Those experiences are certainly real, for many people have suffered incredible abuse and atrocities in their lives. All of us have circumstances that have attempted to overwhelm us. However, those experiences should not continue to be the foundation upon which we build our lives, or rather the foundation upon which we disintegrate our future.

Positive people, on the other hand may have suffered in similar ways, but they have, through Jesus, moved beyond those experiences and have broken through. They have become “committed to changing themselves to line up with the Word of God,” rather than changing the Word of God to meet their circumstances.

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