An opportunity was before me to reach out and meet someone new. I could tell she was trying to find a way to talk to me. I continued to look her direction but clammed up. I am not like this as an adult. What was wrong with me today?
How hard it was as a child to engage a group of girls you don't know. I would never have walked up to a crowd the way I push, I mean encourage, my children to do. Today it is still a struggle. I am more confident in who I am since I know to who I am responsible.
But those old tapes play in my head. Remember those tapes when you were in middle school and high school. I couldn't have been the only girl out there who thought the world was watching and judging every breath she took. One wrong move and the 'friends' would laugh and cut you down...or so the tapes played.
Those tapes are really encouragement from the one who does not want to lift me up but wants to tear me down. Another tidbit I share with my children. We have a choice every time we open our mouths to build up or tear down. We have to take that tape that plays the evil one's put downs and rip the tape up.
It is only when we know who we are in Jesus that we can take the monotonous tapes and learn to replace them with the words from the only One who wants to give us unconditional love. There is no other love that is unconditional. The words of Christ are the words we want to replace the tape with and turn on our Jesus CD.
Take the tape of the past and transform it into a new creation--the CD
2Cr 5:17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!
