Breaking up is hard to do

Hmmm... breakups. Those aren't fun.

I’ve had my share of self-inflicted heartache, but I think one of the most challenging breakups I’ve experienced is the one with myself. That sounds silly, yeah? But the truth is, I’m STILL breaking up with myself.. everyday, every hour, every minute.

I look at my life NOW and look at my life a couple years back. I don’t know that girl anymore. That person is dead to me. When I accepted Christ as my Savior, I broke up with that person. Christ entered in, and the rest is history.

"Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!" 2 Corinthians 5:17

Ever so often though, I feel like I receive the phone call from that past relationship. And rather than ignoring the call, I choose to pick up and listen. I listen to the lies that tell me I am unworthy, and that I will never be good enough.

Sometimes my “ex” taunts me. How could you possibly impact other people with your past? lies. I don't know, I do research with isotopes. I'm just some nerd who occasionally throws some baking into the mix. What in the heck does that have to do with the Kingdom of God, yeah? More lies! And I can choose to sit and listen and entertain these lies OR I can hand them over the Jesus. I choose the second option!

I say all this to say that I don’t think that breaking up to yourself is necessarily a bad thing! Painful? Hard? Absolutely! But, in fact, I think breaking up to yourself is quite the contrary of bad. I think it is an AMAZINGLY, wonderful, extraordinary, awesome thing. Call it what you will – breaking up to self, dying to self. Sometimes I read my old journal entries just to see where God had me over the past few months. It makes me laugh.. in a good way! Breaking up to self is an everyday process. We must die to our former “me’s” daily. I read these:

5/3/2012: “Lead me where you want. Use me as You will. Let me nail my anxieties, fears, doubts, body image issues, jealousy, and pride to the Cross. Renew me God.

5/15/2012: “Lord, this verse is perfect for me today. I must deny myself.. Let me lay down this sin, idol, and struggle that I am having with myself..”

6/7/2012: “Jesus, break all my chains – Show me my sin and what needs stripped away.”

9/14/2012: "I know I am being called to surrender... something I've never been good at. I love control... Lord, take control and direct my life"

Pretty much every day’s entries have some sort of cry out along those lines. But the point I'm getting at here is WHAT IF something we see as truly heartbreaking and tough is actually super awesome and what we are called to do? And it is!

I truly must break up with me everyday! And it’s hard. Breakups are painful and uncomfortable and just complicated, and there's just a whole lot of things attached! Heck, I've been "dating" me for 23 years! But OH the beauty that comes with dying to that self. I read a lot of things on this whole “dying to self” thing because it is a concept that really intrigues me. I think it is because it is so supernatural. When I think about my past and the Spenser I used to know, there is no DOUBT in my mind that it is only by the Power of Christ that I am the person I am today. I so often hear of people that want proof for Jesus and the Bible, and while those are all great concepts to explore, I don't need that physical proof to see. I know by the change that Christ did in me how real it is.

One of my favorite quotes from another blog I’ve read on dying to self is written beaytifully and it says this:

“It’s been with some amount of surprise, then, that I’ve begun to see that the process of dying to self is a process of stripping away layers of sin encrusted with selfishness, and that glowing underneath all those layers is the true, complete version of who I was designed to be — the real me.”

How TRUE is that though? And how scary is that? I think that’s why I so often struggle with this breakup process. I see the person I am now, and I think ... "WAIT, this isn’t the person that I’ve tried to be for 23 years." (Notice my key word there… TRIED). With my new self, I don’t have to TRY. I just AM. I don’t have to be somebody. I am Spenser, new creation in Christ! And the exciting thing? The new ME is constantly, every moment just continuing to be refined to be more like Christ! Every moment I am awake, I am being transformed to be more like Jesus.

“For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son..” Romans 8:29

But, I have to remind myself that I have to keep breaking up with myself. I have to crucify all my old wants, desires, lusts, sins, and plans and hand them over to Jesus. He is the perfecter and He will continue to do a work!