Day 23, March 28

“My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?” –Mark 15:34

Inside the city, near the Sheep Gate, was the pool of Bethesda, with five covered porches. Crowds of sick people—blind, lame, or paralyzed—lay on the porches. One of the men lying there had been sick for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him and knew he had been ill for a long time, he asked him, “Would you like to get well?” (John 5:2–6 NLT)

There was a lot of creative adaptation that took place among everyday life during the Great Depression. When women noticed that the cotton sacks in which flour was sold could be repurposed into other items, many families began sporting flour sack clothing. When the flour mills picked up on this trend, they began printing designs on the bags as a means of enticing the purchase of their flour over a competitor’s.

Even after paper sacks replaced the cotton versions, the mentality that sparked it—waste not, want not—continued to thrive in many of those who grew up during the lean years of the Depression. Even in the more prosperous decades that followed, many from that era continued to suffer under the anxiety that stemmed from years of lack.

Rather than seeing ourselves through God’s eyes, many of us define our identities based on old wounds, and we often don’t want to change because that would change how we identify ourselves. We are hoarders who hold onto everything because we fear not having enough. We are liars because we feel a need to be liked. We are control freaks, alcoholics, drug addicts, short-tempered, impatient. And Jesus comes to us all and asks, “Would you like to get well?” Invite the Holy Spirit to speak into your soul, not only to allow Him to show you how God sees you but also to point to those areas where you have built up a false image of yourself that is based on an old wound. Ask God to begin the process of healing that wound and correcting your false image of yourself to more closely align with who God made you to be.

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