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Healthy & Redeemed _ From Holes to Wholeness - HT Hole Theory · Military Broadcast Radio | MBR Talk

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Welcome to the Healthy and Redeemed podcast hosted by Healy
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Eicherd. Healy is a licensed counselor
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with a passion for helping Christians live healthier lives
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emotionally and spiritually. Each episode combines the truth
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of God's Word with practical advice to help you in your
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everyday life. Whether you want to grow
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emotionally, strengthen your faith, or handles life
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challenges with more peace, this podcast is for you.
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We're so glad you joined us. Let's get started.
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To God be the glory. Welcome to the Healthy
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Overdeemed podcast. I am your host.
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Haley. Thank you so much for joining me
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today. I wanted to do a little bit of
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follow up from our last episode. I wonder if you have been
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replacing your thoughts and how that has been going for you.
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Sometimes it is very hard when we have been entrenched in our
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negative thoughts for a long time to actually make that
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change. And so I wanted to do a little
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bit quick follow up to last episode before we get started on
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our topic today. And that is one of the
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techniques I used to help people who are having a hard time
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actually creating their healthy thought replacement is to use
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the Bible. And I do this with clients.
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A lot of the time when when clients are really struggling to
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think of something healthy, the Bible is a great place to go for
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that. So I wanted to take a few
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scriptures and read those to you and pull out some of the things
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that would make good replacement thoughts.
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God's promises will always run through the healthy thought
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criteria well or like at 100%. So is it truthful?
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Is it encouraging? Is it helpful?
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You will always have yes to those in regard to God's
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promises. So let me share 3 scriptures
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that I think are helpful if you're feeling depressed or
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hopeless or kind of having those really down and negative
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thoughts. The first scripture comes from
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Isaiah 4110 and it says so. Do not fear for I am with you.
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Do not be dismayed, for I am your God.
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I will strengthen you and help you.
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I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.
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Isaiah 43 verses 2 through 3 says when you pass through the
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waters, I will be with you, and when you pass through the
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rivers, they will not sweep over you.
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When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned.
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The flames will not set you ablaze, for I am the Lord your
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God, Isaiah 46, four says even to your old age and Gray hairs,
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I am he, I am he who will sustain you.
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I have made you and I will carry you.
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I will sustain you and I will rescue you.
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These are really great scriptures to go to when you
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need some encouragement. Isaiah is packed full of those.
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So let's look at those scriptures in reference to we
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want to create some healthy replacement thoughts from those
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scriptures. Let's pretend like our negative
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thought is I can't do this anymore.
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We would replace that thought with from that scripture we just
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read, God will strengthen me. So we have the thought I can't
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do this anymore or something related to that.
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Our replacement thought would be God will strengthen me.
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Our negative thought would be I have no one nowhere to turn.
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And our healthy replacement thought would be, God will help
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me, I am done, I'm as low as I can go would be our negative
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thought. Our healthy replacement thought
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would be God will uphold me. Our negative thought might be I
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am all alone and our replacement thought would be God is with me.
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Our negative thought might be I'm so scared I don't want to do
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anything, I can't do anything. Our replacement thought might be
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God will protect me and enable me to persevere.
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Though things feel overwhelming, I will be safe.
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Our negative thought might be, I can't do another day, it's just
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too much. Our healthy replacement thought
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would be, God will sustain me, God will rescue me, God will
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carry me. So any scripture that has a
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promise included in it is a great one to use as a healthy
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replacement thought. And you can see as we have that
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negative thought, it pops into our mind.
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We replace it with a Scripture that's made personal to us.
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Please remember that although we're having feelings, they
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don't tell us the truth. We rely on God's Word for truth.
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That's why Scripture is a great place to find our healthy
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replacement thoughts. We can feel a lot of things but
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that doesn't make them true. Our emotions can be very wish
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washy and double minded. They can be back and forth.
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We use our God-given mind to discern truth.
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The Holy Spirit discerns truth for us.
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Our wisdom comes from the Lord and that's what we want to use
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as we begin to think healthier every day.
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I do want to encourage you. Oftentimes we will find that a
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lot of our negative thoughts are really identity based.
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As we dig into God's word and we discover who we are, how much
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God loves us, how much He's concerned about us.
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This will take care of a lot of negative thoughts over time.
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So just keep digging into the Word, trusting the Word to
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sustain you. As you keep replacing those
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thoughts. Pretty soon it'll become more
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and more natural to do that. We're only going to speak
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truthful, healthy, and encouraging things to ourself.
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OK, what are we going to talk about today?
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Well, actually, I wanted to share with you a theory that I
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had. So I think I've said this, or at
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least I've alluded to it on previous episodes, that normally
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when just something stays on my mind a while, that's kind of how
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I choose what I'm going to talk about.
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And so this has been on my mind to share.
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I don't know why it's a theory of mine.
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It's not. I mean, I can find support for
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it in scripture, but did it come exactly from scripture?
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No, this is my theory and it comes from the journey that I
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had when if you listen to We're Back and you know My faith walk
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that I have loved God followed him all my life for all that I
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can remember and but I rededicated my life in my late
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20s, mid to late 20s and through that process of trying to
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understand what had happened. How can I go from loving God
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and, and that didn't change, but that my behavior was so off and
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I couldn't kind of figure out like why I got so off.
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I know a lot of it was that I wasn't based in Scripture, that
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I didn't know the word well enough to obey it and I didn't
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get in and read it. Therefore, I would not be
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convicted. That's convenient, right?
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So you can end up justifying a lot of this stuff in your mind
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if you don't read the Bible. But when you really surrender
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your life to God through Jesus Christ, that produces a heart
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change where you really want to be convicted on things.
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You really want to be told that you're not doing well.
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And so anyway, that's where I am now.
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I like to be convicted back then, not so much.
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Now I do, I want to follow God with my whole heart, soul of
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mind. But this theory, it's called the
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HT hole theory HOLE. This was a theory I created
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based on my own wrestling with my issues and kind of why I was
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doing the things that I was doing other than just not
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reading the Bible. So this analogy, this theory was
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basically that we are, when we're born, we're like a cup, a
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whole cup. Like you can imagine a Styrofoam
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cup. I have actually have a cup in my
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hand. It's a cardboard cup.
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When I've talked about this before, I usually use a
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Styrofoam cup. But anyway, but either imagine a
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Styrofoam cup or a cardboard cup, OK.
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And we are like this when we're born, when God forms us in our
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mother's womb, we are whole, we are complete in a spiritual and
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physical sense. Job 14.
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One says that mortals born of woman are a few days and full of
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trouble. And I I take that to mean that
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it doesn't take long. Once you're born, you're in a
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fallen world, raised by fallen people, surrounded by fallen and
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sinful people. It is hard to be complete as God
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made us to be when we're living in this fallen world, Ephesians
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one verse 4 says. For he chose us in him before
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the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight.
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I think that was the original design.
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We're made in his image. But, but because we live in a
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fallen world, things happen. And so that's kind of what I
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believe in this theory is that we're we're whole, but as we
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live in this world, things start getting all messed up and we
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start getting holes in our cup. And So what do these holes look
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like? What makes them?
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So here's some examples. And I have the cup in my hand.
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And so if you hear a sound, it's a hole being made in the cup.
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A hole might be formed from getting rejected by our parents
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or our caregivers in some way. Maybe others reject us.
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Maybe we are hurt physically or emotionally by others.
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Maybe we're ridiculed or hated or despised.
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Maybe we've been hit or molested or raped.
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Maybe we've been insulted or teased.
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Maybe love was given to us conditionally only if we perform
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well. Maybe we were told to be quiet,
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be seen, not heard. Maybe we've been told or someone
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acted like we didn't matter. Maybe someone said that we have
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no value. Maybe we were forgotten and each
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big or small thing that happened in our life as we grow up and
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even as adults, holes are made. We live in a fallen world and so
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holes are definitely going to be made in our cup.
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We feel like we're not good enough.
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We've been put down, rejected, ridiculed, abused.
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So we may have a lot of holes in our cup or we may just have a
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few. But because we have these holes,
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we start looking for things to make us feel complete.
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Because if we think about these holes and we try to fill this
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full of water, it might hold some water for a little while,
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but eventually it's going to come out because there are holes
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in there. And even if we didn't try to
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fill it with water, we just don't feel complete.
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We don't feel whole. So we might start looking around
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to the world to fill our holes. So we might look to good grades
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or an education, hoping that fills our holes.
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We might look to a spouse, children or other people to fill
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our holes. We might look to a job or money
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to make us feel whole. We might look to alcohol or sex
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or even drugs to help us fill whole.
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And you know, honestly those will fill you up temporarily.
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They will kind of, you know, you can kind of pop out the thing
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and it looks a little bit whole and probably even feel pretty
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whole temporarily. So we keep looking for things of
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the world to fill us up to, to fix our holes.
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And honestly, this is what kept me unhealthy for a long time.
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I had holes that were created from just different things in my
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life. I could see very clearly that I
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really wanted to be loved and accepted.
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And so I did all sorts of worldly things to feel that.
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And that was really the downfall, how I got so far from
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acting appropriate for a Christian.
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But I'm here to give you some good news.
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This is what I found out, that we can look in the world for all
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these things to complete us, to fill us up, to fix our holes,
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but there is nothing in this world that's going to do it.
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The only thing that can heal us from all those holes that have
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been made is Jesus Christ. God promises to make us new, and
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He does make us new. Once we surrender our life to
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Him, He makes us new. He completes us.
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He repairs the holes, He restores those holes where our
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cup can be filled. Then now I believe that he will
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fix our cup here. Now, I haven't got the perfect
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analogy of how this works specifically, but I do feel like
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he fixes us enough that our cup can be complete and whole and
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hold water. But when we get to heaven that
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we will receive a new cup completely new with no scars, no
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bumps, no bruises, nothing. It's going to be all new.
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And to me that is very exciting. But we do get to experience a
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little bit of that heaven on earth that our cup can be whole,
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we can be fixed, repaired, healed, because that's the
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promise that God gives us that we can be that.
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But we have to seek him to find that.
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There's no other way that we're going to find that now.
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I mean, if we're feeling empty and down and and lonely and all
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that, like our spouse can help, our friends can't help, can
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help, but they're not going to be what completes us.
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So if we're constantly searching, like I can't feel
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good about myself unless somebody is saying this to me.
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I can't feel good about myself unless someone accepting me or
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approving of me or all this stuff that we look to to fill us
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up. We're going to always be
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looking, we're always going to be searching, We're always going
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to be longing. So people can help, but they're
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not going to fix our cup. Only Jesus Christ can do that.
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And He did that on the cross for us.
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So we have to go seek Him, turn to the Lord, give Him our life,
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and He makes us whole. Are you struggling with anxiety
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or worry? God has given you the power to
18:57
change those emotions. In the workbook Changing Your
19:00
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19:03
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Whether you're seeking personal growth or you're a therapist
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working with Christian clients, this resource can guide you
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get your copy and start changing your feelings and your life
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today. As I'm thinking about this
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concept, like the Do you remember the story?
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It's in John 4, It is Jesus having a conversation with the
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Samaritan woman. They are at the well.
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She is getting water during a certain time of day that makes
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us think that she could most likely be an outcast in her
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community because she's going when nobody else is but Jesus is
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there. So she's drawing water from the
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well and Jesus asked her for some and she's kind of shocked
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and a little taken back because he's a Jew, she's a Samaritan
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and they don't associate and. So Jesus is asking her for
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something to drink from her container of water.
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Like that's kind of big so but Jesus basically tells her that
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if she knew who Jesus was, she would be asking him for a drink
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of living water. And with some more of that
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conversation, Jesus ends up saying in so they kind of
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converse a little bit more. And then in verse 13, Jesus
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says, Jesus answered, everyone who drinks this water will be
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thirsty again talking about the water in the well.
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So anyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again.
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But whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst.
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Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of
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water welling up to eternal life.
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It's not the things of the world that's going to fill us.
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The things of the world keep us thirsty when we go to Jesus, the
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spring of water, the spring of living water that will cause us
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never to thirst again. God gives us something through
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Him that cannot be satisfied with earthly things.
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Ultimately, we're going to be satisfied perfectly and
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completely in heaven. But He does offer some of that
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right here. The other scripture that comes
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to mind is 1 from Jeremiah 213 is God speaking to his people
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and he says my people have committed 2 sins.
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They have forsaken me, the spring of living water and have
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dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water.
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So God is referring to himself as the spring of living water.
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Isn't that beautiful that it's in the Old and New Testament?
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And that's beautiful in and of itself because if you've been to
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a spring of water like that's already miraculous.
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But anyway, so he refers to himself as the spring of living
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water. He is saying that they are,
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instead of partaking of him, that they have dug their own
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cisterns. Isn't that crazy?
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God is offering them a spring of living water.
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And they say, Nah, we're going to, we're going to dig our own
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cisterns. We're going to, we're going to
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try to get some water out of this.
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And then those cisterns are broken.
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They're they're not even holding water.
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They can't hold water. So the Israelites, instead of
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seeking the best water, they're looking to their own doing to
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get filled. They are looking to their own
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broken stuff that doesn't feel, that doesn't hold, that doesn't
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do anything. They're looking to that to fill
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them. And God's over here saying, hey,
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excuse me on the spring of living water.
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Why are you doing that? But isn't it crazy?
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We do the same exact thing? And that's why I think this
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theory has stuck with me so long because I actually created the
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theory. That's what's called HT hole
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theory. This was before I got married,
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before I was a counselor. Just that own my own wrestling
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that that's it's so true. We're looking to get filled up
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from the world and it never will fill.
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It will never fill. So I so I don't know if this
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theory is correct or it can hold water, so to speak.
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That's a good one right. I, I don't know how how far that
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analogy could go, but I do know that God has created a certain
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way. He's created us to be in a
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relationship with him and we are always going to be looking for
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something to satisfy because we need, he's created us to need
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him. And so we're always going to be
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looking to get that need filled. And so whether it was a hole
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made or it's just a lacking a relationship with God that's
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going to leave us searching. If you've been searching is
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right here, friend, right here. God, the one that's created you
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wonderful, you made just for him.
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You will not be satisfied until you rest in him.
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Now, there's a great quote from Saint Augustine.
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So he's a real old guy, Christian theologian,
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philosopher that was way back, like died in 430 AD, like a long
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time ago. Anyway, he wrote a book called
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Confessions and it's kind of an autobiography.
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We're kind of talking about his spiritual journey and how he
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converted from being a Catholic to Christianity.
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That's from my understanding. But anyway, that's all of a
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sudden point. He had a quote that says you
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have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless
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until it rests in you. Gosh, isn't that good?
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Our heart is restless until it rests in you.
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So if you're feeling restless, maybe you're not resting in God.
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Maybe you're looking to other things.
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I, I know I have and do I do the same thing.
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It's like so natural and we're always kind of fighting these
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natural tendencies of the scars of our holes.
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If we didn't feel loved when we were young, we're going to look
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for other ways to get that. You're not going to be
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satisfied. This is what I found out.
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You're not going to be satisfied until you get that from the
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Lord. If you were abused or hurt in
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some way, there is nothing in this world that will heal you
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except our Lord and Savior. He promises this for His
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children and I. This is, I mean, this is a lot
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of why I started this podcast because I, it breaks my heart
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that there's so many people hurting in this world.
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And I just want to share with you like God loves you.
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He wants you to be healed and He wants to make that happen in
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your life. And maybe there's some obstacles
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stopping you from turning to Him, but I pray that you do that
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because He's got everything you need.
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We don't need to look to broken cisterns or make our own trying
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to get what He's over here trying to give us.
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We're not going to find what we're searching for in the
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world. We were made for Him.
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We need him. That is the only thing that is
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going to make us whole. So I'd like to close with the
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Scripture from Psalm 42, verse one through 2.
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It says as the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul
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pants for you, my God, my soul thirst for God, for the living
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God, friends, our soul thirst for God.
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Now, not everybody knows this, you know, it's thirsting and
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we're looking to the world to fill us, and that's not going to
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fill our souls, thirst for God. That's what our hearts, our
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souls, our bodies are looking for.
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They need God. So I would just encourage you
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today to turn to Him and let Him heal you.
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It doesn't matter how many holes you have in your cup.
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God is here and He's willing to heal.
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Remember that we can seek fulfillment and worldly things,
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but these ultimately are going to leave us unsatisfied, making
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us feel restless or empty. We're never going to be
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satisfied when we chase the things of this world.
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So when you have a need, friend, I want to encourage you to go to
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God. Give him that need.
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Don't seek that need to be filled by other people or other
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things. God is the only one who can
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restore, redeem and complete your cup.
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Now let's go and live healthy and redeemed, reflecting Jesus
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Christ rightly in all that we do.
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Thank you again for joining me, and Lord willing, I'll see you
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next time. Thank you for listening.
29:42
The information provided is to be used as a resource.
29:45
If you have a serious mental issue, we would encourage you to
29:47
contact the therapist in your state.