Legacy Guardians Pass Along Wisdom
Are you a legacy guardian? Do you sometimes (or often) think about what wisdom you might pass along to other generations so they could bypass all the silly (or serious) mistakes that tripped you up in life?
At 3 AM, when I should be sleeping, these thoughts run through my mind. Before I went to sleep last night, the Lord burdened my heart to stand in the gap for the generations of my family line who walked in pride and insisted on holding on to unforgiveness and bitterness. Many of those people have passed on but failed to walk in the fullness of their God-designed destinies. They rejected God and chose to live their lives filled and focused on past wounds, mistakes, or regrets.
When we choose to vent or process aloud (or dramatize or respond to others in a less than Christ-like way), it doesn’t glorify God. It’s not harmless. It gives the enemy a foothold in your life. It shows unforgiveness. Pride and unforgiveness can open the door for the devil’s harassing torments. Our words and actions can give the enemy a legal right to access and curse our bloodlines.
Women can get especially chatty when we don’t understand why things happen the way they happen. We tend to process aloud with girlfriends in person or via the phone, offering an instant replay of conversations or events to anyone who will listen. Social media is another danger zone. But have you ever considered that we’re releasing unforgiveness into the atmosphere as we're venting? More than that, we’re giving breath to death in our lives—death of joy, peace, the fullness of God’s love, and death of the gift of a tender and correctable heart posture before God.
Sin multiplies when we’re venting and processing. Sometimes, we’re also unintentionally slandering, gossiping, judging, or fault-finding. We’re declaring our rightness and everyone else’s wrongness and holding ourselves captive with a self-pity-filled, victim mentality. Our sinful words and unbridled emotions spill out onto others, which, when left unchecked, gives the devil a foothold in their lives as well. The worst example is when the conversation begins with, “Would you pray for me.”
Life and death are in the power of the tongue, my friends, and we don’t need to take everything to our girlfriends to process. We can do a new thing in the generations of our family line and take our concerns straight to God. The Holy Spirit is our Comforter, Counselor, and Friend. We can invite Him to show us what’s going on. Jesus is ever-interceding on our behalf. Have you ever considered asking Jesus how He’s praying so your prayers align with His?
If people are always coming to you to vent, process, whine, or complain, ask the Lord what that’s really about. Are you enabling those behaviors? When people come to you, are you helping them grow in spiritual maturity? Are you teaching them to take everything to the Lord in prayer? Perhaps you might ask, “What has God said about this? How has God directed you to pray? What scripture are you praying?”
So, back to the opening question, “What wisdom might you pass along to other generations so they could bypass all the silly (or serious) mistakes that tripped you up in life?” Watching your words would have to be the top-rated advice I might offer future generations. I’d love to hear what wisdom you would impart to others.
