What Causes Your Heart to Skip a Beat?
There are many occasions that can cause your heart to skip a beat—being heads over heels in love, getting engaged, holding a newborn in your arms, seeing friends and loved ones you haven’t seen in years, or a new job. But the question to ponder is what occupies your heart that takes you away from the creator.
God gave us life, and He has expectations, to be the first love of your life. To not be replaced with another person, habit, or thing. We are to love Him with all our heart, soul, and mind.
Deuteronomy 6:5
You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.
God wants to be the throne of your life. To be your everything, so when you think of Him, your heart skips a beat in love for Him, as He loves you.
Jeremiah 31:3
I have loved you with an everlasting love.
It’s so easy to search for someone or something else that doesn’t involve God. For me, it was new age. Thankfully, Jesus saved me from this indoctrination that believes in designing their life without God. (Read my testimony).
What I didn’t realize is how I replaced God with comfort in my habitual remedy for sugar. It’s what makes my heart skip a beat, planning what sweet to have for the day. This addiction has controlled my life for ten years. It started after heated arguments in my marriage, as it gave me temporary relief to feel something sweet in my life. Sadly, I’ve been doing it for so long it’s become an automatic reaction, and a replacement of God’s love for me.
I invest in diets but always return to the same cycle. I lose weight, gain it back, as I’ve allowed the pain in my life to consume me and become more important than God.
God wants my devotion. He wants your devotion. To rely on Him in all aspects of your life. Even when life events tear us apart. Take Jill Kelly, the wife of Hall of Fame quarterback Jim Kelly, who lost her son to a fatal genetic disease called Krabbe leukodystrophy. About a year before her son passed away, she wrote this journal entry:
“Of all the gifts I’m most thankful for in this very moment, Lord Jesus, You’re it. In this world with all its abundance, You are life to me. You are everything. You keep on giving; there is no end to Your grace and goodness. In You I am held together. Held together with a love that binds the parts of me that cannot function alone. If I rely on my brain, it will confuse me. If I rely on my body, I will fall apart. If I rely on other people, they will never meet my expectations. If I rely on my heart, it will bleed and break.
When I look to You, Lord, and rely on You, I am whole, and I can live. I am able to think with my brain, stand on my feet, love people for how You created them to be, and possess a heart that beats for You and allows me to go on.”
Jill was able to praise God, in the midst of her son’s suffering. A profound statement of faith in placing God’s love above her pain. She is an author, public speaker, and podcaster, teaching others about this disease and her courageous journey.
Her words touched my soul. It showed me how God’s love can carry you through the strongest storms.
Addiction of any kind can control your life, change you from the inside out to someone who doesn’t abide in God’s will. It can distort your perception on life and hold you captive in an unhealthy lifestyle, in your mind and body. Jill’s words ‘if I rely on my body, I will fall apart.’ These words pierced my heart as I’m relying on my body, it’s cravings for sugar and nighttime snacks for comfort and not surrendering this habit to God.
Christ is my life; however, I haven’t surrendered everything to Him, as I depend on sweets for solace and not Him. I desire to be in a place like Jill, in the midst of pain, relying fully on God, as I can’t do this without Him.
If you’re like me, faced with an addiction that separates you from God, let’s pray together.
Lord Jesus,
Examine me from the inside out. I truly want to be whole and complete in Your eyes. Shine your light on the darkness within, the shame I hide, the guilt, resentments, anger, envy, pain, sorrow, and selfishness.
I’ve faltered, made bad decisions, and feel entitled. Sins you bore for me on the cross. You willingly endured all this pain, the weight of sin, and died so I could be saved.
Yet, I still cling to earthly desires of the flesh. I’ve damaged the precious gift you’ve given me and do it without thought, with an insatiable hunger to be satisfied. It’s all about my comfort. My escape. My temporary relief.
You’ve paid the price for my sins. You’ve felt the sting of my pain. The woes of my heart. You suffer them with me. Why can’t I walk away from this endless cycle of self-gratification.
I ask for your healing to remove the automatic actions that impairs this body. It’s been a battle in my life for ____ years. I know the pain attached to it, the hardships, feeling unworthy, scarred, and hopeless.
I don’t want to be this way, living beneath the plans you have for me. I want to abide in Your light, Your peace, and Your will for me. I want to see myself as You see me, and not dwell in self-pity over all the wrongs in my life.
Lord, remove the darkness that entraps me in this habitual cycle that seeks to separate me from You, and replace You. Break down the walls of bitterness, pain, and hopelessness. Help me to be whole in You. May I be a walking testimony of the power of Your healing and hope.
I can do all things through Christ. Philippians 4:13
“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” Jeremiah 29:11
In Jesus’ name,
Amen
Hi, I’m Cathy.
A blogger, photographer, author, passionately driven to pointing people away from new age indoctrination to find redemption in Jesus Christ.
I’m a mixed blend, excited to share all I offer...
Blog-Twisted Roots
Do you find yourself asking questions about new age, whether the practices and beliefs are leading your soul to redemption?
As a reformed new ager, I was saturated in the belief I could co-create with the universe and manifest a life of abundance. But I was deceived. This blog is to point you to the truth of God’s words and how He perceives the new age indoctrination.
Fine Art Photography
I always dreamed of being a professional photographer when I grew up. It was a journey to reach this goal, but I did it!
I owned a home-based studio for over a decade but have been shooting images for two decades. Now, semi-retired, I have a collection of my most cherished images of landscape or nature available for wall décor.
