The Grace Journal

I'm a backpacker. 

Not a granola eating, Birkenstock wearing, outdoor camping and enjoying it kinda backpacker. 

I'm an emotional backpacker. 

Even before my counselor used that term, I knew the concept well. When problems and feelings would arise, rather than deal with them, I would stuff them down inside...into my emotional backpack. 

In the beginning...it was merely uncomfortable...like when you bring a purse that is too big and heavy on a long shopping trip. It's more annoying than anything, but you'll survive. 

However, as time went on and my backpack got fuller and fuller of issues and hurt feelings and secrets, I began to stumble under the weight. 

Once the weight became too much to bear...it began to control my life. It was my master. 

My emotional baggage told me everyone would leave me, so don't get close. So I didn't. 

My emotional baggage told me you have to be perfect or no one would love you. So I tried. 

My emotional baggage told me you are unworthy. And I believed it. 

My emotional baggage told me no one would miss me if I was gone so if I killed myself, I wouldn't matter. And I thought long and hard about doing just that. 

I was a slave....controlled by my issues to the point for constant nerves, self-doubt and self-destruction. 

After finding Christ, I had to make a decision: who was my master? 

In Matthew 6:24 says it so well "No one can serve two masters. You will either love one and hate the other, or you will be devoted to one and despise the other." 

Although this particular passage is in regards to money, the truth still holds: you can not truly love something if your attention is divided. 

Why do you think Abraham Lincoln said "a house divided against itself can not stand." He understood the concept that division leads to death. 

So you have to decide...what do you want from life: life or death? Light or dark? 

For me, I had to make the decision to not just empty by emotional backpack, but to deal with the incidences in my life that led me to have those emotions in the first place. 

It is a process that is still going on. I still see a counselor to talk through my past and some of my present. Some days are better than others, but I have made the choice to serve only one master...and it's not my emotions. All they've done it cause me heart ache and pain. 

Instead, I am daily making the concious choice to allow Christ and his word to be my guide...my master if you will. And unlike being ruled by my emotions, Christ is not a heavy load. 

Matthew 11:30 says "my yoke is easy and my burden is light."

Ask yourself...who's master today? 

In Love, 

Keri