Use the Bible To Change Your Thinking
Can the Bible help you and me overcome childhood trauma? The answer is an unequivocal yes. One way the Bible helps us in recovery is by changing our thinking. We walked out of our childhood with victim mentality and it needs to go. Daily Bible reading helps us see that we are not fated to be a victim but an overcomer.
The Bible has much to say on thinking. Let’s take a little survey and see what God’s word can say to us about our thinking and how to change it. These are verses that I highly recommend you write down in your journal and read over and over. Meditate upon them. Memorize them. And let their truths sink deep into your mind and heart.
“For who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ. 1 Corinthians 2:16
Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. Philippians 4:8
Apply your mind to instruction and your ear to words of knowledge. Proverbs 23:15
Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect. Romans 12:2
Use the word of God to change your thinking
The last verse I listed, Romans 12:2 is the one that has impacted me a great deal. It tells me to renew my mind. As an abuse survivor, my mind has been impacted by my brain which has been in a constant fight-or-flight loop. So, when I do things that rewire my brain and stop the fight-or-flight response, I make room for my mind to be renewed by Holy Spirit.
Cynthia A. Kubetin says of this verse in her book, Beyond the Darkness: Healing for Victims of Sexual Abuse, co-written with James Mallory, M.D., “It was telling me not to be fashioned or shaped by my own experiences of sexual abuse, which cause me to be unstable, but to be changed by letting God make me new again. By overcoming what the world had done to me, the victory in my life would be witness that the will of God is good and acceptable and perfect.”
The world offers survival, as Kubetin points out. “The world had offered only surviving, and that’s what I did when I depended only on the world--I merely survived. I didn’t commit suicide, but I ached inside every day. But God offered restoration--a new life. He taught me that there was much more than surviving, that there was overcoming.”
Do you want to overcome? Are you tired of just surviving? Do you know that as a child of God you can overcome the effects of trauma? I pray that God will impart hope to you, that you will realize that you won’t always feel anxious and depressed.
Prayer for healing
If you want to ask God to change your thinking through His word, start by praying this prayer:
Oh Lord, I come to You feeling so battered and bruised by what happened to me as a child and how my brain reacted. I need a touch from You. I need Your power to help us recover. Fill me with the hope that I can get better, that healing is possible. Speak to me through Your word, and let Your word change my thinking. In the name that is above all names we pray. Amen.
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