We all wish for peaceful, calm waters don’t we? The more peaceful, the better. But, what comes out of us when we are in the storm, pressed down, shaken? That is what God is most concerned with. I can tell you what has come out of me the last two days has not been pretty. I’m fed up with the OCD. I’m fed up with having to deal with it and not being 100 percent better and yesterday I had a temper tantrum with my husband. Things didn’t go right at work. Things weren’t going to my satisfaction at home and I blew. Then, as I watched Joyce Meyer this morning, she addressed this very subject about what comes out of us during our times of trial and suffering. I thought, “wow, I needed that.” Then I got to work and something set off my OCD and bam, I blew again. I hope I pass the test in this area and get it soon. I would like to get out of the storm and into the peaceful, calm waters.
Getting Through OCD.

Trusting God as we walk through anxiety and OCD has been on my mind a lot lately. I was reminded this morning in a devotional time of how God applauds and cheers every step of faith we make. Mary Southerland wrote, “If you listen carefully, you just might hear Him applauding that one tiny step of faith you were willing to take as you walked straight through your fear. God is fully aware of where you are and what you need. Heaven is not in a panic. And when you fall, you can rest assured your Father will be there to hold you in His arms of love and strengthen you for every step of your journey.”
When we feel panic and fear or our OCD ramps us up, we forget that as we push through our fear toward the life God has for us, He is there and all of heaven is applauding our efforts. The enemy wants to distract you from your goal. He wants the fear to stop you, but God says come on child, I know you can do it. Just like when we were toddlers and took our first steps, we are regaining ground again through first steps. If we are determined and trust God, then nothing is impossible for us. Nothing at all. Remember as you take each step through your fears, God is with you and He is cheering you on to the finish line.
Getting Through OCD.

I was reminded of something today in our fight against OCD. Ignore the lies of the enemy. OCD is the enemy and it is a cruel liar and taskmaster. When we begin to ignore something, the power it had over us begins to diminish. When the thoughts come, if we are able to catch them at their onset and say that is a lie then we are moving ahead in the battle. The more we realize the thoughts are coming from the enemy – and we don’t want to be in agreement with that – the more we begin to be set free. It might be easier if we were always able to discern the negative thoughts as the devil whispering in our ear. If we knew that every time, we would be less likely to listen to it. If an evil person or a person you knew was a habitual liar told you something, would you keep believing it over and over again. No, you wouldn’t. At some point, you would say to yourself, if this person tells me anything I will check it out first to make sure it is absolutely the truth. You wouldn’t repeatedly buy into their nonsense. That my friend is OCD. OCD is the habitual liar in your life who you no longer have to listen to or believe. Nothing it says is true. Nothing it says is based on fact or reality. Why do we continue to listen? We need to shut the door in its face the moment it rears its ugly head. Let’s do our best to shut the door today and say don’t come around here no more. God has a better plan for us. Let’s begin to listen more to Him and what He whispers in our ear that will always line up with His word.
Getting Through OCD.

Isaiah 26:3-4 (ICB) “You, Lord, give true peace. You give peace to those who depend on you. You give peace to those who trust you. So, trust the Lord always. Trust the Lord because he is our Rock forever.”
Trust is not an easy thing is it? We have all been disappointed in life. Things didn’t work out the way we hoped. People who have hurt us never seem to suffer any consequences for their actions. We wonder when and if God will come through. We wonder, “Can I trust you?” The simple answer would be yes. But, the trusting and doing are often a lot harder.
Even when God is leading us through a storm, we can have His peace. We sometimes don’t understand the storm or why God is allowing this or that in our lives, but I Believe if we can find the strength to trust Him everything will work out for our good. In fact, scripture tells us that it will – “all things work together for good for those who love the Lord.” I have heard some translations of for those who trust in the Lord. He didn’t say some things, but all things. When the waves rise and our boat is tossed about in the sea, we become afraid. But, Jesus said, “Fear not.” Fear not for He is with us. Now, for those of us who have suffered with panic and anxiety, we sometimes wonder how in the world will we do that? The answer is one step at a time. One mountain at a time. One act of trust at a time. One casting out of negative thoughts at a time. There is no other choice. There is no other option. With God all things are possible. Even getting through OCD.

Bringing a problem out of the darkness and into the light is the first step toward healing. You can’t address a problem that you haven’t first brought into the light. I was reminded of that this morning as I watched Joyce Meyer before work. She was talking about this very subject and how the devil wants us to keep our problems in the darkness, but once they hit the light, we can begin to heal. One of the ways we heal is by acknowledging the problem and praying about it to God. We also heal by journaling about it before God and always bringing our problems to Him. I read portions of a book this weekend called “Who Switched Off My Brain,” by Dr. Caroline Leaf. It talks about these very things and how when we do them, we retrain our brain to think correctly. When we have thoughts, we should ask ourselves, “Do these line up with scripture?” she writes. “Do they line up with the word of God?” All of my thoughts that cause problems in my OCD and anxiety world do not line up with scripture or God’s word. They line up with what Satan wants me to think – fear based thoughts. I am not where I want to be fully yet. But, I am making progress. The thoughts that I used to just let bombard me as I went over and over them in my head, I am now in the process of learning to catch them and say to them, “No, that is not true. There is no truth to that thought and I no longer want to think on it.” We may have to cast the thought out over and over again and replace it with what God says about that subject. According to the book, we should begin to master that in 21 days and then we can move on to the next subject area. What I found interesting is that unforgiveness and bitterness and resentment can cause anxiety, panic, depression, and phobias – the building blocks of OCD – as well as a host of other physical and mental problems from a scientific standpoint in our bodies. It is toxic and it leads to toxic thoughts, behavior, attitudes and actions. I no longer want to live that way. God had dealt with me about unforgiveness in my life and kept asking me to come with Him, let it go and move on. But, I wouldn’t. I stayed at the edge of the cliff with dirt smeared on my face glaring down at those that had hurt me in the valley below – as Jesus stood near me with an outstretched hand saying, “Come on. Let’s go. We have things to do.” But, I wouldn’t. I stayed there, camped there until I finally broke again three months ago. Now, God and I are in the process of rebuilding and I have chosen to forgive. The enemy continues to try and bring up those wounds and feelings toward those people, and I have to choose again to forgive and let it go. I no longer want to ever live with that poison in my life. I hope you don’t either.
Getting Through OCD.

Yesterday, I wrote about being placed somewhere for such a time as this. I wrote about the words of that football player in New Orleans and the same words were spoken to Esther so many years ago when she was asked to speak to the King to save the Jewish people. She didn’t feel prepared. She was afraid because women, even though she was the King’s wife – could not just approach a king without being summoned. She risked being killed to approach him. And, Mordecai, the family member who raised her – who had much at stake himself for he was to be killed – told her in Esther 3:12 “Do not think that because you are in the king’s house you alone of all the Jews will escape. 14 For if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your father’s family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to royal position for such a time as this?”
Sharon Jaynes wrote in a devotional I read this mornign, “You see, there was a woman in Samaria who had been used and abused all her life. And now, God reached down from His throne and chose her for such a time as this. While she felt that she was damaged goods, fit for no one, God chose her as His special spokesperson for an entire town. And He sent His own Son to commission her for ministry.”
Where is God leading you today? What ministry is He leading you toward? We all have one if we are God’s children. It is no coincidence that I keep getting, “for such a time as this.” I feel just like that Samaritan woman, damaged goods right now, not fit to help anyone because I’m struggling in my own storm. And, God’s word says, “and who knows that you have not come to this storm for such a time as this.” Ironically, I am a spokesperson in my career and a member of my church group spoke something over me at the beginning of this storm by saying, “God’s spokesperson.” It resonated within my soul. We are all God’s spokespeople. We all have stories to tell. What is yours?
Getting Through OCD.

Yesterday during lunch I went to Lifeway Christian bookstore and a book about a football player overcoming adversity struck my eye. I flipped open the book and landed on page 103 and it was if God came down in front of me and put the words right in the center of my heart. It was talking about Hurricane Katrina and its devastation on New Orleans. In describing the city, the professional football player wrote that before the storm, the city had problems like any big city, but the problems had been covered up, ignored or slapped over with duct tape to hold it together. He wrote now that the storm had leveled everything, it could be rebuilt the right way with all the voids filled in that needed to be filled. He went on to say that maybe he had been put there for such a time as this. That reminded me of Beth Moore’s Esther study I did a while back where Esther was told maybe God had put her in her position “for such a time as this.”
That passage struck me to the core. I have been in a storm, and the problems I had I had swept under the rug, ignored or slapped some tape on them to hold them together instead of getting them out in the open for God to deal with. Now, God and I are in the process of rebuilding the right way. I need to allow Him to fill in the voids of my life. He positioned me to write this blog and gave me the resources of my dear cousin to help me create the website. It made me think, maybe I have been put here for such a time as this. Not just for me, but for others as well. I am open to whatever God wants to do.
Getting Through OCD.

The above picture is a land where I would love to live. Just as God tells us in scripture – He has given us the land, now we need to go and take possession of it. Now, I might not be able to go out and purchase the land in this picture and live there, but I can take possession of the landscape of my mind. I got the verse about taking possession of the land God had given me when this new storm started back in May. Sometimes taking our thoughts captive and changing years of negative thinking seems an impossible task. But, it is not. I was listening to a program the other day on a Christian channel that I watch for my devotion in the mornings. They had a guest speaker on, Dr. Caroline Leaf I believe was her name – and she was talking about changing your thought patterns in your brain. Did you know that it only takes 21 days for your mind to wrap itself around a new positive thought to replace the old negative thought that you are thinking? Not 21 years, but 21 days. Now, I know I have a lot of thoughts that have to be taken captive, but we only have to start with one at a time. We conquer one and then we move on to the next one. Four days for it to take root and 21 days for it to be a new established way of thinking. That should give all of us hope who struggle with anxiety and OCD. Man, what a glorious revelation. The devil tells you it’s too hard, too difficult, you can’t. But, God says with Me all things are possible. Think about it, just 21 days to change one programmed negative thought in your brain to a new positive way of thinking. Let’s try it. Pick one of your struggles today and camp there for 21 days with positive reinforced thinking. Ask God to show you what he wants you to choose and follow Him through it for 21 days. Let’s see what happens. You have absolutely nothing to lose by trying since your old negative thinking is just dragging you down anyway. Now, that old thought might come a hundred or thousands of times a day and don’t beat yourself up if you are not always perfect. Just get up everyday and try. Try to replace that one negative thought with a positive one. Lord, I need your help as much as anyone on this. Just as I type this, the devil is saying it will be too hard. But, God says…With Me All Things Are Possible. Just 21 days and that is backed by scientific research. And, we know to cure OCD, we have to start with our stinking thinking. Let’s pray for one another and try. Give it all we can and let God do the rest.
Getting Through OCD.

I was reading a women’s devotion this morning about something I’ve written about here before. Our irritants and darkest moments can turn into our greatest triumphs. This particular writer was writing about pearls and how an oyster makes a pearl from a piece of sand that is an irritant to the oyster. She went on to talk about her dark days with clinical depression and how God turned that around to help her overcome fear and doubt, and have a ministry she had never dreamed she could have.
Mary Southerland wrote, “Looking back, I can honestly say that the greatest treasures in my life have been discovered during the darkest times of my life. A battle with clinical depression stripped away years of fear and doubt, leaving me with a new identity in Christ and a ministry I never thought possible…In God’s economy, a mess is the perfect setting for a miracle, girlfriend. A sliver of hope and a seed of victory are buried at the center of every problem. God has gone before you. He has already been where you are going and in every trial or difficult moment of life, God has buried a treasure. When the tough times come, just look for the pearls.”
How true this is for those of us going through battles with OCD and anxiety right now. There are those who have already come through this battle and won. For those of us still in it, we can have hope that better days are on the horizon and that God is working out everything – yes, even this – for our good. I am discovering that God used my husband’s family to pinpoint areas in my life that had not healed from my past, where fear and doubts ruled and anger over old and new hurts grew. It seems they meant it to hurt us, but God meant it to shine the light inside, to heal and get to the bottom of those roots. Is it easy? No. Is it hard? Yes. But is anything worth having easy? If we can stick with it and do the hard things necessary to get free from this with God, then we will be the greatest victors in the end and our ministries – well, they’ll grow!
I have a saying on my wall at work that says, “Right now, choose faith over feeling. Don’t doubt in the darkness what you learned in the light. God is with you, Friend. Look for the pearls!”
God is indeed with us and He wants to see us free. He is standing here with the key to your victory and mine. Let’s let him unlock the doors to our deepest hurts and pains – our deepest fears. He is the only one who truly can!
Getting Through OCD.

We just returned from a week’s vacation. Well, not returned actually because we just took a week off to try and relax at home. The OCD was a factor as always, but I feel I was able to push through some things and grew stronger in my time away. My pastor’s sermon yesterday was on temptation and how the devil tempted Christ. We often think of temptation as something that looks good and lures us, but I thought temptation applies to OCD as well. We are tempted to take matters into our own hands and in my case try and protect myself through avoidance of certain items and washing the germs away. Problem is you can’t avoid things out in the world. They will hit you at some time. The temptation for OCD sufferers is to do the compulsion or the ritual or avoid the situation to control the anxiety. Problem is we get hooked and the outcome is actually more anxiety. Freeing ourselves from the devil’s hook takes some doing. God has to help us get untangled out of all the fishing line and it can hurt when the hook is taken out. We may even be left with a scar, but the end result is freedom if we keep trusting God to get us out of the mess of OCD. I know I need to know who I am and who I belong to and that does not mean my earthly family, but my heavenly family. We will always act out of who we think we are was the message behind my pastor’s sermon. I no longer want to be an OCD sufferer. I want to be an OCD victor who overcame, left it behind and helped others do the same. With God’s help that is not just possible but actual. Look at me, God says to us. Instead of looking at the problem, look at me. I have the answers. I have the solution. You just have to follow and do what I tell you. I pray that we all follow God out of this into victory and freedom. We just have to do our part and let God do His part. There are things we can do and things we cannot do. Leave the things you can’t do to God and do the things you can do – like resisting the urges and retraining your thoughts with God’s help. Sometimes we have to go through the fire to be refined into the gold that we were meant to be.
Getting Through OCD.