NorthStar Community Daily Devotional

June 12

Scripture focus: I can anticipate the response that is coming: "I know that all God's commands are spiritual, but I'm not. Isn't this also your experience?" Yes. I'm full of myself—after all, I've spent a long time in sin's prison. What I don't understand about myself is that I decide one way, but then I act another, doing things I absolutely despise. So if I can't be trusted to figure out what is best for myself and then do it, it becomes obvious that God's command is necessary.  But I need something more! For if I know the law but still can't keep it, and if the power of sin within me keeps sabotaging my best intentions, I obviously need help! I realize that I don't have what it takes. I can will it, but I can't do it. I decide to do good, but I don't really do it; I decide not to do bad, but then I do it anyway. My decisions, such as they are, don't result in actions. Something has gone wrong deep within me and gets the better of me every time.  It happens so regularly that it's predictable. The moment I decide to do good, sin is there to trip me up. I truly delight in God's commands, but it's pretty obvious that not all of me joins in that delight. Parts of me covertly rebel, and just when I least expect it, they take charge.  I've tried everything and nothing helps. I'm at the end of my rope. Is there no one who can do anything for me? Isn't that the real question?  The answer, thank God, is that Jesus Christ can and does. He acted to set things right in this life of contradictions where I want to serve God with all my heart and mind, but am pulled by the influence of sin to do something totally different. Romans 7:14-25 The Message

Continued from yesterday...

As the “cells” in our colony converse, all sorts of interactions, experiences and behaviors emerge. Thoughts, feelings, sensation, memories are contained in a vast array of neuro-chemical communications. Electrochemical energies run along the bodies and fibers of nerve cells, cross synapses (the little spaces between the cells), releasing and inhibiting all sorts of chemicals. Each response creates a reaction. The possibility for communication are almost infinite. Addiction mucks up this system. It’s so complicated that we can’t do it justice, but we must try. Because how our brain processes matters.

It also matters how families communicate.

When Michael shares his vision for a summer in an RV with his guy friends following Phish to and fro, my brain lights up like the annual Christmas tree lighting at Rockefeller Center. What was his father thinking? Fortunately, we’ve been a family long enough that this isn’t the first time our cells have bumped up against each other in uncomfortable ways. We have some guidelines to direct us in moments like this….those times when I want to strangle the father of my children. First, I breathe. I breathe deeply, slowly, and repetitively. Second, I pause to prepare. I think, “Could there be more to the story than I know? Who should I ask for clarification?” These are pretty decent questions and have probably kept me out of the electric chair. An addicted family system when faced with a proverbial light show of excitement in the brain does not have the resources to pause, think, strategize, gather information, breathe or anything else deliberate. Addicted families react, usually to someone’s detriment. More on why this is more about chemistry than character tomorrow.

Click on the word comments below and join our conversation!© Copyright 2010 NorthStar Community

---