{"id":1313,"date":"2021-09-23T01:07:30","date_gmt":"2021-09-23T01:07:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cornerstonecem.org\/blog\/?p=1313"},"modified":"2021-09-19T23:11:16","modified_gmt":"2021-09-19T23:11:16","slug":"box-hoarder","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cornerstonecem.org\/blog\/box-hoarder\/","title":{"rendered":"Box Hoarder"},"content":{"rendered":"

Thursday, September 23<\/strong><\/p>\n

Box Hoarder\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Get rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, harsh words, and slander, as well as all types of evil behavior. Instead, be kind to each other, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God through Christ has forgiven you.\u00a0Ephesians 4:31-32<\/strong><\/p>\n

I am a box hoarder. In my house we must have at least five to ten empty and random boxes stored in our cupboard on the top shelf or in the garage. There\u2019s no reason for them to be there and they regularly drive us all nuts because to be honest, they are in the way. Why do I keep them there then? I don\u2019t know\u2026 it\u2019s just what I do! There\u2019s no other reason for it except I wonder if I may need a box possibly, ever \u2026 and for years I\u2019ve just shoved them in, glad they\u2019re out of sight. This is similar to what we do when we store up hurt and bad feelings in the heart. If you are not quick to forgive or one who takes your pain to God, then you too are guilty of being a hoarder. A hurting hoarder that is. Even though we ask the Lord to heal the hurt, there are times when we hold onto the offence in our heart and, like these cardboard boxes, without even realizing it, we can store it away.<\/p>\n

If we store away hurt and offence no wonder we can end up as a target to being hurt again. And this repetitive vicious cycle the enemy loves. Over and over the same button can be pressed and we feel the same overwhelming feelings come over us like a flood.<\/p>\n

When hurt is hoarded it isn\u2019t just pain we feel, but like a tea kettle on a hot stove anger and injustice and \u2026 dare I even say it \u2026 bitterness begins to boil. We wish it wouldn\u2019t but bitterness grows so quickly in the darkness of our store. Then something happens\u2026a television commercial, you pass by a store\u2026.someone mentions the person that we\u2019ve been hurt by, and without warning, the emotions rise and spill out!<\/p>\n

In this life we cannot avoid being hurt. When people hurt us there\u2019s no getting around it, we feel hurt. When we feel ill-treated, criticized, devalued, misunderstood or disrespected it\u2019s hard. These are all horrible things to experience, and there\u2019s no belittling how it can stab our hearts and severely bruise our sense of self-worth and identity. But in these moments it is also very important for us to be reminded that God has huge compassion and care for us, and knows all the hurts we experience. God also has a path to freedom and healing that sees us truly healed from the past, not carrying it heavy in our hearts \u2013 storing it away, just because that\u2019s what we do without thinking about it!<\/p>\n

Like the cardboard taking up space in my garage, making it difficult to walk I must decide to declutter and remove the mess. In the same manner let\u2019s decide afresh from now on to deal with the storehouses of our hearts – to truly forgive and release when people hurt us or cause us offence. Let\u2019s also allow the Lord to convict us where we\u2019ve stored hurt, offence and bitterness in our hearts, so we can repent and He can clean it out. It will make room for the Lord to fully bring His healing in.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Thursday, September 23 Box Hoarder\u00a0 Get rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, harsh words, and slander, as well as all types of evil behavior. Instead, be kind to each other, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God through Christ has forgiven you.\u00a0Ephesians 4:31-32 I am a box hoarder. In my house we must have at […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1322,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1313","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cornerstonecem.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1313","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cornerstonecem.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cornerstonecem.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cornerstonecem.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cornerstonecem.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1313"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cornerstonecem.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1313\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1325,"href":"https:\/\/cornerstonecem.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1313\/revisions\/1325"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cornerstonecem.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1322"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cornerstonecem.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1313"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cornerstonecem.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1313"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cornerstonecem.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1313"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}