You've made your bed now lie in it... huh?

You've made your bed now lie in it... huh?

July 17, 2013     Happy Birthday Troy!

                                                                                    
So... just a thought I had today... ;)

Growing up there were adults in my family that often voiced their belief of, “You and you alone are responsible for the choices you have made and the life you live, be it good or bad, it is simply a result of those choices”. They believed that if you wanted a different or better life, you should just get up and go out and get it. It’s the whole “you’ve made your bed,now lay in it” mentality. I often heard this kind of talk repeated from them through my grandma when she spoke to them and as far as I know, they still hold to this way of thinking. In all honesty though, they are not alone in thinking the way that they do. As a matter of fact, I have seen similar posts like this by some of my kindest friends on Facebook as well as my closest “real life”friends. They have said as much to me in person.

I find this outlook on life rather surprising actually. And while I consider many of my views to line up with conservatives, I find that many conservatives are the loudest where this subject is concerned. When actually,all this mindset does is perpetuate the problem because it NEVER holds bad people accountable for their actions against others. Is a rape victim responsible for the fact that she now has a child out of wedlock? Is the now grown adult responsible for being hooked on cocaine when someone else got them started on drugs as a young person? Is the woman responsible for choosing rotten men in life because she was abused or neglected by her father? Some may say, “Well, once you are an adult, the choices you make are all yours!” -proving only one thing, ignorance.

The results of childhood abuse span the rest of that person’s life. The Bible says, “train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old, he shall not depart from it.” In communist countries it is common practice to indoctrinate children to the “state’s” beliefs because they know that the way a mind is formed in childhood is almost always how that mind will be when it is an adult, without the saving power of Jesus Christ.


We all see it in action movies, when people get interrogated(or what have you) and the “bad guys” go at them with forms of manipulation,terrorizing, abuse etc… until they “break”. Why? Because it works. When a person suffers enough, they lose their resolve and will to make decisions that they would otherwise wish to make should their minds not be broken.

I look at inner city culture, whites and blacks alike, and see a cycle. Ignorance and abuse are like a plague, they breed more of the same. Occasionally you get some that make it out, and “make something of themselves”, and that’s wonderful, but what about those that are left. What about the homeless? How did they even get that way? Is it possible that they ALL literally have NO family that will take them in and help them out? No, not possible. More than likely, they have family like some of mine, who hold to the belief of, “they have made their choice” or they have good family that wants to help but say “they won’t let me help them and I can’t make them do something they don’t want to do.”

So here we are again, looking at the teenage girl who is pregnant out of wedlock, or the young man who has dropped out of high school because he feels stupid or is bullied. Many say, “they made their choice and won’t let people in to help.” So they give up, mainly shifting all the blame onto the teenager, or the homeless person because we as “sound minded” people can’t imagine that if we were in their situation that we wouldn't be able to figure a way out. Many would tell the girl to use a contraceptive (I would tell her to abstain), tell the boy to study and ignore bullies, and the homeless person to call someone, or find a side job and work their way back into society. All of those ideas sound good in theory, but you aren't actually in that person’s shoes, you may not have had the same abuse that they have; your mind and will may not have been broken beyond repair like theirs.

My intent in writing this is not to outline how to help people like this out of these types of situations, but rather to bring awareness to the fact that people are more than likely (but not always) NOT a product of choices they themselves have made, but rather a product of choices and decisions that were made for or against them. Does the Olympic swimmer get there by them self? Sometimes, but often they are there because they had family and coaches backing and supporting them all the way. Encouraging them that they could do it.

Some people, like my mom for example, defied the odds and when everyone told her that she couldn’t stay at home with her children as a single mother, or raise godly children, home school and protect them, she said no. With everyone and everything in the world against her, she surmounted extreme childhood abuse, and decided that her children’s mental well-being was more important than her own food and clothing. But SHE didn’t do any of that.Not on her own; on your own none of that is possible. It was through Jesus Christ, and the strength that He gives that she was able to do it all. Growing up my mother never yelled at me or snapped at me; she never said a cross word against me. She was ALWAYS patient, kind and loving and never once told me what to do when it came to decisions. Rather, she always directed me to seek God and find out what He would have me do in a situation.

I say all of that to prove that we are not a product of the choices that we make and I am the biggest proof of that. I am who I am today-anything good I have in me- is a direct result of the love of God that was poured into my life by my mom.

It’s very easy and popular to believe the opposite, and occasionally it is true, but more often than not, you have to give time and attention into a person’s past and the things that happened to them to find out why they are who they are.

So as I mentioned in the beginning, this thinking goes against most conservative minds, but if they look deeper they will find that it actually lines up with what they really want. Most people want to help people,but often, they think “tough love” is the best way to go about it, when actually the truth is, the only love that will help is God’s love. If you want to help someone get out of a situation, you have to seek God on his or her behalf, throw out everything YOU think, and allow God to lay out a plan. And if that person, even if they are good hearted, is abusive to you, sometimes you have to take a step back when you are too close to a situation and allow someone else to come in, see clearly without emotion and seek God on the behalf of you and the person in need.


I will end with this little rabbit trailed monologue with this, God’s love is what truly sets a person free and without it, you can’t.Some people don’t want God’s love, they will leave the person to remain homeless because “it was their own fault anyway…” others care and want to show God’s love to help the homeless person but don’t know how to get past the person’s mental and emotional state… Others still… God is gracious enough to work through, and they are blessed to show His love that has healing and restorative power no matter how a person came to be in the situation they are in. Those people who get to witness God’s work first hand are truly given a gift indeed.

The End, Much Love Yall! ~ Michelle