Communication

Lurking Attitudes

by Terry Barlow
09/05/14
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    Attitudes often lurk in our souls like wild beasts under the surface of human events, especially if there is adversity tied up in those events. Maybe something happens that we were hoping wouldn't happen, and it catches us by surprise. If there are attitudinal beasts in the forest, that's when they rear their ugly heads to find us off guard, when things don't go our way. What kind of words betray the presence of these talking beasts? Sarcastic thoughts and words like, "Just my luck!" "I knew it!"  "I told you so!"  "Probably all downhill from here, bad to worse!" Despairing thoughts and perverse words, "You can't trust anyone anymore!" "What's the use!" "It's a hopeless situation!"

   But if we hold back those negative kinds of thoughts and words momentarily, there will be space to appreciate something redemptive about what just happened, something we need to learn from this.  "There are thorns and snares on the path of the perverse; the ones who guards themselves stay far from them." (Proverbs)  We might be able to slay some of those beasts before they rise up to prowl and howl! We may have to stop the beast in its tracks and impale it at the thought level, before it breaks forth into cynical words. Our hope, if it is worth hoping at all, can still be realized, only by a slightly different path, maybe, or even a vastly different path, which will require us to go with the flow. It could be that there's a calloused cynic deep within us that needs to be laid to rest once and for all! 

  Maybe there are cynical callouses on our hearts that the Master Surgeon wants to circumcise away, but we cry out, "Wait a minute, that's just me, ouch,  that's part of my personality you're tampering with there!"  No, that's not your personality, that's a beastly callous that's grown OVER your personality that keeps it from truly shining through.  It individualizes you but it doesn't PERSONALIZE you.   It has grown there from all the habitual kneejerk reactions that we have allowed ourselves in the face of (mostly) little adversities.  

  Neural pathways are forged in our brains by habitually negative thought patterns that arise reactively in certain kinds of challenging situations.  If we don't uproot those thoughts early in the name of Jesus and by the power of the Holy Spirit, those neural pathways run deeper, becoming ruts that shuttle us along into the grip of mental and emotional strongholds, which are more difficult to dislodge.