3 Ways to Not Let Your History Control Your Destiny

Our destiny is the adventure God created us to live. Yet so many of us are not living it, and our history is why—all the wounding, trauma, pain—and the fear it brings. The good news is our history does not have to control our destiny. Jesus is bigger than your fear, and he wants to heal your pain.

To keep us from that healing, our enemy wants us to live in our pain. Forever. He’s terrified of us living our God-given adventure. If we do that, his kingdom of darkness will take major hits and there’s nothing he can do about it. His only hope is to be pre-emptive. That’s why you feel so much fear and spiritual resistance whenever you start to move in your calling.

Our enemy’s strategy is, “I will wound them with so much trauma that the overwhelming pain and resultant fear keeps them from ever moving into the life God created them to live.” Those are the components of the enemy’s strategy: Trauma, causing pain, causing fear, which keeps us stuck. And that’s his goal—to keep us stuck in the pain, never moving into the adventure God has for us. Because he’s terrified of that.

It’s a diabolically brilliant plan. It works on every one of us, taking us hostage to fear. He’s got just one little problem though: The cross. The empty tomb. The love of a relentless God who just won’t stop meddling with things.

Actually, it’s a big problem. The blood of Jesus demolishes all the structures, lies, and plans of our enemy over our lives. The power of the love of God is stronger than the power of the trauma, pain, and fear in our lives.

But we have a choice. The Holy Spirit won’t just burst his healing into our lives like Satan did with trauma and sin. God loves and trusts us enough to honor our choice. Our healing is a partnership with Jesus. It’s our choice.

So here are 3 ways to partner with God and not let your history control your destiny.

1) Decide to Not Play the Victim

Enough is enough already. I’m sick of the pain and wounding in my life, and I pray you are too. The first step in getting free is deciding we want to be free. It’s acknowledging the pain in our lives and believing God can heal it.

2) Get Healing

Step 2 is to proactively get healing. We need to seek it out, and actively take steps to pursue our healing. Healing comes in many forms. For some of us, it’s counseling. For others, deliverance. And then there’s inner healing, prayer ministry, or medication. For most of us, it’s going to be a unique combination of the above.

Some of us need medication first to level us out enough so we can receive counseling, inner healing, and/or prayer ministry effectively. Some of us need deliverance or prayer ministry first.

It may take several tries until we find the counselor, pastor, prayer minister, and/or doctor that work for us. That’s normal. Keep trying.

Pro Tip: Ask to sign releases so your pastor, counselor, prayer minister, and/or doctor can talk to each other. You want everybody on your team on the same page. That doesn’t just happen by chance. Be proactive. Ask them to call each other and talk about your case.

3) Limit Negative Influences in Your Life

Misery loves company. The only thing worse than being miserable is being miserable alone. Some friends are just toxic, and they need to go. People who identify with you because your wounding matches theirs may not be happy when you get healthy.

I know a young woman who has a very difficult relationship with her godly parents. A few years ago, through interventive counseling and prayer ministry initiated by her parents, she was on the verge of a breakthrough and healing in that important relationship. But she had a friend who has a bad relationship with her own toxic parents. This friend sabotaged the young woman’s healing. Who else would the friend commiserate with if the young woman got healing?

“Bearing your heart to your hurting friends is not helping. Because all they do is accommodate you in your pain and understand it. You call that sensitivity; I call it enablement.” –Dan Mohler

When someone resents or downplays our healing, that’s a sign that friendship is unhealthy. The young woman would have been better off pulling away from that friend. But because her healing was hi-jacked, she’s now into decades of total estrangement from her parents.

But what do you do if you’re married to the negative influence?

I know someone who, every time they get inspired to move forward in their calling, excitedly talks to their spouse about it. This spouse is like a wet blanket. Their response is always, “Ok that’s great, but…” And they point out the difficulties, issues, or obstacles. The result is the person either doesn’t move forward at all, or moves forward in a limited way.

Now, yes, there’s a balance here. When you share an idea or a plan, most people will just say, “Wow, that’s great!” and won’t share any checks they have in their spirit about it. You want someone in your life who will tell you what no one else will.

Spouses are great for this. A healthy spouse is a great sounding board. While they tell you the obstacles they see that maybe you don’t, they are willing to help you work through them. If your spouse is truly supportive, you’ll come away from the conversation feeling encouraged, not discouraged. You’ll feel empowered, not limited. They are excited about you moving forward, not threatened by it.

If, maybe out of their own wounding, they are consistently a wet blanket of negativity, talking to them is not helping you. You are stuck with a significant negative influence in your life. You need to realize this and acknowledge it.

A negative reaction typically comes from fear. Because of their wounding, your vision is scary or intimidating to them. But you are not helpless. You need to find a way to share it that is less scary. And you can.

If you need ideas for dealing with this situation, download our free guide “7 Ways to Deal with a Wet Blanket Spouse.”

Do not accept it like it’ll never change. Don’t let your spouse be your excuse for not walking into your destiny. That’s not fair to either of you.

Your Turn

So how about it? We want to help you walk out of your history and into your destiny. What in your past has kept, or is keeping, you stuck? How did you walk, or are walking, out of it? Tell us in the comments—your story and vulnerability will help others. Or shoot us an email [LINK http://identityinwholeness.com/contact-us/] if it’s too personal. We’d love to hear from you. And please share this post on social media to bless others.