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Weekending Well: The Inner Game. A podcast and a prayer for you!
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Weekending Well: The Inner Game. A podcast and a prayer for you!

Let's talk about how we see our journey to restoration and enjoy a cheeky listen to this week's Living Well podcast which is usually for Strengthen Insiders only!
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Welcome to Weekending Well! It’s been another beautiful week here at Strengthen - filled with audios, devotionals and chats about walking free from restraints and truly knowing that we belong in God. We’ve been digging deep into the promises in Jeremiah 30 and realising that we are not insignificant - that God rebuilds on the ruins of our lives. Big, beautiful, life-giving moments of leaning into God. 

Attached is this week’s Living Well podcast. This is usually only for the paid Strengthen Insiders. It’s been such an important one that I want to share this one with the whole Strengthen community today. Strengthen Insiders - this is your chance to share it with your friends! 🔥 (Also, Insiders, please note, I’ve attached it separately here so your comments on the private Insider post earlier this week remain just that, private to our Insider community.)

Keep reading now though, as I introduce this audio. You’ll also find a prayer and more links at the end of today’s bonus extravaganza!

I’ve been thinking this week about hooks, impressions and ideas that stay in our mind. Some of them are myths, attractive but slightly askew from real life. Some resonate with our own experiences, putting words to our emotions and describing lessons learned that we identify with. Others are life approaches, wrapped up in the pain of watershed events and trauma.

Hooks like Tina Turner’s What’s Love Got To Do With it? Catchy and iconic, an easy sing-along that’s really a bruised soul telling us love is “a second-hand emotion” and “Who needs a heart when a heart can be broken?”. If you’ve had your heart broken, you might know how easy it is for the broken-hearted threads of our own story to pause and listen - maybe even identify with the kind of pain that can make us lock our emotions up in a defensive tower.

At the opposite end of the ‘approach to love and life’ spectrum we have the hopeful, sunset haze of the Disney Effect. A huge catalogue of hope-filled romantic adventure movies that tell us “Be rescued from your traumatic life by the man or woman of your dreams and you will live happily ever after”. They teach us to be pursed, to be rescued by someone else. 

How easy it is to feel that having that someone special in our lives will solve things or that being that someone special will solve things for others - only to awaken from the Disney haze and realise that the real power that we have is over our own life and thoughts… and that if we don’t stand up in that power, any external rescue will still not rescue us on the inside. It may bring us to a place of comfort and to a person who loves us, but we are still confronted by our own choices to believe in ourselves and to heal those internal bruises. If we want to walk free, we’ve got to do the walking. No amount of rescuing will move us forward unless we take those steps towards freedom, healing and restoration. It’s all about choices, actions and boundaries.

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Catchy song hooks and sayings exist all around us, and not just about love either. Life, our self-worth, our success and our potential, are all presented in pithy phrases and idioms we hear all around us. 

We also tell them to ourselves, sometimes without stopping to ask: Is that really true? Is that really how I want to think of myself? Is believing that actually me giving up my power - the power I have over what I think and believe? More importantly, if you’re walking with God: What do I really believe about how God sees me and who I am in him?

It’s easy to feel like the world and our life is “doing to us” rather than picking up our power and owning our life. Owning our story and our narrative. When we’re living a religiously Christian life, we can also give up that power in a super-spiritual way that masquerades as exceedingly humble - leaving everything up to God and living life as a pawn in a battle between good and evil. Blaming “the enemy” and claiming a good life by trying to “do the right thing” - only to spiral into confusion (and dare I say, maybe even sulk with God?) when something doesn’t happen the way we expected. But that’s so far from the truth of relationship with Jesus it would be laughable if it wasn’t so tragic. 

A tragic waste of capacity and potential because it’s not the reality of the overwhelming extravagance of God’s mercy as he washes us clean, drawing us close to him and invites us to walk with him - not to have life “done to us”. Not to be pawns in some eternal blockbuster. Instead, to step into a set apart, sanctuary relationship with Jesus in which we know that we play a leading role. We are a player. If Jesus is the hero, then we are in fact, the heroines (and heroes) - not the victims - in this deeply beautiful love story that is already underway between God and us. And though there is some rescuing going on - alongside a great deal of healing from trauma in many - that rescue releases into a place of strength.

The “salvation” that he brings is empowering. It’s a co-editing of our lives with him. An allowing of him to change and transform us, to meet us in the bruised and broken places within us and to restore us - beauty for ashes. And as we meet him, to lift our heads and remember who he says we are; to walk free. Free from the victimhood. Free to step into our potential. To grow into the person that God designed us to be. It’s a maturing of our strengths. A deepening of integrity in our character. A growing compassion. We are a person of power. Not in our own strength, but as our story combines with his story over us.

And piece by piece, the different threads of our life are restored as we walk with him. He has broken the chains, he lifts the restraints, we lift our heads and accept his invitation to walk free of those restraints. Free from shame. Free from the echoes of the narratives that keep our head lowered. Walking on into a fullness of life even in this broken and turbulent world.

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God doesn’t give up on his restorative plan for us. He doesn’t say “I’ve come as far as we can with you now”. He’s not in the business of settling for anything less than full restoration for you and me. So why do we settle for less? Why are we okay with a measure of freedom when he’s gently calling us on into a fulness of life and freedom?

All sorts of things! The protective parts we’ve built up inside us to help us handle the bruising and the challenges of life. The challenge of facing things we have to “own”, like forgiving or asking for forgiveness. How we see ourselves and what we believe about ourselves plays into this as well.

A key that we’ve been remembering big time this week in the Strengthen Insider membership is about the core beliefs we live in our relationship with God with. What do you fundamentality believe about who you are to God and how he sees you? This is important because what we believe about this affects how we engage with God in co-editing those bruised and broken parts of our lives - or even believing at all that he would work restoration in and through us.

This week, in the Living Well podcast, I spoke about our inner game. The idea of whether we feel that we’re winning or losing at being a Christian - winning or losing at life even. The hooks, the impressions, the ideas that we all seem to have about a “good Christian” and what we expect from Christians or ourselves as a Christian. How we think God feels about us because of things we’ve done or things that have happened to us.

There are so many distorted perceptions of what that looks like, and they’re very much tied into a heinous lie: Good things happen to good people and bad thing happen to bad people. 

When we buy into that misconception, we judge and weigh our worth in God, how we’re doing as a Christian, how someone else is doing, by the things that are happening in their life. All the while slipping, sliding, falling into a vulnerable place where we forget the simple truth that transforms our sense of belonging, our self-worth and our journey to healing and restoration with God: We belong to God and in all things he is working out his plan and his purpose for good in our lives.

I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. (Galatians 2:20)

For more on this, have a listen to this week’s Living Well audio and don’t forget to scroll down for your free prayer download❤️

If you’d like to read instead or read along, here’s the transcript:

Hello, welcome to today’s Living Well podcast. This week, we’ve been talking about what walking free from shame really looks like. In the Mini Deep Dive and the devotionals, we’ve been praying through a key scripture in my own story of walking free and I’ve been sharing some of the insights God has given me.

Today, let’s talk about our inner game - what goes on inside of us. Not just the flow of thoughts we experience each day, but much deeper. Let’s talk about our core beliefs and how they impact the idea of winning or losing in our life as Christians.

In the early 1970s Tim Gallwey set the ball rolling on the concept of the “Inner Game” for optimum sporting performance. It revolutionised how sporting and, later on, life coaches began to talk about and understand a key to success. What goes on inside our heads really matters. Marshalling our thoughts makes a difference. Knowing yourself - your tendency to certain thought patterns - and choosing to actively engage with what is going on inside yourself makes a difference. There’s a whole load of research that’s been done on this in the 50 or so years since Gallwey first started this conversation off. And, of course, the Bible and our faithful, all-knowing God got there first!

The phrase “inner game” obviously relates to tennis - sporting contests. “Game” seems a bit odd to think about in relation to our spiritual journey because, let’s be honest, we don’t really think of our life as a game. But if we flip that slightly and remember that sporting games are contests, it can help us think about who is contesting over our life.

It’s not a long hop, skip and jump in our thoughts to realise that there is a battle for our lives. There is God’s Kingdom of Light which we have been saved into and there is a contester who is continually trying to get us to live as though we weren’t part of that Kingdom. As though we don’t belong. As though those promises of God are not for us and the inheritance, the legacy, the fulness of life that Jesus gifts to us is out of our reach. That sneaky contester trying to get into our “game head” and tell us that we don’t belong, we’re an imposter in the Kingdom, we can’t play this game of Christianity and we can’t win at it. What ridiculous rubbish that contester speaks to us! But it’s sharp and jagged, often stopping us in our tracks in a way that we have to overcome. That is our inner game as Christians - remembering what it really means to belong to Jesus.

I suspect, when you saw the title of this podcast and I began talking, that you may have thought I would talk about our inner critic again or taking every thought captive. But you’re only partly right with that. I really want you to understand something so much more important. It’s the true setting of the scene for all those squabbles with our inner critic and the overcoming of other’s echoes in our lives:

Knowing where you belong and who you are in Christ is the foundation from which we defend ourselves and walk into restoration.

I’ll say that in another way:

You have to know that you are part of God’s family now and that means you’ve already won.

Let’s say it another way:

It doesn’t matter what that contester tries against you. It doesn’t matter if rain stops play for a while, or there’s an injury or someone from the crowd throws a plastic bottle at you (why do they even do that?!) - you are the champion. The game is already decided.

The game is won. That’s what Jesus has done. And that’s the mindset with which we need to learn to live our lives on the inside. That’s our inner game.

Not struggling as we wonder if we can play this game of being a Christian. Not telling ourselves this Christian stuff works for everyone else but not for us. Not feasting on the disappointment that makes us feel dejected, rejected and full of shame.

Our inner game is a mindset that we set the scene of our thoughts and emotions to. It’s the foundation. It’s the backdrop of our lives and it’s this:

I belong to God. God is in control. Jesus has already won restoration for me and God will vindicate me - he is working to turn my life and this situation right side up.

That mindset is the one that we need to defend and unpack so that we understand increasingly how that truth impacts our day to day life and interactions with others.

It’s about understanding God’s mercy is new every day. It’s about remembering that we can lean in at any time and talk with God about what’s going on. It’s about welcoming the Holy Spirit within us to guide and teach us. These are not just spiritual concepts we know about and say “Oh yeah, I understand that…”. These are realities that set up our attitudes, our thought patterns and our reactions to all the random and daily situations that come our way and buffet us in our day to day lives and relationships. They are more than our game face. They are the conviction or deep seated belief with which we live our life and that influence how we turn up on that game pitch. They are the attitude with which we come to the table of life. They are the posture with which we walk.

Is it hard to remember all the time that we belong to God, that we are not only on the winning side but that God is winning in and through us? Yes, it often is. That’s why we’re talking so much about lifting our heads. Remember: Shame will lower your gaze away from the reality of God’s love and that you have inheritance with him, that you belong. It will lower your gaze from remembering that you are his inheritance and he restores every part into a fullness of life in him. But when we lift our heads, we remember who we are in Jesus. And that is something that the contester doesn’t want us to do.

You see, the enemy of our souls knows that he has already lost. We belong to Jesus. So if he can make you think, for as short or as long a time as he can, that you are a loser, he breaks your gaze with Jesus. He breaks your focus on being a child of the Kingdom. He creates cracks in your hope for healing and restoration. He drives a wedge between those cords of loving kindness that God is drawing you closer with. All because he has simply knocked you off your game and interrupted your perspective.

That crucial perspective is remembering who we are in Jesus. It’s okay to be imperfect. It’s okay to make missteps and to have mishaps in our lives - that’s part of life. But even with those, we have mercy that already flows from God’s throne of grace. It’s already allocated to us - a never ending flow of that mercy, grace and love.

What the enemy wants us to think is that that flow is interruptible. That we can mess up in the game of life and God, our backer, will pull his sponsorship from us. Like those real life sports stars we see. That’s not the truth in the sprititual world though. God’s promises are faithful. Our salvation is eternal. We belong and are grafted into God’s family. Branches on the vine of the Kingdom of Light. It’s all there in the New Testament in so many passages of scripture.

The victory is won. The game is won. Whether we feel like we are winning or losing on any given day. That’s the real game changer. That’s the real pick me up. That’s the difference between worldly thinking and Kingdom thinking. Not ignoring the bruising, the broken bits, the things that are so difficult to understand and the things that make us so sad and angry in our daily lives, but knowing that we are not alone and that in and through it all, God is working good for us because we are called and chosen - we are part of his Kingdom. He will bring healing and restoration. That’s non-negotiable. It’s a cup we’ve already one. An award that won’t be stripped from us. It’s ours and something God wants us to remember.

So when we come to our day to day inner game, our conversations with ourselves, our own choices, our own navigating through life, it’s important to remember that all of that rests on the stage that has already been set of freedom and confidence in who we are in Jesus.

I don’t often write about the enemy because I really do feel that we actually do a very good job on our own at sabotaging our inner game so often! Not every critical or negative thought is from the enemy. A lot of it is our mind working things out. Looking for understanding, searching for wisdom. Much of it is the natural burning off of emotions - those messages our body sends us as we sensually experience the world and our daily life. Our bodies are complex and there are so many reactions all intermingled with in us - knock on effects for our wellbeing from our thoughts and emotions to our body, and vice versa. Feeling sick physically can spiral our thoughts and emotions as we’re overwhelmed and our body moves into a protective and healing mode. All these things are not because of the enemy. But they are vulnerable moments where we’re ripe for him to question our deeper beliefs about ourselves and God. To entice us to rethink “Did God really say…” just as he did with Eve in the garden of Eden.

And that is really it in a nutshell. The only thing the enemy can do is question what God has said. Because he cannot change what he has done. He cannot change the victory and victories that Jesus has gifted you and the restoration that is yours as an inheritance. He can only make you think that you cannot claim it.

So we have a choice to make and a continual defending of that choice:

To remember that our inner game depends on us not just remembering and believing, but also defending our belief that we belong to God, He is working all things together for our good and that He has broken those chains that hold us back from walking free.

The invitation is clear and the inner game is on. One step at a time, one point at a time, one match at a time, we move with a mantra inside our spirits, hearts and minds:

“I belong to God and restoration is mine through Jesus. Show your power Lord”.

From that mindset, from that heartset, from that spiritual understanding, everything else flows.

That’s the importance of our inner game as we journey through life and as we walk free from shame. Lifting our heads and not building our attitudes on anything less than the unbreakable strength of God’s love, mercy and victory in our lives.

Here’s that freedom prayer for you too! We’ve been digging into Jeremiah 30 this week in the Insider devotionals. To enjoy those devotionals and access the pdf download for this prayer, please upgrade your subscription.

I’ll leave you with one of my favourite, rousing reminders of the joy and depth of “doing life” and healing with Jesus rather than just relying on self-healing. When we lean into Jesus, we discover that we belong to so much more than our own self and that there is a depth of joy and healing that God works in us piece by piece - growing and walking free into who he designed us to be:

Have a great week! Thank you for all your encouragement, shares, comments, likes and support for Strengthen. I truly appreciate it when you do that, and it does make a difference - not only are you encouraging me to keep going with Strengthen but you’re also sharing the joy of leaning into Jesus with others. ❤️

Strengthen is written from a Christian theological perspective with evidence based psychology and coaching insights. For more on some of the themes mentioned in this email, here are a few links to free content. Don’t forget that by upgrading, you can access the whole archive, including Mini Deep Dives into scripture and devotional audios that help you lean into God and work some of these deep themes we’re discussing through with him.

For more on struggling with other people’s opinion and interference in your life:

For more on our inner critic:

For more on recognising and interrupting shame:

Discussion about this podcast

Strengthen
Strengthen - On Jesus, Faith, Living & Loving Well
On Jesus, faith, living and loving. Welcome! I write about how God entwines who he is with our evolving stories. Challenging religious stigmas, busting some Christian cultural myths and leaning into faith and intimacy with God. This podcast is currently available to paid subscribers only.