Understanding the Power of Acceptance; A Guide to Accepting the Things you Cannot Change

The Power of Acceptance

There is power in accepting the things we cannot change. The sooner we learn to do this is the sooner we will be able to live the amazing life God created us to live. On our journey, we will often become bombarded will unseemingly horrendous circumstances, but in all of this, we must accept them for what they are, so we can defeat them because of who we are! We must both accept our situations for what they truly are, and also accept that we are fully capable though the power of God to overcome them. We must also faithfully accept the truth of God for our lives.

Perhaps the most humbling of experiences is when we meet up on a situation we do not like, but we cannot control. In these uncomfortable moments we will realize how little we are in the bigger picture of life. The truth is that we will encounter many situations in our lives that we do not understand and we cannot control. As we face these situations we will realize both the pain of non-acceptance and the power of accepting the events we cannot control. It also gives us the opportunity to trust God, who is in control of all things.

Most of our anxiety is caused from the turmoil we feel inside of us when we do not accept what is going on in our lives. It is hard to accept a thing we did not expect to happen to us. We often feel that some things should never happen to us because of who we are, yet it is because of who we are why things happen to us. As imperfect human beings we will realize that we do not have it all together and unfavourable things can happen to us. We will also realize that as human beings we have the undiluted power to overcome.

There is a saying that goes,  'What you resist, persists. - Carl Jung.' What this means is that whatever you face that you do not accept, you will keep on facing. The moment you stop resisting, and start accepting, is the moment you'll experience the great power of acceptance.

God grant me the serenity To accept the things I cannot change; Courage to change the things I can; And wisdom to know the difference.

Reinhold Neibuhr Tweet

Accepting God's Will For Your Life

One of the hardest things to accept in life is the calling of God. When I say calling, I mean the assignment of God for your life. For Jonah (Jonah 1: 1-3), it was his pride and lack of sympathy for the people of Nineveh that caused him to run away when God assigned him to minister to those individuals. Jonah was acting out of his own selfishness and decided to abscond the will of God. Jonah's disobedience led to his suffering. The Bible explains that God caused a big fish to swallow Jonah. After the fish swallowed him up, Jonah's suffering was so great that he accepted to take on this assignment of God. After Jonah accepted God's will, his situation ended.

Abraham (Genesis 22 1-19), on the other hand, was obedient concerning the will of God for his life. One particular event that proves this is that of Abraham offering his son Isaac as an offering unto God. As God asked Abraham to kill his only son as a sacrifice, Abraham accepted God's request. For Abraham, this had to have been the hardest decision to make, yet not accepting the will of God was harder for him. In the end, as Abraham was about to sacrifice Isaac, God stopped him. When God saw Abraham's faith, God blessed Abraham with an even greater blessing.

Both these situations show two different characters, with two different attitudes in accepting the will of God for them. One the one hand, we see the blessings of acceptance and on the other hand we see the pain when we resist the will of God.

For me, one of the longest and most difficult battles I have faced is not accepting God's will for my life. I always knew that God made me to be ministering in some capacity, and even after going to theology school for three years, I still didn't fully accept God's calling. I have fought nightly battles, trying to dodge God's purpose for my life. I always felt that I didn't have what it took to be what God called me to be. For many years I struggled with immense pain and suffering trying to resist God's purpose, yet when I stopped to resist God's will, my struggles went away. It was not the calling that caused pain in my life, but it was my lack of accepting the calling that caused me to suffer.

My lack of acceptance caused a lot of battles for me. The funny thing is that the greatest pain I have felt is when I resist the will of God. As soon as I begin to do the will of God I find it hard to accept, my life becomes worthwhile. The moment I stop accepting God's will, is the moment the inner conflict resumes. After many years of resisting God's will, finally I discovered that it was my resistance of God's will that caused the inner uneasiness to continue. There have been many long nights when I had to rap in my blanket as a chick in a brood, and I would just command myself to accept life as it happens. Sometimes the pain of staying the same becomes so great that we have to seek change. The important thing to note is that the change that we seek is through the door of acceptance.

For many of us, we find ourselves in a similar position. We spend so much time trying to resist the life that is happening to us, that we are not fully able to allow this same life to happen. Often it is our own selfishness that causes us to keep suffering. It is our pride and arrogance that shadows our eyes from reality, yet faith shows us the way of God. My case to you today is to identify with the power of acceptance, and begin by faith to accept the will and leading of God.

Acceptance doesn't always take away our troubles, but it will always help us get through them.

Acceptance doesn't always get rid of your circumstances, but it will help you live through them. By this I mean that when we accept what is happening to us, it won't automatically take away our troubles, but it is the first step to getting through these circumstances. You might be up against many enemies, yet if by faith you accept these enemies, and allow them to have their way by faith, then by faith you will also be lead through them. Accepting your enemies doesn't mean you heed to them, but it means that you see them as the enemies that they really are. When you see your enemies for what they are, then you can be properly empowered to defeat them.

You might be experiencing the whilst of the wind of life, be encouraged! The truth is that what you go through is what has been assigned to you, and what is assigned to you is for you to go through. You might be walking through the pricks of your own wilderness, yet look on before to the prize that lies ahead. Be like Paul, that though there was an unbearable thorn in his flesh, he anticipated and waited on the perfection of the power of God.

In my own life, there have been many situations that have been so foreign to me, that they have been so hard to accept. There was a time when I was going through the experience of a broken home. A broken home is a really sad and hurtful place to exist. If you have ever been in a broken home, you will know about the intimate wounds and indelible scars that can be experienced. I remember in this time that I felt some pain I didn't know could be experienced, yet all this pain was a result of my lack of acceptance of the situation. I just couldn't accept that this was happening to me. I thought I was better than these things happening to me, but what I realized was that I was only human, and humans pass through quite unpredictable pathways.

I remember one night in my bed, as I curled on my pillow and the pain burned, that I finally accepted that this was the situation and that there was absolutely nothing I could do to undo what was done. At this moment, there wasn't a sudden quenching of the pain, but slowly, as I accepted the reality, I was able to cope with it. This took some effort to keep reminding myself of the truth of the situation, but my acceptance made me acceptable before God. I must say that it is in this brokenness that I experienced some of the richest spiritual blessings of life. As I learned about the power of acceptance, I was able to shed a lot of the negative emotions I travelled with. I was also able to let go of the selfish way of thinking that some things couldn't happen to me, and accept the leading of God, that wherever He leads me, is safe for me to go.

Our Acceptance Disarms our Fears

One thing I have learned throughout the years, and it's that when I accept something I no longer fear it. Consider the person that fears death. The moment this person accepts that death is inevitable and there is no way around it, this person will no longer fear death, but will begin to accept it. The truth is that sometimes it is not the comfortable thing to accept things we do not favour, but it is the wise thing to do. Accepting death doesn't take away its sting, it just helps you to prepare for it.

It is very similar with almost all situations in life. When we accept the thing we fear, then we lose that fear. Sometimes it's very hard to accept the things we fear. Consider the one that fears losing a loved one, it can be very hard to accept this. As a young man I lost my father to a critical illness. For me, this wasn't something I was looking for at that time. I remember I use to watch my father on his bed suffering and I couldn't even watch him without tears, needless to say, accepting his death.

One morning at about 2:30 AM my Uncle called me with the news of my father's passing. I remember as I heard the news that I suddenly fainted. To this day, I remember the aching in my stomach as I tried to make sense of my father's passing. At this point in my life, this was the thing I feared the most, and up to this point, it was the most tragic event I experienced.

Even though I did not accept my father's death before he passed, eventually I had to accept that my daddy was gone. It was at this point that I began to heal and to let go of my fears.

Conclusion

Some things that we can take away here is that acceptance is both powerful and redeeming. We must accept the Truth of God over our lives, and we must also accept the realities that life throws at us. It often becomes very difficult to do this, but we must accept that it is the wise thing to do. The moment we begin to accept life for what it is, is the moment we begin to move forward to higher realm of being. Be encouraged! As you seek to accept the things you cannot change, be strong and know that God is on your team and He is rooting for you. God Bless You!

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Hello, I am Orlando Rowe and my passion is to encourage you. I am an author who focuses on Biblical encouragement. You can contact me by filling out the contact form on this website. God bless you!

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