John Murphy 

This is the Rock House Center podcast and I'm John Murphy. 

Beth Murphy 

I'm Beth Murphy and our podcast today is about choices. It's reasonable to ask why our choices would ever be different from our intention or our will, but they frequently are and. People regularly say things like why did I do that? Or I just don't know why I can't get myself to get that thing done, or why did I blurt that out and then, you know, we have that feeling of, I know better than that. The question of why our decisions are often not lining up with our will is the topic for this podcast. We're going to discuss what drives our decisions and how God can help us make decisions that are more consistent with who we want to be in life. 

John Murphy 

I don't think there's a single client that comes in a rock house that doesn't have a level of frustration with why it is that they make the decisions they make, why it is that in repeating scenarios where. In every case, they want to do one thing. They find themselves doing something else. They're they're making a decision. They're moving a direction that they really don't want to move. It's very frustrating and certainly I think everybody experiences this to some level is they just can't get themselves to whatever it is, go the extra mile or to not eat the second dessert or to quit. After the first glass of wine or knowing full well that all those things are probably what they really should be doing and want to be doing, but they find that they're kind of disconnected from some of their decisions and it's a very frustrating. This is also experienced by Paul. It's certainly we are in good company, a very spiritually mature individual. The apostle Paul had exactly the same concerns and he talked about in Romans 7/15/16 where he expresses how frustrated he is that he cannot do the things that he wants to do and knows he should do and he can't keep himself from doing the things which are actually morally. Conflict to what he believes are the things that he which should be doing. At Brockhouse, we expressed this condition as the the head knows what to do, but the heart is about to make the decision or the heart will always make the decision on what we actually do. So there's a disconnect between our head and our heart, and that's a foundational thing that we help people bring back into alignment when they come. 

Beth Murphy 

Here our heart is where our motivation comes from. So we have to look into the motivation of our heart to understand. Why we're doing what we do. So as Paul says, God can bring the solution. He has the answer through Jesus Christ. And the answer is that by healing our heart, when the woundedness of our heart motivates us. To do the things that we don't want to do or fail to do, the things that we would really like to do, or know that we should be doing. So we want to understand how we engage God. To to bring about that solution, to bring about that healing in our heart when our choice is on our behaviors are in conflict with who we know we want to be and the choices that would be consistent with God's desire for us. And, and we know would be the best thing for us on that. That disconnect is there. It's an opportunity for deep healing of the. Part which will result in a change in our decision making. God is always available to help us bring the alignment that we want so that we can get on his track in his will and live in that place that I think of the safety zone, the place where he wants us living under the shelter of his protection, cause we're residing in his will. 

John Murphy 

There really are a lot of examples of this and I have so many in my own life, I think probably as I've spoken before, food being an issue for me in in the early in my early years, most significantly that whole idea of going into a restaurant and ordering something that that you already had resolved before you go in, that you're not going to do it, but you go ahead and have that second dessert or you have the fries, you weren't going to have. Are you going to be. More lean. And then you come out and you just can't. You just bewildered why it is that I that I made that decision. That's one of the examples. That's pretty common for a lot of people. Things like buying more stuff, going out to go shopping and ended up getting the most expensive thing. They didn't really need or three of them. They didn't really need or or whatever sort of excess in spending that can come along. That's just another really common example of this is just the disconnect between our head has an idea of what we want to do and how we're going to proceed, but then we end up making decisions that conflict with it. It's pretty common. 

Beth Murphy 

And then there's a whole category of just how we may treat other people. Or maybe it's just certain people that hit some spot in us and we respond to them in ways that we regret later or just have sort of reactions or a bad attitude towards someone and end up saying and doing things that we feel badly about but can't seem to get it under control. And certainly when we are having eruptions, emotional eruptions, whether they're anger or rage or fear, panic, even panic attacks, people will commonly report to us things along those lines where they're having reactions that they can recognize or intents. And they're really outside of what their logical mind. Things make sense in the given situation, but they're out of control of that response and what they do or feel or. Day so that whole category of things can bring a lot of suffering and and again be pretty bewildering to people. 

John Murphy 

Another one that you commonly hear of are folks who are uncomfortable with the limits of how far they've gone in physical intimacy with someone else. There's a lot of shame and a lot of guilt that can be around that, but in the middle of the of this situation, they just were not able to stop things when they need to be stopped and they come back and they go. Why did I do that? I didn't want to go to that extent. That's just another one of those places. Where there's a real, maybe even fairly deep commitment to limit how how much of a certain anything I'm going to do, but aren't just not able to stop at that point. Something's pushing back, pushing beyond where they know they should stop. The another one obviously is. We've seen over and over again just folks drinking more that they intended to drink, having a lot of consequences. And bewilderment about why it is that I just can't stop after the first drink or whatever that is. And sometimes it can be just in our thought life negative or troubling thoughts, that kind of overtake our mind. We really can't understand where they're coming from. They don't seem to be coming from a rational source or have. It's just not rational that it's just, it's just us. It's surprising to them. 

Beth Murphy 

People are often troubled about realizing that they're living in judgment or criticism of their people or of themselves, and really just find them themselves going into that kind of a loop and falling into thinking things and maybe maybe saying things that are judgmental or critical, or maybe being able to refrain from. Playing it, but knowing that they're just clamping down on it, but having those thoughts and responses that they really don't want to have. So all of these things and many others can represent the ways in which we're making choices or decisions or living our lives in a way that's inconsistent with who we want to be. And I think Paul expressed it well and just that there was a conflict between his moral instincts. And what he would find himself doing. And it's that thing where God's given us, his godly moral instinct. But we nonetheless say and do things that are in direct conflict with that despite our best intentions. 

John Murphy 

If you talk with people about this, it's very common that they would say something like there was really no good reason for that. I had. It's just it's not what I wanted to do. I did it anyway. It it wasn't reasonable. So everyone of the clients that we work with will experience motivations that really are beyond their rational reasoning. But the important thing to realize is that even though the behavior is not rational from their reasoning and their intellectual perspective, that it actually does make sense to the heart. It doesn't mean that it doesn't come because it's not reasonable, doesn't mean it doesn't come without reason. And there is reason. And the reason is is that the heart is the epicenter of our motivation and choices, and so there's a reason. Why the heart wants to do that and and there's a reason why there are motivations in place and like we like to say if the heart is driving us to do that, even though it may not make sense to you, it makes perfect sense to the heart that this is what it's doing. And so that's where we have to go to start unwinding what's really driving these choices that are beyond our rational reasoning. 

Beth Murphy 

And I want to say, too, that every counselor at Rockhouse Center understands the things that their clients report, where the the client can be ashamed, embarrassed, mystified about attract, they've gotten on, or a repeating pattern that they're on, and it doesn't make sense to. But because of our perspective and the understanding of what goes on in our hearts, that's all wrapped up in what we do at Rock House Center and our counseling here, it makes total sense to us. And so people can report what they think it are bad, unreasonable, outrageous, outlandish things that they've said or done or thought and. Odd as it may sound, it always makes sense to us because of what our perspective is is going upstream to the heart and understanding where those things came from early on. What was the foundation? How did we get? How did any of us legitimately get to the place that we are now in life, where we're making the decision? That we're doing, even though they're in conflict with where we want to be, so that is the answer. It's all about getting at what are the foundational drivers in our hearts, where we're being driven foundationally for with a desire for peace, but we can't get that peace without God. He's he's wired us that we need. Him. And so he wants to help us redirect to him to get that piece that we're seeking. 

John Murphy 

Just because we were made that way doesn't mean that the heart is ready to trust God, for that need, and that is now what is going on here is that what we've seen is the heart made for God actually has been trained and are has learned, or has been convinced in some way that it can't trust God. And that's not the answer and that it must go another direction to solve those foundation. Needs and so that's when when we know what the right thing is to do, what would honor God and our intellectually, then our heart is heading off in another direction because it's not functioning under the same belief system really, as our head is. 

Beth Murphy 

So the heart's going to pursue whatever life has trained it to pursue for peace. Whatever sort of a counterfeit track, instead of going to God for peace. So all those things we talked about earlier, all the countless forms of excess that we may be doing, whether it's drinking or eating for comfort. Or physical intimacy to get value or and try to get out emotional intimacy. Buying things because we think it will impress others or try to increase our worth somehow all the kinds of things that we do to try to control and we're trying to control other people, their opinions ourselves one way or another. To try to get our deepest divine needs met. 

John Murphy 

And of course, we couldn't list all of the wrong strategies of the world that our heart could be convinced of, or that we certainly have seen come through here. It's just that based on people's life stories, it makes total sense that they are where they are. So it's not a. If they could have diverted from where they are in terms of a premeditated redirect in their life apart from their life story, we have our life story. It has a certain result on how our heart has reacted to it and our heart is doing the best it can to fill this basic need for peace. So it's not something that we beat ourselves up about, but it's just time to go upstream and try to figure out what are the drivers and then try to get our heart healed up through inviting. Got into the. Situation so that our heart can be pointing towards looking towards moving towards God to satisfy these things fully instead of whatever it is. In the world. 

Beth Murphy 

So the symptoms that we can experience that indicate there's suffering going on underneath are feelings like depression or anxiety or hopelessness or despair or fear or panic. Certainly anger or rage or negative thoughts. All those things are symptoms that God wants us to have empathy for. To understand that there's something underneath all that as well as just all the associated bad decisions. All of this is making true peace impossible. 

John Murphy 

So we have the opportunity, by God's invitation, to bring him into each of these situations and to redirect and get our heart aligned back up with what is really going to satisfy the heart. So God has the ability to. Allow us to engage him to overcome wrong beliefs and wrong dependencies. The the heart may have, and therefore replacing them with the absolute truth and replacing those dependencies with him, with our dependencies from other things in the world which are never going to satisfy the basic need that we have in our heart to be at peace, but only through a deep trusting relationship with the Lord. As we move into that trust, then the choices of our life will make more sense and come into alignment with who we are and who we want to be. 

Beth Murphy 

I think this is a great time to go ahead and move into a prayer. Where you can invite God into the why of your choices so that you can live a life that's more consistent with who you want to be and the life that God has for you. All of this is the life that will lead you to the deepest blessing you can have. 

John Murphy 

So the place to get started here is to ask God for some guidance. I know that we have. We could probably list a number of things, but we really want to go after the main choices that you're making, which if you could get a breakthrough in it, would really move the quality of your life. There would be a significant change in how. Feels. And so we just want to start off with a prayer of asking God. Show us what that choice is, which would give us a lot of peace and a lot of freedom from if we could align it with our heart and his will. So let's start by asking God into that by just saying Heavenly Father, we just ask you right now to reveal to anybody who's listening. What is that choice that you want most to heal them of? What is the thing that you want to free them from being out of control of so that they can bring their life into alignment with who they are and. Who you want them to be? Because you want them to be blessed and you love them, Lord, and you know that their decisions out there, that they're making that need, they need help with. So Lord, I just ask that you would reveal that to them right now in Jesus name. Amen. OK, so take the first one. Usually what happens is there's the choice that hits us. That's like we can't even control it. That choice just pops up, and then we start thinking of all the other choices that we could talk about that we'd be more willing to trust to God. So if you really want the breakthrough, go with the very first one that came to your mind. And then let's go into this prayer together. OK, let's pray. So repeat after me in this prayer. Heavenly Father, I Recon. As. That it is not your will. For me to be habitually out of control. Of any behavior or not to be able to make decisions. That you and I both want for me, Father, I need your help the most. Right now, with my decision about and there is the blank. What is that decision that you want God to enter into your life and help you get to the root of? And bring it until I'm. I'll just repeat that, father. I need your help the most right now with my decision about. Fill the blank. Father, I declare I am powerless to consistently. Make the right decision in this matter. And I invite you to work in my heart. To change anything that's necessary. To bring this decision. And to alignment with your will. And what I know is the right thing to do. Father, I reject any lie. And any dependency. On anything in the world. That is causing me to make wrong decisions. Or causes me to have unwanted behavior. Father, please replace the lies in my heart with your truth. And replace my hearts dependencies. On things in the world. With trust in you. To fill my deepest needs. Please heal me from how these lies and dependencies. Have caused me emptiness. Frustration and suffering. Please strengthen me with the desire to return your love. By honoring you. In all of my decisions. I pray this in the name of your son, Jesus. Amen. 

Beth Murphy 

Amen. We're on a mission at Rock House to bring healing and restoration to every challenge of life, and we welcome you to join us by sending this podcast to any one who might be blessed. We want to reach folks anywhere in the world, those who may never come for counseling or talked to us, and those who have tried traditional counselling and still feel. Those of you who have a testimony as a rock house client or from doing our be transformed workbook on your own, join us in this mission. You can lead a friend through the be transform workbook or have them contact Rock house if they're in the middle of a life struggle. We have God's answers for the hurting people in your life, and if they connect with Rockhouse they will hear a life changing truth. Call us at 615-369-0668 or connect on line through contact at rockhousecenter.com. Thank you for joining us today and God bless you. 

John Murphy 

Thanks for being with us. Goodbye. 

Virtual Christian Biblical Counseling and Couneling in Nashville TN, and Bellingham WA just north of Seattle