Tall Tales vs. Truth

So a while ago I picked up this book entitled Perfectly Unique, written by a woman named Annie Downs.  To tell the truth, I wasn't really reading it for me, but I was thinking about using it as a teaching tool for my small group of sixth grade girls so of course I was giving it a quick scan first.  While "scanning," the bold title of chapter two jumped out at me: Mind.  I was intrigued.  All the other chapters were named after various body parts young girls commonly feel insecure about:  eyes, ears, mouth, hands, knees, and feet...How was the mind being related to all this?  I began to read:

{Your mind.  It's just a container.  But a fragile container, don't forget.  So your first duty with your brain is to protect it.  Things are going to fill it...It's up to you to decided what.}

Even if you aren't a twelve-year-old girl on the verge of puberty, you can't deny the truth in that.  We are falling prey to lies constantly.  "I'm so ugly...I'm dumb...I have no talents...S/he is a WAY better person than I am...If only..."  Even if you don't believe every lie that pops into your head throughout the day, if you don't shut it down immediately, it's there.  And it gnaws at your brain until you actually start giving in to it; believing it.  Real talk, people:  I struggle with this.  Especially after being exposed to the university environment where GPA is everything and everyone's only concern seems to be their own success.  Things that used to come naturally to me didn't seem to come so naturally anymore.  I actually had to study for tests (which, I suppose, shouldn't have been new to me).  I felt worthless every time I made a mistake academically, and I allowed it to crush me.  The lie I was so often believing was that I was worthless.  The truth?

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I am chosen.  I am royalty.  I am part of a holy nation and I belong to God.  Of course I knew this, but it wasn't until this year after going to Passion (which I might talk about a little bit later) that I really started to believe it.  And once I started to believe it, it began to shut down some of those lies I was letting fill my precious mind container.   A couple weeks ago it seemed like my professor had nothing good to say about a project of mine.  I just though to myself:  "It's okay.  He must not know I'm part of a royal priesthood."  It actually made me want to laugh out loud, because the Truth literally set my mind free from the falsehood I was feeding it.  What I was filled with instead was pure joy.

Annie Downs had the genius idea of making these "Lie vs. Truth" cards.  The idea is that on one side of the card, you write down a lie you often believe, and on the other side you write the Truth of what scripture actually says on that matter.  For example, I made one saying "I am not chosen" on one side, and on the other side I wrote 1 Peter 2:9 (the verse you just read above).  So whenever I'm falling captive to the lie of worthlessness again, I just flip over my card and remember that I'm part of a chosen generation (NBD).  I encourage you to make some Lie vs. Truth cards of your own and carry them with you everywhere you go, or make them for someone you know who needs them!  Here are some examples of a few I made.

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 I challenge you to shut down the lies and grow some Truth flowers in your mind garden today.