Red Flags

“Neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Romans 8:39 NIV

I once heard someone say, “You only need one red flag.”  So why did I collect a wagon full of them?  Maybe, if you are anything like me, we want to trust people. We want to show mercy, to give someone the benefit of the doubt. This is especially true if you’re in a relationship or a marriage. Because after all, a Christian should be loving and forgiving. God has shown mercy to me when I messed up, so  I had better show mercy to others when they mess up, right? The Bible says we should forgive 70×7 and that doesn’t mean 490 times. It means endless. Infinite. So we can stop counting. 

Most of us prefer avoiding conflict. We don’t want to open that can of worms, so we don’t go there. Instead we choose the denial phase avoiding any possible pain, keeping silent, hoping it was only our imagination or that it will just go away, but guess what? It stays in the back of our brain until something similar happens to refresh it, or we don’t stop thinking about it at all, and it ends up consuming our thought world for the entire day. That’s no way to live! 

I’ve heard of people who have gone through some ugly stuff and are now on the other side of a difficulty only to say, “I have no regrets. It made me who I am today.”

Although I’m so thankful I’m at where I’m at today, it doesn’t mean it was an easy feat getting here.  Believe me when I say I have regrets! I can look back now and I wish I could have told  my 19-year-old self a thing or two, in addition to my 29-year-old self, my 39-year-old self, and my 49-year-old self!  We learn as we go so I’m just saying, I wished I had known about some things or had applied some things while I was younger. 

What I’d tell my younger self: Know your worth. Love is blind and often you see what you want to see, so take a step back and remove those rose-colored glasses. If there’s something not quite right, perhaps it’s not just your imagination. Pay attention to the red flags, because there is some truth to having a woman’s intuition. It could be the Holy Spirit speaking truth to you. (At the same time, the enemy will be trying his best to deceive you into believing his lies.) Know God’s Word and cling to it’s truth. Believe you are perfect just the way God made you because He doesn’t make junk!  You’re beautiful! He loves you, nothing can separate His love from you, and there is not one thing you can do to make Him love you more or less. God wants the best for you, so He doesn’t want you to settle for something or someone less than His desire for you. As a child of the King of kings, you ARE worthy, so KNOW YOUR WORTH!

Whatever phase of life you find yourself in, I’m praying for you to address the red flags, and to know your true worth. Amen.