Beauty for ashes

"The world is full of hurting people wearing masks"

The past few weeks have made me become rather pensive at heart. I have what seems too much time in this fast-paced world. I have so many things to do...yet allow much of my time to go to thoughts. At best, I'm learning things that seem to be shaking me from the inside out. At worst....well, I guess there really is no worse at this point.
I keep thinking of God's promises for me...He said He would make beauty from ashes. Unfortunately, Something I've come to realize is that although God will burn away at the things that are rotten, and leave behind ashes, we, as humans can sometimes choose to hold on to the ashes. Every now and then, we open up the fragile hand that chooses to keep the ashes, and we look, remember and hurt over things that are very much over and done. What is the use of God being so gracious and kind, if all we do is hold on to the past. Was is not enough for Him to sacrifice Himself for our own failures and short comings? Was it not enough that He willingly gave His life for our freedom? Hmmm...I think we forget sometimes, this Recently proven by my own stubbornness.
God desires wholeness of our hearts, not hearts full of holes. Even as ministers of the Lord, we can tend to get so caught up helping other people, that we begin wearing masks in our day to day living. Don't get me wrong, it's amazing what the Power of God can do through anyone, but how sad to see us limit His power through our own stubborn state of minds. Freedom and Healing are there for the taking. However, is our desire for those greater than the desire to look back? I can complain (and very much have before) about needing healing and not being able to get over the past, but in such an attitude, can I really expect anything more than the low places I find myself? There is so much power in words of God. So much power in the Spirit. There is power in what I speak forth in the Name of the Lord, but am I choosing to speak it forth? If we do things as God does, then why do we fail to see that we serve "the God who gives life to the dead and calls things that are not as though they were" (Rom 4:17). If I say I have not received healing, then I have no healing. But if I choose to speak out things as God does, and say I have healing (even when the enemy wants me to believe or see otherwise), then I HAVE HEALING!
Today I chose to get up again. I may not have been down too low, but none the less, I was down. I chose to let the past mistakes and past "disappointments" haunt me like a live horror movie. I could not and would not get out of the mindset that the enemy convinced me to be in. I wanted to get a over a past that seemed so brokenhearted, but I was never really giving God the ashes. He waited, I'm sure. He stood in front me many times before...asking me so gently to just give it to Him. I didnt know that I was ready yet, for whatever reason that was, but I'm more tired now of hurting over things that are worthless. Things which have not brought me happiness in a long time. Broken people have broken relationships, well, I'm no longer broken. By the strenght and grace of God...I'm back up and taking the position I was born to inherit. There is an uncreated light of God that longs to shine through each one of us...don't let it be clouded and covered by the ashes that hold on to. Just let it go. God will bring beauty in His time. All in His time. <33