The Challenge of Putting God first

In this episode, Erin Michele focuses on putting God's truth first in your life by quieting the internal and external voices that create pressure and doubt. She emphasizes letting God's voice and truth be the loudest, thereby facilitating a deeper trust in His character and actions. Erin shares practical steps for silencing negative thoughts and distractions, highlights impactful scripture verses, and offers insights from previous guest Rose Ward. Key takeaways include understanding God's unwavering love, the importance of scripture, and recognizing trustworthy voices that echo God's truth.

00:00 Introduction and Purpose

00:20 Understanding the Voices in Our Lives

03:03 Identifying and Silencing Negative Voices

04:08 Embracing God's Truth

09:26 Practical Steps to Amplify God's Voice

11:18 Final Encouragement and Prayer

12:57 Closing Remarks and Upcoming Content

Transcript

The Challenge of Putting God First

Hi, I'm Erin Michele. Welcome to Steps to Trusting, where it's my goal to meet you where you are in your faith journey, and to encourage you to continue to transfer trust from yourself and your actions to the God who is enough. If you are like me and you need to be reminded over and over that you never needed to do it all, that you don't have to be enough because we trust a God who is, then you are in the right place. Friends, on this episode we're discussing putting God's truth first in your life and quieting lies.

I often like to say this as letting God's voice be the loudest in my life. What does that mean?

I mean it's the voice that we listen to. I mean we let his voice increase, his truth increase other voices decrease. Now before you go and think I'm hearing voices, I want to clarify a little bit. When I say voices speaking into our lives, I don't necessarily mean an audible voice. Sometimes these voices are a narrative, Friends, we are surrounded by voices and [00:01:00] comments and statements that tell us who we should be and what we should do, how we should act. Everyone from the commercials, to our neighbors, to our loved ones, to even internally telling us what we should do, who we are. There are constant pulls on our attention and our actions often we can be pulled along just by the things that we think that we should do or the opinions that we think people have of us. Some of these voices are messages that we receive from our culture. From others disappointment, from ourselves internally. This constant battle that tells us we need to measure up. We need to do more.

We've messed up too much. And sometimes these messages that we receive or these voices in our life seem to be so loud, they're yelling at all the things that we should do or should have done or didn't do right.

And I don't know about you, although I'm not audibly [00:02:00] hearing those voices, I feel those pressures all the time. I feel the pressure that I, should know what people in my life need. I should have the amount of time or energy to give them what they need. I need to be available when someone wants to have a lunch with me or Needs a moment to sit down.

And these voices in our life sometimes become so loud as we turn inside and look at ourselves and the pressures that we put on ourselves and that others have put on us to do things in a specific way. And I personally need to quiet the impact of those voices.

I need to quiet those voices so that that's not what I'm listening to, but that I'm listening to God's truth in my life. most important of all, that I'm listening to who God is and what He's done for me, the character of my God that loves me, [00:03:00] letting His voice be the one that speaks over me. In order to let God's voice be the loudest in our life, we need to quiet the other voices. We need to let voices that are telling us things opposite of God's truth to quiet in our lives. For me, that voice that I need to silence isn't even one from the outside. It's one that I hear internally. I second guess my actions. I second guess if I did enough or did it right or chose the right thing. That is internal criticism, telling me that I need to do more, or be more, or live up to a standard, instead of being reminded that God, gives me a value, because I was created in his image. So how do we do this? How do we quiet the voices? Whether they're internal or external. And push away their impact on our lives. So that we can focus on God's truth.

I've found that when I have negative thoughts in my mind that I need to isolate those thoughts and I need to look at them and I need to recognize, is this true or is this not [00:04:00] true? And then I need to preach the truth over myself, my life.

How do we do this? How do we preach the truth into our lives? The number one encouragement that I have for you is to echo what I've heard from many of our guests, most recently from Rose Ward on the last podcast, that spending time with God, spending time in his word, Looking at who God is and what his word says will help us to recognize what is true. A question that you may have is, does letting God's voice be the loudest in our lives mean that we can't listen to what people speak into our life or speak over us in our lives? And I would say that we need to look at what people are saying about us, to us, speaking over us. We need to look at what those voices are saying and if they're true. I think that God uses people and circumstances to speak into our lives, but we need to [00:05:00] look at what is the source of what is being spoken into our life.

If someone who has a voice in your life is saying something contrary to truth of God, then that is a voice that we need to quiet and replace with truth. However, God often uses people and circumstances to show us his truth, to point to him.

We can listen to what people are saying to us and speaking over us. We can let that have an impact in our life, if it is pointing us to God. I sat with someone once in a Bible study and we were talking about how. We need to rely on God's truth. And the woman was discussing how someone sat with her and spoke love and care over a situation that she was in.

And through conversation we were able to realize that what they were speaking pointed to truth found in God's word. They were speaking identity [00:06:00] and value into the woman that sat before me. These are trustworthy voices because they echo what God speaks into our lives.

And when there is a lie that tries to tell you you need to do more or be more, that you messed up and you can't be forgiven, then we need to turn and we need to hear the truth that we are loved. 

A verse that comes to mind is from Zephaniah 3, 17, and it says that God sings over you with rejoicing. This is a picture that I need when the pressures of this world, when the voices are getting loud, when the lies are sneaking in. I need to shift my gaze to who God is and be reminded that He delights over me.

I need to be reminded that he knit me together in my mother's womb. A verse from Psalm 139.

I need to be reminded the promise from Matthew 23, 37 where [00:07:00] Jesus said to Jerusalem, How often I have longed to gather your children together as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing. I need to know that I'm invited to come into God's presence, that He will gather me, that I won't be pushed away because I wasn't enough, but that I'm accepted because of who He is longing to gather me. Friends, you don't have to earn position with God. You are welcome because of who He is, not because of who you are. 

I find more of this truth in Romans 10 9 where it says if you confessed with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. I need this reminder. It's not telling me to do more or be more or live up to someone's standard, but it's telling me to turn to God, to claim him as my Lord, to be reminded that he is the one that does the saving. 

And if my faith is failing [00:08:00] me, and I feel the pressure that I must believe, I'm taken to 2nd Timothy 2.

13 that says if we are faithless, he remains faithful, for he cannot deny himself. It reminds me that I can have faith because he's faithful. Faith itself doesn't depend on me, but it depends on the author and finisher of my faith. I can believe He did what He said He's done, and He will do what He says He will do, like the promise from Revelation 21. 4 that says God will wipe away all of our tears. because God is faithful.

These are truths that point me to who God is. When I feel like I need to earn something, I'm reminded from Romans 5, 8 that I was loved before I did anything right. It says that while we were still sinners, Christ died for you. And I can believe that, no matter what I've [00:09:00] done or haven't done, that Christ died for me. Christ died for me before I did anything right. This is the truth that I've needed to preach over myself, to preach over my circumstances, To let this voice increase, this voice of truth increase in my life so that the voices that tell me I don't measure up or I have to do more or haven't done enough,

quiet in my life.

Practically, how do we increase this voice in our life?

A verse I used to say to my son all the time when he was little is Philippians 4, 8. And it says, Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable, if anything is excellent or praiseworthy, think about such things.

That's what I need to be reminded. I need to think about those things. And again in James 1 17, it says, Every good and perfect [00:10:00] gift is from above. I need to look at these things that are gifts in my life. What is noble and right and pure and lovely and admirable and praiseworthy.

These things that God has done in my life, that he is doing in my life. I need to shift my gaze again to him and his word.

Friend when a voice, or a question, or a lie, sneaks into your head and leaves you feeling the weight and the pressure of it.

I encourage you to ask, is this true? Is this noble? Is this right? Is this pure? Is this something that I should think on? Or do I need to replace this lie, this challenge, or this distraction in my life with something that is true? We can ask ourselves, what is true about this circumstance about me or about my God?

And we can choose to look at those truths instead of the lies, instead of the voices that tell us to do [00:11:00] more. We can let God's truth and his voice be loudest in our lives.

I encourage you today to start looking for the truth that you need to apply to the challenging voice in your life. to the voice that is distracting you from focusing on God's voice and his truth.

I mentioned recently on the podcast about practicing putting on the full armor of God from Ephesians 6. If you don't know where to start, I encourage you to start with Ephesians 6:10- 18. Putting on the full armor of God. This is the practice of preaching truth over our life. But I encourage you also to start reading in God's word and to be looking at the truth of God that washes over our circumstances, washes over our inadequacies, washes over our failures and says, we are welcome like A hen gathers its Chick, God longs to [00:12:00] gather us.

You are welcome. Let His voice and love for you be the loudest today. 

Dear God, I thank you that you love us so dearly, God, that you loved us before we did anything right that our faith rests on your faithfulness, God, that. We don't have to earn your love, but we've received your free gift. Lord, I pray that you would build our faith.

That you would help truth come to mind when we need it. That you would point us to the truth that we specifically need today. To tell us that we are yours, God. We are loved. You value us. You gave us value. You loved us so much that you sent your son to die for us. Lord, let that be the voice that is loudest in our life.

Your voice, your truth, telling us that you love us and we are welcome.

It's in Jesus name that I pray. Amen. Friends, thank you so much for [00:13:00] joining me.

Please like, subscribe, and share with a friend so they can be encouraged and you don't miss what's coming next time. You don't want to miss my upcoming conversation with Teresa Whiting. Where she too is telling us to look to God. To look to His truth and not the distractions of this world.

If you want to connect with me, you can do that over at ErinMichele. net. There you can sign up to receive my free gift.

 What's your next step? It's a Bible journaling resource to help you look at places in your life where you can continue to transfer trust from yourself and your actions to the God who is enough. I hope you join us back here next time, but until then, I wanted to leave you with this reminder from Ephesians 2.

10, For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. Friends, I'm praying for you as you keep on stepping.