Keeping Short Accounts: The Secret to Living in Freedom

🚨 An Unexpected Discovery

During a recent dental cleaning, my hygienist noticed pus coming up from under my gums. Gross! An x-ray revealed a deeply impacted wisdom tooth with an infected cyst around it. Off to the oral surgeon I went, praying antibiotics might fix it. No such luck. The surgeon explained that not only did the tooth need to be removed, but the surgery was complex and carried the risk of a broken jaw. Yikes!

As horrifying as that was, what really struck me was when the surgeon said most people don’t discover this kind of problem until their jaw actually breaks. That image stuck with me—and it got me thinking. Sin in my life can be just like that tooth…

🦷 A Painful but Necessary Solution

At first, the solution to sin seems as unpleasant as that surgery to remove my tooth. It feels disruptive. It shakes things up, exposes what we’d rather keep hidden, and sometimes requires painful honesty. The name God gives to the process of digging out our sin and exposing it to the healing touch of his grace is repentance and I'm guessing that, like me, it's not your favorite activity.

But ... there's something I've noticed. God's ways often seem counter-intuitive, but if we push past our discomfort, trust Him, and actually do what He says, the results are astounding.

I've shared in other posts about my long struggle with anxiety, but until recently I never thought of repentance as a way to have less anxiety and greater peace in my life. However, lately God has been showing me how He can use my repentance to disarm the enemy and to actually set me free from the trap of shame and inadequacy that has led to a lot of my anxiety.

✨ The Power of Keeping Short Accounts

Here's an example from my own life. During my first marriage, I cheated on my husband. I was deeply ashamed of having done this, so when I met my now husband I didn't share this with him. I was always afraid that if he knew I had cheated on my first husband that he would be afraid that I would cheat on him. A few years into our marriage we went to a marriage retreat where one of the exercises was to share this type of unrevealed sin with your spouse, so I finally came clean and told my husband about my past infidelity. You know what happened? Nothing!! It just wasn't a big deal for him. He knows that I love him and am faithful to him, so this past behavior wasn't any kind of issue for him. What happened in me, though, was that this burden I'd been carrying around for years and years was suddenly gone. The fear of the revelation was gone. My infidelity was no longer a weapon that Satan could use to make me cower in fear and shame.

This is the power of repentance.

📖 A Lifestyle of Repentance

But, repentance isn't a one and done, because I still sin, and so do you. I've learned that to keep the enemy disarmed I need to make self-examination and repentance a regular discipline. One of the wisest people I know calls this "keeping short accounts". That's a good description. I don't want any sin in my life to become like that wisdom tooth, buried deep inside of me festering. So, I'm keeping short accounts so that the enemy has no ammunition.

What about you? Is there anything you need to bring into the light today?

If today’s post stirred something in your heart and you’d like a safe place to process what God might be saying, I’d love to walk with you. Coaching is simply a space to listen, reflect, and discover together what God has for your next step. You don’t have to walk this journey alone.