Why We Pursue Toxic Friendships - Encouragement for Today - October 3, 2018

Peace and perspective from God's timeless truths. [View this email in your browser]( Encouragement for Today --------------------------------------------------------------- [Mary DeMuth] October 3, 2018 Why We Pursue Toxic Friendships [MARY DEMUTH]( “Don’t remember these earlier events; don’t recall these former events. Look, I am about to do something new. Now it begins to happen! Do you not recognize it? Yes, I will make a road in the desert and paths in the wilderness.” [Isaiah 43:18-19]( (NET Bible) We tend to chase what we didn’t have. Growing up, I longed to be affirmed and loved by my parents. One leaned toward predatory tendencies, and the other battled narcissism, which meant neither had much energy to give me. So I spent my childhood desperately trying to make sure they would love me. Oh, the relational gymnastics I performed to be noticed and loved! And yet, that story seldom solved itself, so my heart felt incomplete. My love-loop remained open-ended, unresolved. When I met Jesus at age 15, He beautifully tied up the loop, but as life wore on, I subconsciously (desperately!) tried to close the already-closed loop in my own strength. I felt that if I could get a predatory person or a narcissist to love me, I could prove, finally, that I was worthy of love. So I chased friends that had either trait — or both — which led to some difficult years. The sad thing is, I couldn’t see my pattern. I kept pursuing friends who hurt or disregarded me in the same ways my parents had. I would invest years in friendships that inevitably blew up and left me devastated. Today’s passage helped me recognize my unhealthy pattern. The prophet Isaiah, just prior to these verses, recounts how God miraculously rescued the nation of Israel from those bent on destroying them. He provided a clear pathway of rescue through the Red Sea! But now God was encouraging the people to not dwell on the way God worked back then, but to prepare their hearts for a new, completed work. “Don’t remember these earlier events; don’t recall these former events. Look, I am about to do something new. Now it begins to happen! Do you not recognize it? Yes, I will make a road in the desert and paths in the wilderness” ([Isaiah 43:18-19](. While my parents weren’t my enemies, Jesus did deliver me miraculously through the sea of His blood when I met Him. That deliverance meant He truly did complete my love-loop, but without the predatory or narcissistic tendencies. I simply needed to rest there, then anticipate the new life and new ways of finding friends He had for me. Maybe you’ve experienced something similar. Have you chased the same kinds of toxic relationships, only to be continually broken by them? Have you experienced friend-breakups that left you reeling? Do you keep choosing unhealthy people to close the love-loop? Here’s the truth: Jesus has already completed your love-loop. You are worthy of love because He chose you before the foundation of the world. Whether you had parents, siblings or friends in your past that treated you awfully, you can still rest in the fact that the God of the universe left the 99 and pursued you. (Found in the parable of the lost sheep, [Luke 15:3-7]( [Continue reading...]( [Learn more about RevenueStripe...]( [Read about Salem Web Network]( | [Subscription Preferences]( | [Unsubscribe]( --------------------------------------------------------------- © 2018 Salem Web Network. All rights reserved. 111 Virginia Street, Suite 500, Richmond, VA 23219. This email is never sent unsolicited. You are receiving this email because your email address, {EMAIL}, is signed up to receive newsletters, updates, and special offers from Encouragement for Today. [Link](