How to Overcome Ultimate Living Aversion: Breaking Free from Spiritual Food Jags

Many believers struggle with what could be called "ultimate living aversion" - a spiritual disorder that prevents us from embracing God's full plan for our lives. Just as some children develop food aversions that keep them from eating nutritious meals, Christians can develop aversions to biblical concepts like blessing and prosperity that God intends for our spiritual health.

What Is Ultimate Living Aversion?

Ultimate living aversion is a spiritual disorder that makes believers uncomfortable with God's promises of blessing and prosperity. Like a child who gags at the thought of healthy food, some Christians recoil when they hear words like "blessing" or "prosperity" - even though these concepts are clearly biblical.

This aversion isn't natural or healthy. It's a disorder that prevents us from receiving what God wants to give us. The Bible clearly states God's desire for our wellbeing: "'Beloved, I wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health, even as thy soul prospereth'" - 3 John 2 (KJV).

How Sin Creates Spiritual Food Jags

The Problem with "My Truth"

Sin creates a deadly spiritual disorder that promotes life aversion. Culture has worked to normalize immorality while creating an aversion to truth, life, morality, and God's goodness. Instead of embracing God's truth, many people develop a "jag" of "my truth" - eating the same spiritual junk food over and over.

Common Spiritual Food Jags

Many Christians get stuck repeating unhealthy spiritual phrases that sound religious but lack nutritional value:

• "The Lord just loves me the way I am" (ignoring the need for transformation)
• "I'm under God's grace" (using grace as an excuse to avoid growth)
• "I'm just an old sinner saved by grace" (denying your new identity in Christ)
• "I'm just suffering for Jesus" (instead of living for Jesus)

These spiritual jags become excuses to avoid the abundant life God offers. They stop the cycle of spiritual breathing - the flow of receiving and giving that characterizes ultimate living.

Why We Develop Aversion to God's Goodness

The Enemy's Strategy

Since the devil cannot stop God from blessing you (Jesus defeated him at the cross), he works to help you stop yourself. How? By promoting spiritual aversion to truth. If you develop an aversion to blessing, then all the blessing verses in the Bible won't work for you.

Trusting Feelings Over Truth

"'There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death'" - Proverbs 14:12 (KJV). You cannot trust your feelings or sensitivities when you have a word aversion. That's why "'Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding'" - Proverbs 3:5 (KJV).

How to Overcome Ultimate Living Aversion

Just as therapists help children overcome food aversions through exposure therapy, God provides spiritual therapy to overcome our aversion to His goodness.

Step 1: Taste and See

"'O taste and see that the Lord is good: blessed is the man that trusteth in him'" - Psalm 34:8 (KJV). God knows we need help with our life aversion disorders. He tells us to taste and see that He is good.

Speak God's will out loud so you can hear it and taste it. Quote 3 John 2 and declare: "That's God's will for my life. I believe that God said it, so I believe it and I receive it."

Step 2: Listen to Yourself

Record yourself reading 3 John 2 on your phone, then listen to yourself speaking that verse of life. This helps reprogram your thinking about God's goodness.

Step 3: Search for Confirmation

Find other Bible verses that complement 3 John 2. Consider studying:

• Deuteronomy 8:18
• Psalm 1:3
• 2 Corinthians 9:8

There are hundreds of verses confirming God's desire to bless His children.

Step 4: Give Cheerfully

Practice ultimate living by giving as you have received. "'Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal it shall be measured to you again'" - Luke 6:38 (KJV).

The Power of Authorized Living

Restored Authority Through Christ

When sin entered the world through Adam and Eve, humanity lost its license for ultimate living. Jesus came to restore our God-given authority. Being born again means being authorized for life - licensed to live as sons and daughters of God.

From the Inside Out

"'In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water'" - John 7:37-38 (KJV).

Jesus teaches that life flows from the inside out. What we receive is meant to flow out to others. This is the cycle of ultimate living.

Breaking Free from Spiritual Atrophy

Many people today are angry and hopeless because their hearts have closed in on themselves. Their hopelessness creates a vacuum that pulls in hostility toward themselves and others. The remedy to not living is always giving.

"'It is more blessed to give than to receive'" - Acts 20:35 (KJV). The power and blessing are found in the giving, not just the receiving.

Life Application

This week, challenge yourself to overcome any ultimate living aversion you may have. Start by implementing the four-step therapy process: taste and see God's goodness by speaking His promises aloud, listen to yourself declaring His truth, search for additional confirming scriptures, and practice cheerful giving.

Ask yourself these questions:

• Do I have an aversion to biblical concepts like blessing and prosperity?
• What spiritual "food jags" have I been feeding on that lack nutritional value?
• Am I trusting my feelings over God's clear promises in His Word?
• How can I practice the cycle of receiving and giving in my daily life?

Remember, you cannot trust your feelings when you have a word aversion to God's truth. Choose to trust His Word over your emotions, and step into the ultimate living He has planned for you. Your life matters, and God's desire is for you to prosper in every area - spirit, soul, and body.

~Dr. Stephen Marshall