Aligning the Story of Your HeartSample

Have you ever used photo filters on your smartphone? Maybe you wanted to make yourself look a little better. Maybe you wanted to enhance the beauty of a sunset by bringing out the vibrancy of the oranges and pinks in the sky. Or maybe you just wanted to be a better photographer with a little extra help from filters.

Filters can turn photos black and white, transform the color to cool or warm shades, and even make them look like comic art. Some filters are quite dramatic and leave the original photo almost unrecognizable. Others slightly adjust the photo, leaving most of the original image intact. 

Just as filters affect your perceptions of photos, Sore Spots affect how you see yourself, other people, God, and the world around you. They can distort everything you perceive, coloring it with the pain (whether actively felt or not) that defines the Sore Spot.

Your Sore Spot can affect your ability to see things the way God does. You may have known God’s truths, but your thoughts and emotions may mirror your Sore Spot more than the truth you know. You may see risk where God sees trust. You might see “I can’t” when God sees “You can.” You might see only your shame and defectiveness when God sees the compassion in your heart.

Your Sore Spot creates a confirmation bias, so you see only what you’re looking for, not what’s really there. You interpret new information as evidence of what you already think or believe. Your filter has a seemingly magnetic energy that attracts what fits the Sore Spot and rejects what doesn’t!

For instance, if your Sore Spot is rejection, it seems that rejection is waiting around every corner. If your Sore Spot is insecurity, it seems that everyone is judging you and accusing you of doing a terrible job. Or if your Sore Spot is fear, you’ll see threats everywhere. When your heart filters life through the Sore Spot, you don’t (and can’t) see things as they really are. It requires the heart of a lion to face hurts we’ve tried to bury our entire lives. Some people assume they can ask God to “take the pain away.” He’ll answer that prayer, but probably not like these people hope. A broken leg requires excellent medical care, perhaps surgery, and many months of healing and rehab. That’s the way God heals our inner brokenness. The “miracle” is that He brings loving, wise people into our lives to be with us in the process.