Tea Bags

In last week's chapter of Lies Women Believe, which Jen and I have been working through, the subject was Our Circumstances. The fact is that many people believe that their circumstances make them what they are, when in reality their circumstances only reveal what they are. I am at times one of those people!

Jim Berg, one of my favorite professors at Bob Jones, had a famous Tea Bag Analogy that illustrates it perfectly. Think of tea as your heart and hot water as life's circumstances and trials. Tea tastes the way it does because of what's in the tea bag. The hot water only reveals what is in the tea bag. You can't blame the hot water for making the tea taste bitter; that's the tea's fault. If you are continually spouting anger, or displaying bitterness or envy, or if you throw pity parties for yourself (this is a big one for me), it is only revealing your sinful heart, NOT whatever circumstance you are blaming.

Good stuff, huh?

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