Silicon Valley Healing Rooms Breaking Bad Habits
Have you ever struggled with breaking a bad habit? It could be binge watching TV shows or eating a particular food or something more serious. It can be really hard to stop, even if we know it is impacting other people. If it is a deep rooted issue, it might seem more like an addiction. With a bad habit, we tend to think we can overcome it by sheet will power. We toggle between feeling great when we lick the problem through self-determination, and feeling guilt and shame when we slide back into the familiar pattern.
When Adam and Even took a bite of the forbidden apple, and then realized what they had done, they hid from God. He came at the usual time asking questions and they felt embarrassment. Adam looked for someone else to pin the problem on and established the blame shift pattern way back in the garden.
As hard as it is, the key to freedom is to run toward God. In fact, we need to run to God in the midst of our sin. This seems counterintuitive at first. But it is key to turning around our hearts when we can’t do it on our own.
There are two basic prayers to pray in these moments. If we can turn to God and pray these prayers, we can receive His supernatural help to turn the situation around.
1. Cause My Heart to Change
We see lasting change when our hearts change direction. This was King David’s prayer when he asked God for a new heart. “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me” (Psalm 51:10). Asking for God’s help to change a heart make the process much easier because we are accessing heaven’s resources along with ours to attain a good goal.
2. Detach me from the need so I can change
We may be asking God to detach us from the world system. The apostle John talks about this in 1 John 2:15, “Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.” This is a prayer that is asking God to change our desires. He can give us Godly desires that supersede our original desire.
This prayer deals with the root of the bad habit which is often some form of idolatry or rebellion. If He can redirect the root need, we can receive lasting shift from the world system to a spiritual system. Instead of seeking relief from painful situations in fiction and fantasy, God may direct us to being a truth seeker. Instead of a root rebellion response of, “I can do what I want,” we see our desires change. God may show us His love and ability to turn our lives around. Our curiosity might allow us to glimpse a different future. We grow to yield what we want to truly desiring what He wants for us. This may come with the ability to see God in a whole new light.
Saying these two prayers is the beginning of a process. If we try and fail, we don’t need to beat ourselves up. We simply turn toward God and run to Him. We ask God to cause our hearts to change. And we ask God to detach us from the need so we can change. God can and will change our desires if we allow Him.
“But for you who welcome him, in whom he dwells—even though you still experience all the limitations of sin—you yourself experience life on God’s terms. It stands to reason, doesn’t it, that if the alive-and-present God who raised Jesus from the dead moves into your life, he’ll do the same thing in you that he did in Jesus, bringing you alive to himself? When God lives and breathes in you (and he does, as surely as he did in Jesus), you are delivered from that dead life. With his Spirit living in you, your body will be as alive as Christ’s!” Romans 8:10-11 MSG
Turning toward God is one very important tool. If this is an area of interest, there are several books on the topic. Joyce Meyer has one called Make Good Habits: Breaking Bad Habits. Erwin Lutzer has a book called How to Break a Stubborn Habit. Other books focus on the Power of Discipline or Self-Discipline.
God Answers Prayer
Since our last Healing Rooms Open Hours:
One person came for the first time and was amazed that the word from God that the prayer team members received ahead of the appointment was exactly what she was experiencing even though she had never spoken to them before. She was great encouraged and confirmed in what she was hearing from God.
A man came to the Healing Rooms with cancer 6 months ago, and was greatly encouraged to learn that sometimes the doctors initial diagnosis isn’t always accurate. Since then the brain cancer has disappeared and they can’t find it any more. The cancer cells in his chest have stopped growing and started shrinking. He is very encouraged by the power of prayer in the healing process. He has great hope in what God has spoken to him about his health and his future.
Members of our prayer team prayed for an older lady at their church retreat a few weeks ago in the mountains. She was using a cane and taking 3-4 pain meds a day. The prayer ministers prayed for her and she no longer needs the can and is now down to 1 pain killer a day if at all. She has now gotten very interested in looking at more inner healing and emotional responses. She has a great hope and joy.
The teams prayed for job interviews, finding housing, court cases, finding destiny, insomnia, depression, back pain, knee pain, tennis elbow, decisions about work, fibromyalgia, parent-children relationships, college graduates that need to find their first job, trauma relief from recent and long ago times, chemotherapy side effects, breaking curses, marriage and divorce challenges, mental stability and well-being, caring for elderly parents, finances, physical hearing, and abdominal pain.
Scheduling An Appointment
Together, Silicon Valley Healing Rooms Prayer Ministers are ready to take your prayer requests to God in prayer. They also seek God’s word for you in advance of the appointment.
We are now taking signups for prayer appointments for Tuesday June 20th, 2023.
To sign up for an appointment, there are TWO STEPS:
1. Let us know your TOP THREE APPOINTMENT TIME PREFERENCES, in order of priority.
We will coordinate the teams, and send the zoom information on Monday for the appointment on Tuesday.
2. Share a phone number so we can TEXT you with scheduling changes.
In the event that we are not able to offer you the time frames you desire, you may share a phone number with us to text you if an opening should arise when someone needs to cancel an appointment. This happens from time to time, and we are able to text you to see if you are available to join an available prayer team. All information is confidential to the ministry and is not used for solicitation. This step is optional.
You are welcome to sign up for prayer appointments at the following times listed below:
| Morning Times: | 11:10 to 11:40 am |
| 11:55 to 12:25 pm | |
| 12:40 to 1:10 pm | |
| Evening Times: | 7:10 to 7:40 pm |
| 7:55 to 8:25 pm | |
| 8:40 to 9:10 pm |
It is our greatest joy to join you in prayer and pray for whatever you want to bring before God.
We pray, believing, knowing, and confident that God answers prayer.
If you don’t need prayer right now, you are welcome to forward this to others you know that might want people to pray with them.
***We love to hear how God has answered prayer. Please share what God has done in your life as a result of prayer. You can reply to this email, or share it in your appointment, or write a comment on our web site.
The spiritual winds are blowing strength, life, and peace into us,
Stephanie Shoquist, Donna Maranon, Jim Clow
Directors, Silicon Valley Healing Rooms Team
CONTRIBUTIONS WELCOME
Future Open Hours Online. For 2023: June 20 & July 18. There will be NO Healing Rooms on July 4.
For more information about Silicon Valley Healing Rooms, or to contribute to this ministry, visit www.SiliconValleyHealingRooms.com