Iron Press
So many times, our old mindsets establish themselves through what we believe we are experiencing in our lives. A pattern of past memories, set to images much like a child standing in the park, holding words and thoughts as if they were balloons. This relationship of thoughts and words, dancing within the images of our mind, stir up past emotions which we experienced in those instances. This the voice of our subconscious calibrating every move, interaction, and circumstance we encounter in our day.
As a result, we can have a faulty reality in our soul, feeding our self-image these beliefs, giving us a fixed mindset. This is what we wrestle.
The Iron Press
Rich and I eat bacon every morning during the week and on most weekends. It is a part of our ketogenic lifestyle, which will be four years this July. A ritual of sort, we get out the Caphalon stir fry pan, a reasonable size of about 10 inches diameter. Then I place pieces of bacon on the pan, meticulously prepping for what promises to give us a good return for the wait and the process, while Rich turns the kitchen faucet on so I can wash my hands after he puts soap on them.
Some of you might laugh, but for those who know, cooking bacon is no laughing matter and at times can even frustrate the most sophisticated of cooks.
It all begins in the grocery store, and no matter how many hours you have put into buying bacon, each and every time you buy a package, you feel as though you’re taking a risk. Any one who puts enough thought into the bacon package, puts at least 15-30 seconds of time in, investigating the cuts and the packing. Only during the cooking process do you truly get to see if your efforts of selection paid off.
The perfunctory cardinal rule of a real bacon chef, is whether or not there is the dreaded ….. (drum roll)……. CURL! The curl makes the all the difference.
So many times it has happened to me, where you think that you are getting the best cut of bacon, having invested the time beforehand in the selection, only to find out that you might have missed it. You consider letting your spouse or your children select the bacon package from now on, and wonder if all your years of selection have taught you anything. Then at that moment you realize bacon is bacon.
Initially, when you’re in the store selecting the package, you see visions in your head like a kid at Christmas. You imagine the bacon cooking perfectly. Instead when it begins to curl, you slowly feel disappointment knocking on your door, when subconsciously the word, “curl,” echoes in your mind of which you are convinced is a four letter word.
Maybe you have not experienced this but I have.
This dear friend is where you are grateful for the God given talent of whoever created the BACON PRESS!
Once the bacon starts curling, one of two things will happen. You will either have to get a knife and fork to skillfully cut the pieces into the perfect form until they lay flat or you will stand there playing the game of push the curl down while the bacon cooks. Either option is not fun. The first option promises to cut someone’s portion smaller, leaving the chef uncertain of exactly which bacon is a part of that particular slice, since out of 6 pieces of bacon you now have 30 pieces on the pan. The second option affords you the possibility of getting frustrated, realizing you are spending all of your morning over the stovetop, instead of doing multitasking and finishing your Facebook posts. (lol)
With all of this said, the bacon press resolves all the issues you might have with either one of these frustrations.
You might be wondering by now how does a bacon press relate to our mindset? Moreover, you might be asking yourself, “Did Robin go off on a rabbit trail to talk about bacon and forget she was talking about mindsets or is she normally tangential?”
I have not digressed although it might appear that way, but rather am using the analogy of the curl, with our mindset. Whether we realize it our not, we can have fixed patterns in our mind, which are erroneous, much like an error on a computer.
We have subconscious errors.
Therefore, in the times of our trials, those faulty errors pop up much like the curl in the bacon. However, again there is a resolution for these errors, which is the Iron Press. The iron press holds down the curl while you are cooking bacon, promising EACH TIME that you will get the perfect form when you cook.
Your trial is the IRON PRESS. Do you feel overwhelmed, stressed out, unable to function at times? Aside from considering the physical issues that might be adding to your stress, the mental and emotional issue always point back to what you think, and you think through your self-image.
Therefore, the circumstances that are causing the discomfort, are actually the iron press, exposing what would try to surface within the conscious mind, as it relates to our self-image. People are so quick to want to get out of the trial, when they do not realize that it is in the trial, you are perfected in a greater grace in the image of God’s glory! It is then that you know you need a physician to remove the imperfections of your thoughts, bringing you a sufficient love, which makes you feel whole.
Faulty mindsets decrease and fade away, as you are aware of your need for the transformed mind, where grace is sufficient and truth rings within the inner being of your soul to remind you, “ALL IS WELL!”
Three words that change a circumstance in less than a second, “ALL IS WELL,” is sufficient for any soul that is in the midst of the iron press. We calm down in an instant, realizing God is sufficient and our position in Christ is what we cling to, knowing that as we keep our eyes fixed on Him, our faulty error will disappear and before you know it, we will know the FORM we were meant to be! We know who we are! GLORY TO GOD! We know that we are fearfully and wonderfully made!
I will confess and praise You for You are fearful and wonderful and for the awful wonder of my birth! Wonderful are Your works, and that my inner self knows right well. Psalm 139:14 AMPC
We are made wonderful! The Hebrew word referring to our makeup being wonderful is pâlâh pronounced paw-law' meaning, “show marvelous, set apart, and make wonderfully.” (SCH # 6395) The three Hebrew letters, Pey, Lamed and Hey, in this word, come from ancient Hebrew symbols and form a beautiful word picture. Pey is the symbol of a mouth and means, “word, speak and open.” Lamed is the ancient symbol of a cattle goad, which looks like a shepherd staff with a prick in the curvature meaning, “tongue, control and authority.” Finally, Hey is the ancient symbol of a stickman holding its arms up and means, “to reveal.” Therefore, the word picture for wonderful is “To open your mouth and speak with your tongue that which has been revealed to you!”
All the revelation of your true reality is inside of you, and is brought to you by God! You were not meant to be fragmented and cut into all these pieces in your soul, walking in a faulty self-image; you were created to know you are wonderfully made and loved by Christ, believing that ALL IS WELL!