West Pines Community Church

Manipulation is one of the most entangling obstacles that we face. It’s tricky because it’s all about reading between the lines, and trying to recognize people’s intentions. People can coerce our actions through all kinds of tactics like guilt, sympathy or even over-spiritualizing something. We know we are not supposed to be naive, but we also don’t want to be paranoid. We don’t want to always think the worst of people, but we don’t want to get taken advantage of. What’s the difference between perceiving someone’s motives and being judgmental? The bottom line is it’s a difficult thing to be discerning. Nehemiah vulnerably shares how he faced this obstacle. And through his example we can learn how to sharpen our discernment for when we will face this too.