Cynthia Garrett is a longtime TV personality in the US and Internationally. Her love of Christ caused her to create the TV Series, The Sessions w/ Cynthia Garrett, currently airing on TBN around the world. She has lived her life daily choosing victory over circumstances since childhood; sexual abuse, rape, cancer, divorce, single motherhood. Choosing to use her life, and the lessons she has gleaned from God’s love, as a healing vessel for others, is her passion. Cynthia has been a secular network TV Personality for many years – but it is her faith that drives her commitment to keep bringing the Gospel to the media in new and unique ways! It’s a grace to welcome Cynthia to the farm’s front porch today…
“I have very little problem sharing the things in my life that victimized me because I have chosen to see their value in my calling.
I gained strength from surviving sexual abuse so I can now strengthen others.
I gained wisdom in God’s Word every time I fell down so I am able to help others find His Word and get back up.
I worked for years on TV hosting talk shows. Now I use my skill set for communicating information that matters more than make-up tips or fashion labels.
Look at your life.
You have experiences that others can learn from. Shift the focus off yourself and onto why your life matters to all of us, and you will find your calling!
I see my various experiences, good and bad, as tools in my belt that I can use to lead others into their own victory choice.
I shook off their ability to define me, replacing it with my choice to be labeled a victor.
I support and understand victim groups and classifications, as long as their goal is to eliminate the word “victim” and replace it with the word “victor.”
Choosing victory in this case becomes the cornerstone of calling and purpose.
In a support group that is focused on victory, rather than lingering in pain, anger, and blame, you can ask an important question:
What can I do with a life that was attacked, broken, or riddled with undeserved tragedies?
The answer to this question takes on many incredible shapes and forms, dictating tremendous levels of victory to every individual.
You can embrace your greatest calling based on the skill set these circumstances have given you rather than great limitation based on their residue.
Think about Paul. When he understood that his whole life was meant to share the Gospel, he was able to do it under any circumstances. He understood his why!
What is your why?
In a world searching to define you by what you do, finding out why you do it is infinitely more powerful.
People will not die for their what. But they will surely die for their why! Your why is about your purpose. Your why can positively impact the whole world.
It changes your life, your environment, your community, and your nation for the better.
The most satisfying trophy you receive when you choose to live from a victorious mental state is the why behind what God will show you that you alone are equipped to do because of what you’ve lived through and experienced.
The challenges, the pain, the things you’ve overcome become the fuel for your why—and like me, you will come to a place where you wouldn’t trade much of your past for the power of your present because of it.
You were created with a unique and victorious offering inside you: an offering that is a gift to the world around you.
Everything you have experienced, good or bad, is a weapon in your hand for good—if you choose.
Being able to shift your focus from yourself to all others frees your mind to see the myriad possibilities for your unique, albeit difficult, experience to touch many lives.
The mind that lives in victory begins to soar with the eagles, seeing a world from thirty thousand feet, filled with many avenues and flight paths.
Understanding your calling and purpose is undeniably one of the incredible gifts in your victory zone.
In my life, choosing victory has unlocked doors and created opportunities that you would have never imagined had you looked at some of the tragic moments, life twists, and burdens I have endured.
As the Bible says, count it all joy. What I went through and what you currently may be going through isn’t necessarily joyful.
I wasn’t celebrating while being sexually abused or raped. Cancer wasn’t fun or fair. Financial struggles and a season as a single mom on welfare didn’t feel good.
The residue from many of the obstacles that life has thrown me has been hard and painful.
Taking personal responsibility to find the gratitude in my life, no matter what, and accepting that victory is mine to choose and no one else’s to give has been the hardest part of my journey.
In facing the difficulty in life, you must face the difficulty in each of the awful things that others have done to you, each of the failures and mistakes you have made, and each of the vices and sins you have fallen into.
Then you are required to go to war. Yet that war—mentally, emotionally, and sometimes physically—opens many supernatural doors and creates a multitude of opportunities.
Stop living out the narrative that says, “I can’t,” “I will never …” “There is no hope,” or “That never happens for people like me.” Stop. Right. Now.
Put on a new narrative.
This one says, “I am able. There is nobody else like me. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. I am an overcomer. I don’t need anything but my faith to push me forward. My God is awesome, and I am His.”
Repeat it daily.
I Choose Victory is the cry of my heart. It is a triumphant shout in the face of the many challenges life throws at you and your refusal to live according to the victim’s narrative each day tries to write for you. In I Choose Victory, Cynthia Garrett teaches readers how to confront the three war zones of their lives; each one walking you deeper and deeper into not just how to make the choice for victory over victimization – but how to live in it!
Cynthia Garrett began her television career on VH1 before going on to host LATER w/Cynthia Garrett on NBC, making her the first African American woman ever to host a network late night show. Now the executive producer, creator, and host of The London Sessions and The Sessions with Cynthia Garrett, she brings us the first faith-based women’s talk shows. Not just the first of their kind, but the number one faith-based talk-show internationally. Her half-hour series is among the highest-rated women’s shows on Christian TV around the globe. Cynthia reaches millions of people on four continents with what she calls “not just another talk show, but a WALK show,” teaching women around the globe how to live victoriously guided by their faith.
[ Our humble thanks to Salem Books for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
