circumstances

Hope

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If we don’t protect it, hope can feel like a balloon, filled to maximum capacity for a moment then let go to float into the air, sputtering, and flying unhindered.

Hope is so much more precious than this. I wish it were easy to tie the knot and seal it in all cozy and safe but even inflated balloons lose air over time.

There is only the constant application of pressure to save us. In the pressure, we stretch and hold firm to what we know. God is able. We are not alone! We can stretch farther than we think.

Don’t let gravity, the environmental circumstances of everyday, the pin-hole leaks in our defenses, deflate you. Keep your tank full! Let breath and air fill your lungs and your spirit. Lean in and believe.

Each breath is a moment in time lost once it’s accomplished. Steady your breathing. You can do hard things! And when it’s too much and you feel like you might burst, remember He is stronger than anything and He’s fighting with you and for you.

Breathe!

Hidden

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Maybe there’s something poetic about hiding in plain sight.

Or maybe it’s weakness.

Or maybe it’s strength to stay composed while the world crumbles and stirs around you.

Maybe it’s survival. Maybe it’s faith.

Maybe I’m not hiding at all! maybe I’m standing.

“Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him.” Job 13:15

It is Enough!

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This post is a little different from my standard posts. I’m sharing with you what I wrote this morning while reading my Bible. Last night was a particularly difficult night for me. This morning, Is brighter because His word brings life and hope. Hopefully, you can glean something from it that will encourage you today. If you’re unfamiliar with the stories I’m referencing, read I Kings chapters 18 & 19.

It is Enough!

God showed Himself mightily through Elijah. In I Kings 18, he proves himself by sending fire to consume the sacrifice and turns the hearts of the people back to the Lord. Then he hears the “sound of abundance of rain” and prays until the clouds form and outruns Ahab’s chariot. Still, he (Elijah) was under a tremendous amount of pressure and adversity. By chapter 19 of I Kings, he’s running for his life from Jezebel, and it finally overwhelms him. He prays in verse 4 that he would die, “It is enough! Now Lord take my life, for I am no better than my fathers!” He is tired and feels like a failure.

How many times in my life, have I felt exactly this way? The heaviness of it all gets to me from time to time, no matter how hard I try. I don’t think Elijah was suicidal. He wasn’t trying to hurt himself and if he really wanted to die, he wouldn’t have bothered running from Jezebel. He just needed to rest and find the voice and peace of God in the middle of the pain.

God was there and shows up to sustain him, just like he always does for us. For Elijah, he sent an angel to tap him on the shoulder and feed him. The angel says to him in verse 7, “The journey is too great for you”. God know what we can handle and when it’s too much for us. He doesn’t expect us to do it on our own or in our own strength. He is there with compassion and provision when we don’t have the strength to keep going. His provision strengthens us. Elijah went, “in the strength of that food” all the way to the “mountain of God”.

“What are you doing here Elijah?”

God could have been asking him this because he should have been somewhere else and he was hiding out in a cave instead, but I think God asked him this because He wanted Elijah to see where he was. He wanted Elijah to see his purpose and who he was and who God is.

“Then He said, ‘Go out, and stand on the mountain before the Lord.’ And behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind tore into the mountains and broke the rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a still small voice.” I Kings 19:11-12

When Elijah heard the “still small voice”, he wraps his face in his mantle, the symbol of his prophetic authority and “went out and stood”. “What are you doing here Elijah?” It’s then, when Elijah knows why he’s there and recognizes who he is and that he’s not alone, that he goes back and follows the instructions of the Lord and continues the work of the Lord.

Sometimes this life, these trials, are too much for me. I lay down just like Elijah and pray “It is enough!” God is there for me as well. He sees and provides and leads me through. I need to lean in. I need to trust Him. When he says, “Arise and eat.”, for me that means devouring the word of God and letting His word sustain me. I need to realize that though the winds, and earthquakes, and fire, break the rocks into pieces, He is still, unmoving, constant. The seemingly smallest of things contain the most meaning. I need to lean in and steady myself in that! I need to remember who I am.

Elijah wrapped his face in his mantle, his purpose. My purpose is to glorify God in and through everything…to show Him to the world. When I remember why I’m here, I can stand up.

Like, Elijah, I also need to remember I’m not alone. God has placed people around me strategically to fight alongside me. I don’t have to find alone, and I can rest in that. Still, Elijah had to go out and appoint and anoint them. I need to stop being afraid of being vulnerable and be willing to reach out and accept help and support. That’s a tough one for me, but I’m working on it.

Who’s in Control?

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reactive

Reactive, by definition is the tendency to react or to be characterized by reactance. I think most people I know fall into the category of chronic reactors. We so often relinquish control to others or our circumstances. We see it in the lives of those terrified to move because they are so afraid of what others will think. We see it in our relationships as we react in anger. We are driven by words hurled toward us by careless humans, who unwittingly (or with intent), bite with condescension or malice. We are so easily wounded and broken. We are selfish.

Ben Carson says in his book Take the Risk,

“The more rights you think you have, the more likely someone is going to infringe upon them.”

“It wasn’t until I backed off enough to take myself out of the center that I realized reactions like that [anger/negative reactions] were not signs of strength, but rather indications of weakness. Such reactions meant I was letting other people, the environment, or circumstances control me, and I decided I didn’t want to be so easily controlled. But if I took myself, my rights, my ego, my feelings out of the center, I couldn’t be.”

“Once I was able to take myself out of the equation, to look at things from other people’s perspectives and not feel that all the rights belonged to me, the things that could make me angry were suddenly few and far between.”

When we are brave enough to stop thinking about ourselves and put others first, we may find that we gain the power and the freedom that we’ve been searching for. No one can hurt us if we don’t let them. All it takes is the wisdom to know that we are loved completely and fully by the creator and we can move beyond reaction to freedom and begin to go beyond “me” to “them”. Be free today!

 

A Note to my Future Self on Thankfulness

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Morning view from my back porch

Morning view from my back porch

This morning I wasn’t myself. Don’t ask me who I was…just someone different.

All the things on my mind were hazy under the fog still attached to me from lack of sleep. Ambitions for coming endeavors sat numb on my tongue. Words came out but didn’t really connect with my brain. I told the Lord I really had nothing to say. No inspiration was moving my spirit to action.

In that soft and loving way He sometimes speaks, I heard him say, “How about saying thank you?” Then baby man smiled at me and I remembered stopping to watch the way the light slowly illuminated the backyard with the dawn as I walked by the window. I remembered the rise and blend of colors in the sunrise as it peeked over the trees. I thanked Him. I am so blessed!

Days come when I struggle to muster up words, divine things to move big mountains, revelations to bend will into submission to spirit. I try to inspire and encourage others and myself with grandeur, love and perspective. Maybe everything would fall into place if I woke up tomorrow and remembered to thank Him.

I write this now when things are good to remind myself on days when life seems ‘not so good’.  His faithfulness is never dictated by my circumstances. Future self, remember to give thanks in everything!