A Lesson in Faith from Someone Who Needs One

 It's been a challenging week, but I am trying to stick with my Alphabet Project! I've realized as I've written on these happiness traits, that they are much like "love and marriage"- "you can't have one without the other!" To be Disciplined, you must be Consistent, to be consistent, you must be Balanced. To be balanced, you must understand Acceptance. And the concept of Eternity? Well, that's the whole alphabet all put together in one Awesome place. 

This week, I've had to keep telling myself, "faith over fear. faith over fear", as I've walked through some challenges that threaten my spirit. I've realized many times throughout my life that when I've leaned in to fear, I've found myself giving up, making impulsive decisions, and letting myself down in some way. When I've trusted God with my thoughts, decisions, or fears, I've been able to free myself of the wrestling I've done, trying to "fix" it all myself, and in my own strength. 

The truth is, I would be nothing without my FAITH. My belief that God is my creator, my Savior, my strength, and my everything, is the reason I have been able to walk through all of the things that come my way. Trust me when I say I would have given up long before now if it wasn't for the love and the grace of God carrying me through every rotten test, loss, and desperate day in my life. I hold on to God, because He is the reason I can keep going when there doesn't seem to be any good thing. He is the good thing. He shows me the good things. He reminds me that I am in fact, a good thing too. 

I can rest in Him, and in resting in my faith in God to supply my needs and my strength, I can in fact, be calmer, more content, and in peace. I know when I am not trusting, because I am fatigued, worried, grumpy, and a stressed mess. 

A short message today, but it is a simple one. I am going to let my faith carry me to a place of joy, because I know I can drop my worries at the feet of Jesus. He has it all under control. He has my best interests at heart, and He knows what I need, when I need it, and what everyone else needs too. I don't need to spin out of control, trying to fix everything that I can't fix anyway. Faith is God energy. Worrying is a waste of energy. 

Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. I say to myself, "The Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for him." Lamentations 3:22-23 

An E for Eternity

 We almost made it through the week without another "letter" from me. Oh, can I digress for just a moment? Does anyone else miss good old fashioned letters? I know I do. I miss writing them, mailing them, and receiving them too! There's just something about getting a handwritten letter in the mail that is just so nostalgic and cozy. Now people call them "snail mail" and "fun mail".  It's all good. Anyway, let's get on to the Happy Alphabet, and that letter is "E". "E" for "Eternal, or Eternity." Eternity is not just the wonderful perfume I wore on my wedding day. (Foreshadowing)

I have lost many things throughout my life, and I haven't always taken those losses well. Family, friendships, health, and many others. Each time I would lose some type of relationship or opportunity, it felt like the end of the world. Each time my health would fail me, it felt like every secondary loss that came with it meant my life would change forever. I got tired of feeling the rejection and abandonment feelings that came every time I was let down. I wasn't rolling with the punches anymore. I was just getting punched and bruised all over. What changed my perspective was the lens I was viewing my losses through. I was going directly to "doom" thinking. I was taking everything at face value. I was forgetting that this is not all there is. The problems of this world and the hurts in my life are temporary, so I don't need to take it all so hard. Yes, it hurts, but it doesn't need to steal my joy and my happiness with it. Have you ever heard someone say, "We live in the world, but we are not OF this world"? Well, that is what it means to see yourself as an eternal being, and not a worldly one. 

Therefore, we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an ETERNAL (emphasis mine) glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal. 2 Corinthians 4:18

This world is not all there is! And it's not all we are either. That is of great comfort to me, knowing that everything we are going through is temporary, will be used in some way to glorify the God we serve, and we will one day be with God, spiritually new, where none of these problems exist. To be able to look at life eternally is to understand that every small thing that upsets me is basically a waste of time. Every big thing is still big, but when viewed with God's perspective, I don't have to be crushed by it. 

When I look at things with an eternal lens, I can appreciate that my health issues are temporary.  I will either be healed here on earth or in heaven, but one day I will be restored.  The world may be an awful place where terrible things happen, but it's not our forever home if we have accepted Christ as our savior and not the world. When I look at broken relationships from a worldly perspective, there is often a lot of psychological terms tossed around, or confusion about how or who, what or why. But when looked at from God's eternal perspective, it's simple. At least in my experience (I don't speak for everyone), forgiveness is the way I can experience happiness in relationships even when they are non-existent, because I let go of them and allow God to do the healing. Forgiveness is a gift we give ourselves, not the offender, and it doesn't excuse their offense, only your hold over them and their hold over you. When we let go of grudges and bitterness, we experience freedom. 

When we look at life from an eternal perspective, it can be very freeing. We are going through some life-changing events right now, and it has been difficult, to say the least. Watching others go through end of life stages is some of the most difficult things I have ever experienced. Some times there are no clear cut ways to put an "eternal bow" on any situation, and I have witnessed this firsthand. Some situations just don't make sense, and it is at these times I have heard people wonder why God would allow such things to occur. As a believing person, I understand their pain, but that is why we have to get to know Christ so that we can walk through some of these really hard times with Him.  I've been through many of those, and have all the cracks in my heart to show for it. Each time, my faith has gotten stronger, not weaker, even if the outcome wasn't what I had hoped. Trusting God doesn't mean He does what we want. It means we trust Him, and no, it won't always make sense. Thinking eternally means really thinking outside the human box, and that is not easy! 

And probably the hardest eternal perspective to see was the one I had to find during my periods of grief. One of my most faith-tested times was when I lost my brother. He was only 50, and taken suddenly and without warning. I was so hurt and so angry, and then bottled it all up for a good long time.  God heard all kinds of rebuttal from me every day! But I think back, and I'm guessing He was glad I was still talking to Him. He wants us hot or cold, and never lukewarm. I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other!  So, because you are lukewarm-neither hot nor cold-I am about to spit you out of my mouth. Revelation 3:15,16 All I can say is that through those situations, I have learned to trust God to show it to me at some point, and He will. I have had to learn to give in to His will, because believing in Him and His will for me is so much better than trusting that this world has anything long-lasting for me. 

When I lost my dad just 3 years after losing my brother, I wasn't ready to say goodbye, and I still miss his gentle voice and his loving presence every day. But knowing he is waiting for us in the eternal place of heaven, restored, is why I can rejoice here on earth. It's why I can be happy when I think of him, and even for my brother, though sad for his sons who are going on without him. I realized that both things can exist. I can be both sad and happy at the same time, and my "world" won't end. I can go on without certain friends, I can go on while certain family think what they want to think. I can go on with health issues doing whatever they're going to do. I can go on while the world rages out of my control. I can because this is not all there is. I never have to feel rejected or abandoned or hopeless for any reason. When God is the first and final stop, there is no loss at all.

Blessings to you. 

Shiny, Happy, Disciplined People

 Today is brought to you by the letter "D"! This was not a cut and dried choice, however. There were many contenders before I settled on this word. I had to start thinking about my words in the form of a question. Are _____________people (fill in the blank, happier people? Then it started making sense. To satisfy your curiosity, the other "D" words that made the list were "determined", "devoted", "deep" and I even toyed with "dimensional". After listening to Christmas music and getting my boogie on the other day, "dancing" tried to jump in there, but that's too obvious. Of course, dancing people are happier people! But here I am with "disciplined" and I'll see if I can land this plane. 

Do I believe disciplined people lead happier lives? I think they do in many ways, especially over their undisciplined counterparts. When we have self-control, we make better choices overall. When we make better choices, we are more satisfied with our outcome. When we are focused and honed in on our behaviors that lead to success, we are less apt to be led astray by nonsense, if that makes sense. Disciplined people set priorities and tend to stick with them more consistently (notice that word, "consistent) than those who willy-nilly their way through life.  To clarify, I can be both disciplined and willy-nilly, depending on my current health status, so I am not judging anyone here. We all have our reasons, and I'll touch on that later.  

When we were children, we may have associated discipline with some kind of punishment. We were told we had to clean our rooms before we could do something fun. We were given lists of chores, told to do homework before the TV could come on, or maybe discipline meant taking something valuable away for awhile.  In our home, the girls hated the sound of their dad coming up the stairs on a Saturday morning, because that meant there was work to be done! In sports, discipline meant showing up for practice and putting in all of our effort, playing hard at the games, and even working hard off the courts and fields. If you wanted to succeed scholastically, athletically, musically, or in any way at our home, you were told the same thing. You need to put in the time, the work, and the self-discipline. If you want it, you will work for it. Keeping in mind, our definition of "success" is putting in YOUR very best effort and not what others consider their best. We were not drill sergeants or Olympic coaches here, but simply parents who taught their kids that they were capable of giving their all to whatever they set their minds to. Discipline creates confidence and confidence creates security, even when the results are not what you desire. (Even if we are chronically ill, there is still something we can discipline ourselves to do, and I do)

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. Galatians 5:22-23 

Discipline, when done correctly, also creates confidence in boundaries.  Children who are disciplined with healthy boundaries are children who grow to depend on those boundaries as security. As adults, those same disciplinary boundaries help us to succeed on our own when there is no one telling us to study, go to bed on time, eat right, work hard, and in some cases, don't do this or that. At 53, I can still hear my parents' voices about certain things, and I am grateful that they kept me from the things that they knew were not safe or good for me. Beneath the sting of healthy discipline is love and protection. While I pushed boundaries and crossed lines as a teenager, I returned to my disciplines as an adult, praise God. Because as I discipline myself, I realize I do it out of self-respect and love. I dreaded the times I had to exert discipline over my teenage daughters, and I'm sure I looked and sounded like Shrek, the ogre while doing so. However, my protection and love for them was stronger than letting them get away with whatever was going to harm them at that time and in the future. Discipline of others and of self is never easy, but it is always rewarding. 

 because the Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes everyone he accepts as a son. Hebrews 12:6 

God will discipline us because we are His children and He loves us. He wants to protect us from the things that will lead us astray or will harm others or ourselves. I can't tell you the times God got in between me and something I thought I wanted! I didn't feel His love at the time. Much like a child facing a Shrek-like parent, I just felt punished. But looking back, I saw the love of His protection and then the action of His reward. Maybe one day I will share that story. But for today, please know that being self-controlled and disciplined is not a life sentence of boring, predictable routine, but a contented life of success. And for any parents out there, your kids won't hate you for loving them with healthy discipline. Hang in there. 

For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline. 

2 Timothy 1:7