Your Higher Ways

This song by Steven Curtis Chapman has always touched me, and today it spoke to me as never before. I want to share this with you because many of you are going through tough times. God's ways are higher than ours and we can trust Him, through thick and thin.

Soaring

Today while I was taking my walk I saw a couple of vultures flying. It was very windy and I noticed that they didn't have to work at all to fly. All they had to do was spread their wings and allow the wind to do all the work. They looked just as beautiful as any Eagle would soaring high in the clear blue sky. What if they fought the wind and tried to do all the work themselves? I think they would (at best) have gotten tired really quick and (at worst) they would have plummeted to the ground. But they were wise, and soared effortlessly on the wind. All it took was the slightest shift of their bodies to turn right or left, to go up or down.

It's that way with God. If we trust in Him He does the work. If we are striving and wearing ourselves out "serving Him", chances are we are doing the work on our own. What if we just extend our arms out, fall onto God's "wind" and allow Him to take us where He wants us to go? Serving would be a joy because God is in it!

Have you (like Me) ever felt like an ugly vulture? I most often think of myself as ordinary, nothing special, like the vulture. Yet when he soars in the sky he really is as beautiful as an eagle. We are like that! When we soar with God we are beautiful. doing what God created us to do. What deeper fufillment can there be?!

Rest

This past week has been one of the hardest I can think of. Darin and I have both been upset and tense because his mother is in the hospital and has severe depression and anxiety. If you don't know much about these illnesses, I can try to clue you in a little, but to be honest I don't know if I'll ever understand myself. When the person's medications are not adjusted correctly, or when the person is in one of their "low" periods, they are very difficult to deal with. They always demand their own way and are totally centered on themselves. They are also mean and will turn on a loved one in a heartbeat.

It is very difficult to care for a person with this condition to say the least. But God is faithful. He loves us all unconditionally no matter how we act. Within certain limits, He will still come after us even when we reject Him. I want to be like God is, but to be honest I am nothing like that. I find myself wishing for her to be out of our life, left to her own devices. The other part of me still longs for her to see how much we love her and that we can help care for her. She wants to move an hour or so away and live on her own, even after her health has gone so downhill and she has proven time and time again that she can't take care of herself.

My loving husband has endured verbal abuse over and over. We both endure rejection over and over. We help, we love, we do everything in our power and she rejects us and our help, and blames us to boot.

But I know that although I can't seem to figure out how to do this yet, that God wants us to rest in him. To jump up in His arms and let Him carry us. To hand over our burdens and let Him carry them. I trust God. He allowed my Mother-in-law to fracture her hip, a minor injury that only requires physical therapy, to get her into a hospital where people can care for her. We have to continue to trust in the Lord to work everything out for good, it's the waiting that is so hard.

I wonder...

I have been so tense. There is more for me to do than I can do in a day, the kids have had a little bit of a hard time transitioning into the school year, and my Mother-in-law is in the hospital.

I keep trying to talk myself out of this tense buzz, but I haven't been able to shake it. I wonder if the root is lack of faith. Isn't that really the root of all our problems? If I really trust in God, why am I so tense. God has everything under control, why am I so tense?

I think I like having and being in control much more than I like to admit, that's what I think. I want to know what the future holds - now!

God please forgive my lack of faith. I know You hold the future and nothing surprises You. I know You only want the best for all Your children and that You can use any and ALL circumstances to accomplish Your will. Please flood me with Your peace and I choose to look to You and not to the circumstance. Thank You for Your Love.

In Jesus Name,
Amen

Strung out, Stressed out

John 11:40
Then Jesus said, "Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?" (NIV)


I don't know about you, but for me life definitely has it's ups and downs. Sometimes things go well and the stress level in my life is relatively low. Then there are other times when the stress level peaks so high I feel I can't bear up under it. It can eat away at me until I feel like little more than a shell of a woman. What am I supposed to do when things seem out of my control and seem to be negative, detrimental and destructive? What do I do when I have tried everything to no avail?

Well, I know the answer, but doing it is another matter. The answer is simply to believe. If I can keep my eyes on God and take them off of the circumstances, I know that will change everything. I can believe that God is somehow working these difficulties for my good, that God is bigger than any circumstance. I can believe that God has a special purpose for me and choose to ignore the enemy's lies that say I am nothing, insignificant. I can choose to believe that even though everyone may break his promise or let me down, God NEVER will. God is faithful and can turn things around. I can even believe that even if nothing changes on the outside, God can change me on the inside and give me what I need to go on. That will make all the difference.