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Though we can’t predict or control or demand the outcome of our circumstances, we can know with great certainty we will be okay. Better than okay. Better than normal. We will be victorious because Jesus is victorious (1 Corinthians 15:57). And victorious people were never meant to settle for normal.
Some will live their whole lives missing the chance to see all the good God has placed around them just for them. Partly because the hard stuff has demanded so much of their attention.
Sometimes to get your life back, you have to face the death of
The disappointment that is exhausting and frustrating you? It holds the potential for so much good. But we’ll only see it as good if we trust the heart of the Giver.
But disappointment isn’t proof that God is withholding good things from us. Sometimes it’s His way of leading us Home.
So the human heart was created in the context of the perfection of the garden of Eden. But we don’t live there now.
We don’t even feel permission to do so or we just don’t know how to process our disappointments. Especially not in Bible study or Sunday church.
In the quiet, unexpressed, unwrestled-through disappointments, Satan is handcrafting his most damning weapons against us and those we love. It’s his subtle seduction to get us alone with our thoughts so he can slip in whispers that will develop our disappointments into destructive choices.
If the enemy can isolate us, he can influence us.
Remember, this is a love story. And we will never appreciate or even desire the hope of our True Love if lesser loves don’t disappoint.
To deny my feelings any voice is to rob me of being human. But to let my feelings be the only voice will rob my soul of healing perspectives with which God wants to comfort me and carry me forward.
Dust is the exact ingredient God loves to use.
Of all the things God could have used to make man, He chose to use dust.
Death is but a passageway at God’s designated time for us to finally escape this broken world full of imperfections and be welcomed to the Home we’ve been longing for our entire lives.
The more I tried to grab hold of what was falling down around me, the more I realized my utter lack of control.
But it was the timing that seemed so very confusing.
I want to assume that my definition of best should be God’s definition of best. And that my definition of good should be God’s definition of good.
Disappointment happens every time I come face-to-face with my absolute inability to control people, circumstances, and timing.
If our souls never ached with disappointments and disillusionments, we’d never fully admit and submit to our need for God.
C. S. Lewis wrote, “I believe in Christianity as I believe that the Sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else.”
Obedience is the daily practice of trusting God.
But here’s the craziest thing of all. God doesn’t want you or me to suffer. But He will allow it in doses to increase our trust.
No human is strong enough to withstand seeing too much of God’s plan in advance. It must be revealed daily. And we must be led to it and through it slowly.
Therefore, holy brothers and sisters, who share in the heavenly calling, fix your thoughts on Jesus, whom we acknowledge as our apostle and high priest. (Hebrews 3:1)
To declare to God out loud like Jesus did, “Not my will but Yours be done.” To stop fixating on the circumstances raging around us. To stop trying to make sense of things that make no sense in the middle of the journey. And to stop asking for the knowledge that’s too heavy for us to carry.
God loves me too much to answer my prayers at any other time than the right time and in any other way than the right way.
When you suffer, slow becomes necessary.
Make no mistake, those who are the most eager to harshly criticize others are often the ones most desperate to keep hidden their own secret sins or unresolved pain.
To dwell well in this life between two gardens requires one to make peace with being naked and unashamed.
But if someone says something about me that I’ve already wondered about myself, I probably won’t be able to discern if it’s ridiculous or not.
We are imperfect because we are unfinished.
But what if, instead of being so epically disappointed with everyone, we saw in them the need for compassion?
When we show up with compassion for others, our own disappointments won’t ring as hollow or sting with sorrow nearly as much.
But you will find life-giving purpose and meaning when you allow God to take your painful experiences and comfort others.
The thrashing winds of the storm are gone, but the consequences make it impossible to return to something that feels normal.
Moving ahead and turning back are both equally terrifying.
Hoping doesn’t mean I put myself in harm’s way. It doesn’t mean I ignore reality. No, hoping means I acknowledge reality in the very same breath that I acknowledge God’s sovereignty.
My hope is tied to the unchanging promise of God. I hope for the good I know God will ultimately bring from this, whether the good turns out to match my desires or not.
The promise is a glorious hope to hang on to for the future. But it’s His presence in the process that will steady our hope for today.
For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you. We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all the wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives, so that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience. (Colossians 1:9–11)
And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm, and steadfast. (1 Peter 5:10)
Thinking about everything I didn’t know wasn’t getting me anywhere. So, I started listing things I did know.
In other words, we need to remember the difference between news and truth. News comes at us to tell us what we are dealing with. Truth comes from God and then helps us process all we are dealing with.
I had forgiven this person for the facts of what they’d done. I had said the words. But I had refused to let go of the labels I put on this person.
What if the worst parts of your life are actually gateways to the very best parts you’d never want to do without?
David’s season of confession, cleansing, and having a new heart created within him couldn’t be skipped or rushed. Every step was necessary for this to eventually become a season of restoration and the fulfilling of his calling.
Sin breaks trust. Therefore, we can’t expect God to entrust a calling to us before our full confession, cleansing, and having a new heart created in place of our broken heart. When trust has been shattered, it has to be rebuilt with believable behavior in our actions and reactions over time.
Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. (Romans 5:1–4)
We shouldn’t focus on him, but we should fight him. And God’s Word gives us powerful insights to better understand the enemy’s tactics, which are very worth studying. After
Temptation only works if our enemy keeps the consequences hidden from us.
