There are times when being a divorced woman, a single parent, amd a woman with an issue (fibromyalgia), all become overwhelming. Everything collides and the impact is formiddable. I am alone without a mate parenting two children who need physical, educational, emotional and spiritual guidance, trapped in a physical body that is not at topnotch performance or condition managing within an adjusted micro economy. It's incredible.
I stay organized and on task, all hands on deck and constantly active to make the best of our lives. I thank God for family support. But every so often, I forget to give my heavy yoke over to Jesus, and I almost break under the burden.
So, this past Saturday, I spent a day doing absolutely nothing. I didn't achieve anything, except a shower and clean lounge about clothes. I had no unction to function, and I did not want to think about what the next obstacle in my life was presenting. I didn't want to give up, and I didn't want to run head on into the storm, either. I just wanted to sit still.
It is hard to sit still when you are a results oriented person. Guilt overrides every other sense because you know how much there is to get done. Somewhere in your wharped mind, the sky will fall if you don't get it done. Never mind the sun still rose whether or not your floor was vacuumed.
I got up and cleaned the kitchen, sat back down and returned to continuous episodes of Bones, one of my favorite television crime shows that I only watch on Netflix or Internet, got up and loaded the washer with laundry. My niece came over in the evening and figuring that it would be a good idea if I ate something healthy, I made us a great salad with grilled chicken and fresh spinach and parmesan cheese. With back to back episodes of Bones. You get the picture; but it was still rest for me.
I needed to wrap my mind around the concept that everything was not going as planned. As a matter of fact, apparently some folks had not even READ my plan, or had simply discarded it. Because a small mess was brewing and an act of God was going to be necessary to get this plan back on track. It is in this very moment that I had to pull on my resources and say to myself, "self, I have never seen the righteous forsaken, nor His seed begging bread". I had to speak to myself and say "and if I ask these things, believing, He will do it"; I even had to remind myself that I am "a peculiar treasure" and "a royal priesthood". In other words, I had to speak over myself, and encourage myself, in the Lord.
Another of my nieces called me this evening, and had her version of a pep talk with me, which is how I know without anything like a DNA test that she is my Mothers grandchild. "Aunt Buffi," she says "you have a little talk with yourself and get it together. Don't you be sitting over there being depressed. We don't have time for that right now in our lives. Now I will make dinner for the kids tomorrow. You get it together, okay?"
I laughed, because that really was what I was doing. I was getting it together, reminding myself that though there be trouble, joy comes in the morning light; remembering that though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil; remembering that His promises to me are Yea, and Amen and I am His beloved; and that this race is not given to the swift or the strong but to the one which endureth to the end.
That is what I have to do at times, and maybe I am wrong, but I am sure there are times when you have to do that as well. Times when you need to remind yourself that even though you are having a valley day, there is so much in the valley to gain that you know even this is a part of your victory.
By Sunday morning, I feel my help returning. The situation has not exaclty changed yet, but my faith is restored and that is more than half the battle. That is the whole thing. I encourage you today to speak words of faith and encouragement into your own life and over your own situation. Sometimes, you have to do it.
I stay organized and on task, all hands on deck and constantly active to make the best of our lives. I thank God for family support. But every so often, I forget to give my heavy yoke over to Jesus, and I almost break under the burden.
So, this past Saturday, I spent a day doing absolutely nothing. I didn't achieve anything, except a shower and clean lounge about clothes. I had no unction to function, and I did not want to think about what the next obstacle in my life was presenting. I didn't want to give up, and I didn't want to run head on into the storm, either. I just wanted to sit still.
It is hard to sit still when you are a results oriented person. Guilt overrides every other sense because you know how much there is to get done. Somewhere in your wharped mind, the sky will fall if you don't get it done. Never mind the sun still rose whether or not your floor was vacuumed.
I got up and cleaned the kitchen, sat back down and returned to continuous episodes of Bones, one of my favorite television crime shows that I only watch on Netflix or Internet, got up and loaded the washer with laundry. My niece came over in the evening and figuring that it would be a good idea if I ate something healthy, I made us a great salad with grilled chicken and fresh spinach and parmesan cheese. With back to back episodes of Bones. You get the picture; but it was still rest for me.
I needed to wrap my mind around the concept that everything was not going as planned. As a matter of fact, apparently some folks had not even READ my plan, or had simply discarded it. Because a small mess was brewing and an act of God was going to be necessary to get this plan back on track. It is in this very moment that I had to pull on my resources and say to myself, "self, I have never seen the righteous forsaken, nor His seed begging bread". I had to speak to myself and say "and if I ask these things, believing, He will do it"; I even had to remind myself that I am "a peculiar treasure" and "a royal priesthood". In other words, I had to speak over myself, and encourage myself, in the Lord.
Another of my nieces called me this evening, and had her version of a pep talk with me, which is how I know without anything like a DNA test that she is my Mothers grandchild. "Aunt Buffi," she says "you have a little talk with yourself and get it together. Don't you be sitting over there being depressed. We don't have time for that right now in our lives. Now I will make dinner for the kids tomorrow. You get it together, okay?"
I laughed, because that really was what I was doing. I was getting it together, reminding myself that though there be trouble, joy comes in the morning light; remembering that though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil; remembering that His promises to me are Yea, and Amen and I am His beloved; and that this race is not given to the swift or the strong but to the one which endureth to the end.
That is what I have to do at times, and maybe I am wrong, but I am sure there are times when you have to do that as well. Times when you need to remind yourself that even though you are having a valley day, there is so much in the valley to gain that you know even this is a part of your victory.
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