Tangled in a Puzzle

Since enduring a lot of stuff in the last month or two, the deep decline in my daddy’s health, loss of a two very loved friends, homeschooling, band changes, new cleaning jobs, and other things and regular duties of taking care of our house and kids on top of all that, I have discovered something life changing about myself. I absolutely have to talk problems out, say them out loud to a trusted friend, for them to end up making any semblance of sense or improvement. I have to write or talk and it is annoying and too much for the listener but as it comes out, it formulates into organization. And as quickly as I learned this truth about myself during difficult and personally painful times, I learned something far more valuable and important. Even when all the pieces come together to give me a why and see the full story, there is not one thing I can do to change it. And here is a step further, even when. I do not have the whole picture, it is because I have the wrong perspective. I am looking around at the problem. God has a bird’s eye view, He sees it’s entirety all atonce, knows how it goes. Not only that, He knows the entire story before and after as well. So He sees in past time, present time and future time all at once. And because He also loves us, He wants to and can help us. He only wants for us to stop thinking we know so much and stop being proud long enough to ask him for help. And He also knows what part of it all we should know and be given as we go in order to not feel overwhelmed or many other emotions that might invoke a deleterious response from us. He is our HeVenly Father as well as God. Just let that sink in and soak in it a little bit. Humble prayer is the bridge between Him helping us and us struggling in our crazy. It is a choice every person makes for themselves. 

Sharpening the Ax when Trees Fall

When life gets really rough, it is like trees are falling all around you suddenly and without much warning. They might even fall on a part of you. This is happening more and more, dark things, messed up times. And it is so important to get really good at sharpening your ax. I mean, you have to prepare your tools for the job of forging through and making the problems smaller to dispose of them and use them to benefit you like burning them for heat or to cook with. How do we sharpen our axes? We humbly pray and read our Bible. A lot. When we pray and read our Bibles and even memorize key verses, we are allowing our axes to be sharpened. We are preparing to cut our problems down to size with the proper means. All these problems are spiritual battles, attacks from the enemy to harm us. But God is better and bigger and loves us so He can minimize problems and use them to improve us or become good now or later for us. It is amazing what God can do. We just have to do our part.

The Value of Friendship

The type of person I am and things I have gone through, I most often have a handfull of friends. I have lots of aquaintances but only a few close friends. I have some amazing family too (all but my parents are far far away), but I want to focus my thoughts on my friendships. The reason I keep my inner circle small is because they are special in that they accept me as I am and do their best to get me and love me. I value that. Whereas I don’t really trust anyone, I trust them most. I pour myself bigtime into my few friends and love to give and help and be there and apply myself. That is a lot of energy and depth of heart that only a few people can be safely loved properly before I am spent. I don’t have enough energy (and I have a heck of a lot, truth be told) to love everyone that well and deeply, and my love for my friends is deep. I am fanatically loyal and would gladly take a bullet or throw a punch for any of them and their families. Just how God made me. Why say all this? Am I glorifying myself? No. I am saying that quality is much more important than quantity with friends. And there is this myth that says your importance is measured in how many friends you have or how many likes you have or how many people admire you. That is not it. Your importance is measured by those who know you best vouching for your good name. It is people who have seen you love and operate saying that she does it well, I feel loved. It is in people saying, you can see the love of God in her, it just pours out. That is value. That is worth being respected and known. There is not much time in this short, fast moving life to really shine your and God’s light for the world to see and be transformed by. We make a difference in those God gives us to love. We are loved in return as God’s gift back. Those who do walk away really aren’t a waste because you maybe planted a seed of God’s love in them before they went. Who knows, maybe it helped. We can’t take it personally (after the hurt wears off, that is). They have their own battles and choices and consequences. But while in your realm of care and loving, care and love the best you can at every opportunity. You do not know what tomorrow brings. Value the people God brings you. Do not take them for granted. Honor their importance to God and in your life. Give them what you can that they need. Love them deep. Love them like it is the last day you can and you have a better chance of doing it well. Remember and honor your mutual Creator and steer each other to Him. He lasts no matter what. 

The You That You Are

You are a sum of parts, mainly a combination of who God designed/created you to be mixed with every person and experience in your life you connected and interacted/participated with. This includes upbringing, parental influence, friends, bad experiences, travel, great experiences, all of it. Who you are is not an accident, it is rather a fantastic many layered cake being made with a sum of unique ingredients. You are worth much more than some treatment you have endured and so much less worthy of rewards you maybe didn’t deserve but God felt worthy enough for His Son to die for you. That last fact makes you fantastic. This fact is independent of what good or bad ingredients formed you, does not matter your shape, your color, your cleanliness or dirt. You matter because the only and most powerful God declared to the world that you do and loved you enough to adopt you as His child. You cannot change who that makes you. We can show appreciation or not, that is our choice. But just do me a favor and let it sink in that you are worth God’s Son dying for you and He adopted you as his beautiful child, heir to the throne. Rise above today, knowing who you are because of who God is. Walk worthy of your worth. You are magnificent because of God’s opinion of you which cannot be changed. No one else’s fleeting opinion of you matters at all. Always remember this, beautiful child of God.