He Holds My Hand

He Holds My Hand

If your week looks anything like mine, you are running a little ragged. Yours might feel better or worse, but regardless there are so many days that I wake up telling God how I don’t have what I need for today at all. I don’t know how to do it. I can’t possibly have the strength or time to do it. I don’t even want to do it.

Sometimes the way ahead feels completely impossible. The mountain in front of you looks insurmountable. The feelings around you threaten to drown you, and you are convinced that there is no other way but to live in anxiety and constant hypervigilance.

I will tell you what God has been telling me. Not because I understand it completely, but because it is most comforting when you are facing a life that seems impossible.

Love Does Not Shame

Love Does Not Shame

Out of the blue the other day, my 8-year-old daughter piped up from the back seat of the car and said she was really upset that someone in a movie had said, “You should be ashamed of yourself.” I don’t even remember the movie or what it was in reference to, but I thought it was an interesting observation, especially from a younger child. Shame always brings a chaotic mess of discouragement, depression and despair.

Shame is usually defined as something along the lines of a bad feeling of humiliation or distress caused by the belief that behavior was wrong, or that the wrong done was because of the person being intrinsically bad or unworthy. It encompasses a lot of the mess we carry around with ourselves after we have either done something stupid, or feel that we have.

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Weakness is a Gift

Weakness is a Gift

I write and talk about weakness quite a lot, probably because I’m a fairly independent woman who doesn’t like to admit any lack. God is faithful to teach me a lot about it because I don’t want to learn! Generally, when I feel weak, I either try to cover it up and make it look fine, or I run away from whatever it is and decide I can’t do it. Interestingly enough, that is not what God asks us to do with weakness.

I am beginning to see that places of weakness or inability are actually gifts. I know, it sounds strange, right? But these places are where we most find and see the power of Jesus within. It’s sort of like a very thin spot in a piece of fabric—it has been worn to more fully show what is beneath it. I generally throw away clothes that get that level of holes in them, but what God says is to invite Him to show through all the cracks and holes of our lives.

When I see the spots where my patience is wearing thin, or I have no compassion left for someone, or I am just too weary to handle one more burden, this is where I can most experience God’s power because I’m not trying to do something for Him. I have begun to anticipate these times with joy, because after I get done with pondering my self-help plan for making myself stronger, I can then instead turn to God spiritually and ask Him for help. He never turns me down! He’s been waiting this whole time for my request.

Walking with the broken to find hope in Jesus