This Life

I wish that I could say that it is no secret that I have been struggling lately.  And to some, maybe it has been.  However, my absence on blogging and social media point straight to my current plight.  I’ve leaned on a few friends and asked for a lot of prayer.

It’s been hard.  I can’t deny that.  I’m sure it is some form of pride that has caused me to shrink and not admit it.  But there it is.  There’s no way around it.  Life is hard.  No matter how much you have or how little you have.  It doesn’t matter if you are single, married, or dating, if you have no children, one child, or an entire herd.  Life is messy and complicated and difficult.

Now, to be sure, there are times when we bring the mess on ourselves and there are times when it is just out of our control.  So, what then?  If life is hard, then what do we do about it? 

I’m not sure I’m qualified to answer and I don’t know that there is a one size fits all answer.  Each mess is different.  No, I think that the key in any situation, in any mess, is your perspective.  Since we know that there will be messes and that life is hard, we just have to worry about how we are going to look at the mess.

For my recent situation, I have let the mess consume me.  I have treated the mess as if it was in control instead of realizing who actually was in control (answer: God).  I have wallowed in the mess, which is easy to do.  I lost sight of the fact that I live in a big world with lots of messes and lots of lives.  I spent almost one whole day on the couch crying about my mess (how selfish is that?).

Honestly, my mess is pretty bad.  It is easy to let it take over.  But that’s not what I’m called to do.  I’m not called to wallow.  Paul Tripp once said, “Sin reduces the size of your life, to the size of your life.” (What Did You Expect?) And, boy, did I let myself get there.  There was nothing outside of me.  I spent most of my day thinking about my situation, my mess, my problems.

Then  there was that day, the one spent on the couch crying.  I felt a little tug to text a friend.  In my despair, I almost dismissed it.  But I didn’t.  I texted her and let her know that I was thinking of her and that I missed her the previous night at church.  That reminded me that another friend wasn’t at church so I texted her.  Before long, I was in text conversations with both women.  One was committing to pray for me and what I was going through.  The other was sharing that she was going through a mess of her own.

It wasn’t long before I was no longer crying but praying for my friend and her mess and praising for the friend who had offered to share my burden (even though she didn’t really even know what it was).  That perspective shift was what I needed at that moment to remind me that I wasn’t the only one in a mess and that I wasn’t alone to take care of my mess.

When we are dealing with these complicated issue of life (and they are!), we have to be attentive, too.  We can’t allow the mess to close us off and isolate ourselves.  There are those out there that are willing to share your burden and there are those who may need you to share theirs.  Even if you are in a mess, you can still pray for those around you.

Prayer and perspective.  They kind of go hand in hand at times, don’t they?  We can’t stop praying.  And when the time seems hopeless, we have to remember to pray for that perspective.  For God to show us that He is sovereign and no matter how messy our situation might be, He is good and He’s got this.