M-O-V-E O-N: A Faith-FULL Friday Post

Six letters, two words, easy to say, hard to explain, harder to do: Move On

~Unknown

Never has there been a more true statement than the above.  In my life, there has been so much hurt..so much pain.  People I thought should love, didn’t and people I thought did love, stopped.  Through it all, I have known that God loved me.  I have been reminded so many times…With the birth of my sons…one by one I came to believe that unconditional love is truly one of the most beautiful thing there is…..finding Josh and the growth and love that he and I have experienced in the last 3 years, not to mention the 13 years before that….and the growth in ME..the healing that God has brought me to…All examples of His love for me.

I focus on these positives.  I focus on the love around me and not the love denied me.  I focus on Josh, my sons, I focus on HIM.

But what of the days when the memories come flooding back?  What of the days when the sadness feels overwhelming?  What then?

Letting go and moving on is HARD.  It’s hard to look at the life that you were denied…it’s hard to look at the life you had at one time and know that situations beyond your control caused those, who once pledged their love, to turn on you.  It’s just hard.  And it hurts.

And when that hurt shows up, sometimes there are tears and sometimes there is a gut wrenching pain that overwhelms your tummy and causes physical ailments to present themselves..but always, always there is sadness.

What then? What do you do? Do you let it go? Do you move on?

Yes.  Yes, definitely do that but also TRUST…Trust Him to continue to heal you…Trust Him to hold you….Trust Him to LOVE you. Unconditionally.  No matter how many times you disappoint him, his love will remain.  No matter how many times you mess up, his love will remain..no matter how many times you let the hurt plague you, HIS love…will…remain~

Close your eyes, clear your heart, let it go.

~unknown

Do that & turn it to Him.  When those memories come back and sadness feels overwhelming, I sometimes have to physically say, “Lord, it’s yours…remind me, remind me that YOUR LOVE IS ENOUGH…remind me Lord.”

Don’t give into the sadness.  Give it to HIM.

 And remember if you’re raising children or HOPE to have children someday, whether it be boys or girls and you’re choosing to leave the relationship & break the cycle, whether it’s the cycle of abuse (emotional, psychological, physical, sexual), the cycle of conditional love, the cycle of sadness or maybe it’s the cycle of neglect, regardless of what the cycle is and You are choosing to do things DIFFERENT and  parent the way your Abba parents you, remember this….

Someday, someone is going to thank me, for letting you go.  ~Unknown

And I would add, “even if it IS painful.”

Here's MY reason for letting go of the hurt...letting go of the pain..letting go of the anger...

In the greatest difficulties, in the heaviest trials, in the deepest poverty and necessities God has never failed me; but because I was enabled by His grace to trust in Him, He has always appeared for my help.

~George Muller

Have a Faith-FULL Friday…

~M

Good Friday~GREAT Friday

What does Good Friday mean to you? An extra day off of work? Two more shopping days for Easter basket goodies?

I went, recently, and watched the play The Thorn, which is phenomenal by the way, that starts with creation and ends with the  resurrection.  It was during the “eating of the forbidden fruit” that I had a thought….Have we changed?

When we talk about Adam and Eve and the eating of the fruit, we tend to demonize them.  We kind of spit out their names and then “tsk tsk” their actions.  I mean, they had it SO good, why would they be such idiots?

It all boils down to ONE thing….conceit.  The serpent tempted them with knowledge.  “You will know as much as God”..well, who could pass THAT up?

My only question is, have we changed that much? Are we THAT much different from Adam and Eve? Don’t we STILL want to know as much as God? Or maybe we already claim to know as much as God? or even, gasp, know MORE than God?

Do we truly TRUST Him with our lives? Or is it more “Thanks God for the blessings, but money, no no, I better man that category of my life..I’m the MAN…It’s my job to determine where the money is spent…how the money is earned.”

Or maybe it’s more, “thanks God for my children, but I’ll determine how they are raised, I mean, come on, I take them to church on Sunday, isn’t that enough. I’ll parent 6 days a week, you can have Sunday. OK?”

Or, “God I’ll do what you ask, as long as it’s what I want. If it’s not, then that CAN’T be what you’re asking of me..Desires of my heart, right?”

Maybe the following scenarios fit you…maybe they don’t…or maybe, they are you, but you’ve never actually put words to the thoughts or actions.  If they are us…than we are no different than Adam & Eve…we DO believe we know more than God. At some point in time, we have all eaten of the “forbidden fruit” of pride and conceit.  All of us have…SO…Can we admit it so He can fix it?

What better time, than on Good Friday…the day set aside to remember the sacrifice that Jesus and God made so that we could be reunified with God after that fateful choice made by Adam & Eve, what better time..to FINALLY put aside the conceit…the same conceit that caused us to be separated, the conceit in OUR hearts and FULLY live for Him.  To finally give him control of our finances, to give Him reign in our households…to FINALLY give him control of our lives and refuse to take another bite of the “fruit”.

What better day?

Good Friday….no, make it a GREAT Friday….and give Him control, not lip service…not “good intentions” or “more service” but give Him what he was beaten for…what he endured the cross for…what he walked the hill of calvary…Give Him….

YOU.

1Peter  2:24 — He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed.

1Peter 3:18 — For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God.

Genesis 3:4-5 The serpent said to the woman, “You surely will not die! ⁵ For God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, andyou will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

Isaiah 53:2-6 He grew up before him like a tender shoot, and like a root out of dry ground.  He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him.  He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering.  Like one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not.  Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted.  BUT he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.  We ALL, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.”

 

Happy GREAT Friday!

~M

Let EVERYTHING That Has Breath….

I was reminded yesterday of the beauty that surrounds us.  Created FOR us.  By our Daddy.

Yesterday, my family and I went on a road trip to the Great Sand Dunes in Colorado.  We had a blast..but it was during one of those, rare, quiet moments that I was stunned. Speechless.. I was watching the boys roll down the dunes and Liam was sitting, content, playing in the sand, when I looked up.  In front of me were the dunes, to my right was a “fourteener” (mountain whose summit is higher than 14 thousand feet) covered in snow and behind me were more mountains covered in evergreen trees.  It was breathtaking.  All I could think was “Wow, what an amazing artist you are.”

So, today, this weekend….take a moment, whether in your car, at the park, or in your house to look around you.  Even in concrete jungles, there is beauty, whether in the sky…the faces of the people bustling around you..you just may have to look a little closer to find it. But find it!  After you see the beauty that was created for us, breathe it in…breathe HIM in…and ENJOY.

Philippians 4:8
“Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy—meditate on these things

But ask the animals, and they will teach you;
the birds of the air, and they will tell you;
Ask the plants of the earth, and they will teach you;
and the fish of the sea will declare to you.
Who among all these does not know
that the hand of the Lord has done this?
In his hand is the life of every living thing
and the breath of every human being.
Job 12:7-10

Psalm 150:6 – Let EVERYTHING that has breath praise the Lord! Alleluia.

Rev. 5:13-14 – Then I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and on the sea, and all that is in them, singing: “To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be praise and honor and glory and power, for ever and ever!” The four living creatures said, “Amen,” and the elders fell down and worshiped.

Have a Faith-FULL Friday!

~M