It doesn’t look like I thought it would. Does yours?
Life.
It has a strange way of completely turning and taking you down paths you would never choose for yourself. Like the death of a child–or a spouse, or someone else you never thought you’d have to learn how to live without; the diagnosis from your doctor you’ve always heard of but wasn’t ever supposed to hear yourself; the papers from the lawyer that knock the wind out of you.
“They” say life is about choices. And I suppose it is. It isn’t like I really disagree, but sometimes I wonder, “Who the heck is “they” and what do they really know?” Because even if life is about choices, sometimes those choices are limited by circumstances.
But I guess that’s the point. When limited by circumstances, we still have choices. Even if it’s simply to choose to not give up.
Simply?
Seems to me, that is a pretty huge choice.
In the seasons that never seem to end, where you are taking hit after hit after hit until you don’t think you could possibly ever take one more without completely being crushed and bleeding on the floor, to “simply” choose to not give up is HUGE! To remember, even if you can’t quite believe it in that moment, that this season won’t last forever—every season eventually has an end, and to trust that another day will come, and with it will come sunshine, is a powerful choice to make.
To look around you at all that is wrong, and painful, and overwhelming; to acknowledge and feel it, yet see beyond—even when you can’t really see beyond yet, is to choose trust.
Trust.
What exactly is trust?
According to dictionary.com it is “confident expectation of something, hope”.
So, can we really choose to trust? Is trust really a choice?
I think it is. But I’m also learning something important about that choice. It matters what or who you choose to trust in.
Personally, I and my family have been in a real season of testing. The last few months have been brutal and there have been more than one occasion where I have felt I have reached the end of my rope and can’t take one more thing. And then one more thing hits.
I’ve cried. I’ve screamed. I’ve pleaded with God. And nothing has changed—or so it appeared. Recently, however, I have realized, my circumstances may not have changed—but I have. Inwardly I have changed. I’ve let go of old beliefs that were never meant to define me. I’ve released anger, judgement, fear and deeper levels of grief. I’m emerging from this season a different person than I went in, and as hard and intense as the season has been, and as much as I would have preferred not to have gone through it, I like who I am becoming. Or is it really becoming? Perhaps it’s discovering underneath all that I let go, the real me I was intended to be when God first created me.
So I’ve come to the conclusion; trust is a choice. But it is vitally important Who that trust is placed in, because that will make all the difference in the world as to who we become (or unbecome) in these seasons. And only when our trust is placed in Someone bigger than our circumstances will we make it through battle weary but stronger than when we went in.
Choice is power. What, or Who are you choosing to trust in?
In case you are needing a bit of encouragement today here is my current favourite song. If you are battle weary too, pause, close your eyes, breathe and listen. I pray you will find some sort of relief and release as you do.
Love and Hugs