Previous Challenge Entry (Level 3 - Advanced)
Topic: Week(s) (02/10/11)
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TITLE: TGIF | Previous Challenge Entry
By Judy Lawhon
02/13/11 -
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Oh, how long that was the normal cycle of my life. Along with it came migraine headaches and stress that never went away.
Then my sister died. Suicide is a terrible thing. The reasons she chose that way to end her life were many, but much had to do with the stresses of everyday life that she was unable to handle. Her relationship with her husband was a shambles, her finances were out of control, her physical health was not good and her emotional state was obviously not capable of handling such troubles.
At one point in time she was working many, many hours per week in a situation that drained her completely. She had nothing left to help her cope with everyday life. I believe she never recovered from that experience.
And after her death, I realized I needed to take a look at my own life. While I did not have the emotional difficulties she had, were the migraines not a sign that something was wrong? Was my frantic hurrying from task to task, feeling I was just barely keeping my head above water, not a sign of something totally out of control?
One day, I picked up my Bible and just let it open. The words from John 14:1 “Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in me” jumped from the page as though they had been written only for me.
This chaotic schedule I was keeping was not at all what God had in mind. God was promising so much more than just surviving from week to week. Tears dampened the pages of the Bible as I surrendered my heart and my life one more time to Christ.
I opened myself to the possibilities He had for me. It wasn’t long after this occurrence that I saw an ad for a communications job with a local school district. Less hours, less money, less stress. When I agreed to surrender the craziness, God answered with this position.
It wasn’t an easy change. Less money meant the family looking at priorities in the budget and being willing to live on less. Not a bad thing, as it turned out. Taking a new position meant getting to know a new job, new computer skills, new people. It was scary, but in the middle of it all, I knew I was not alone. I never really had been, I was just keeping control and not giving it over to the One who was really in charge. And out of the change came a new confidence as I learned new skills, wonderful co-workers who became good friends and a more relaxed lifestyle that freed me to enjoy my family and time at home.
The weeks turned into years and before I knew it, I had been there nine years. A move necessitated a job change again, but this time it wasn’t nearly so scary and I knew I wasn’t alone. If it didn’t work out (which it didn’t), God had something even better in mind (and He did).
And now several years later as I’m enjoying retirement, I understand that God is in control. Any time I start to get nervous, I open my Bible and the words on the pages are always as though they were written just to me. Just this morning I read Matthew 6: 21, “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” My treasure is with Jesus--now, next week and forever.
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