I was having my quiet time and studying the Word and God took me directly to 1 Chronicles. The word that stands out to me the most is "joy". Once again I am back to that word. After my study time I realized that God is pushing me in a way to feel exuberant joy. Real joy! Not one that comes and goes, but joy that stays with me every single day of the rest of my life. I want people to be around me and realize that my walk with God is not just about working hard and waiting for the next "thing" but laughing all the way through it.
I've been watching people around me lately. I see both. The joy and the sadness. I see people getting engaged and planning their weddings and they are so excited. I see the expectant parents waiting for the birth of their next child. I hear the excitement and joy in their voices. And I look back at my life and can't recognize any of that anywhere. I got married when I was 17. Not because I was so madly in love and couldn't wait to spend the rest of my life with this guy, but that I wanted an excuse to get out of my house. He was a guy that was physically abusive and I knew that prior to getting married. On our honeymoon, he beat the crap out of me on a cruise ship and he ended up with scratches on his face. How joyful is that?
When I was pregnant with my two oldest sons, I was consumed about gaining weight. I was in the middle of an eating disorder battle and that was more important than the living baby inside of me. Once I had the babies, I was on my own. I can remember waiting for my husband to pick me up at the hospital to take us home and he called asking that I talk to the doctor to see if he could pick me up early because he was in harvest and had to get parts. Our joy of a new child was put to the side and we were resigned to being convenient on a parts run.
So having real joy in my life is so foreign to me. I remember a particular job I had and I would laugh constantly. It was great to have that every day. Since I've been home, I'm trying to find the laughter here. It's my own fault that I don't find it. I isolate myself from others. I don't really understand why I do that. I always thought it was because I didn't want to get hurt. But I realized this morning it is because I feel like I'm going to fail. I have put myself in such a position of being "responsible" that I've lost out on just letting go and being free in life. I can remember that whenever my Dad would help me out when I was a single mom, he would send me money in the mail and write a note saying that he was helping me out but in return I needed to call him more. I needed to be there for him more.
I didn't realize that I had associated people helping me with something attached in return till yesterday. I was praying about the words "falling from grace" and God showed me many things about how I view the world according to people in my past. Mostly my Dad. Now I have healed in so many areas with my relationship with my Dad. But the one thing that haunts me still to this day is that I had tried so hard to make amends with my Dad. I knew that as a Christian I needed to honor and respect him regardless of our past. I felt the need even more once my Mom died. She made me promise her right before she died that I would take care of Dad and not be too hard on him. He called me one day and we had the typical conversation and I was praying quietly the entire time to keep from getting angry. And he made a remark and I instantly lost it and spouted something back and then hung up. A week later he was dead. He died of a heart attack. That was the last words I spoke to him.
So here I am a very serious woman. I analyze things I say to people making sure that I was appropriate and didn't hurt them. I don't ever want to leave something negative in the air. And what this is doing is robbing my joy.
It's time to shed the old skin of oppression. God never intended for me to wear it so long. It's robbing my joy. I don't know what that looks like, but I know I will find it very soon. I am helping children 1 night a week. Talk about finding joy and laughter. It's just what the doctor ordered. Or should I say the great physician himself. I pray that you will find your true joy. Not the joy that just shows up every now and again but the joy that is deep down. And if it doesn't come naturally, I pray that you will allow God to show you what old skin you need to shed.
As I was journaling this morning, this song played on the radio. It's been a song that God plays for me so that I know He is still there. I hope you can find some comfort in it today as well. Click
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