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Are your Expectations Ruining your Life?
Expectations are sneaky buggers. They are often so engrained into our ideas of normal that we forget we have them at all. We have all these cultural expectations that we don’t even question. For example, think about the 4th of July. Most Americans immediately picture patriotic picnics and hotdogs on the grill. If our day looks different, we can feel a little let down. And when these ingrained expectations aren’t met, we can experience real costs in our lives. I sometimes don’t even realize I had expectations until I find myself disappointed. And then I’m upset, angry, sad, etc. because I set myself up for failure. My expectations were ruining…
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Rejected Rock or Cornerstone
Do you ever feel rejected? I have been really struggling with rejection the past few weeks: gossip, slander, unkind messages, ignored phone calls. Praying and working through this issue, I’ve realized feeling rejected has colored on the canvas of my entire life (but I’m in good company). I remember being happy and confident as a child. Then the first day of kindergarten, I somehow didn’t fit. I was called cruel names. No one asked me to play during recess. A cruel boy ruined my new ‘cowboy’ boots in second grade when I left them in the coat room. I was rejected and bullied mercilessly throughout elementary and middle school. Sophomore…
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Just Another Day – Waiting with Hope
Waiting with hope for answers to prayer can be the toughest challenge of our lives. We wait not knowing what the answer will be or when it will come. We try to have faith in the waiting. But what does the day before your miracle look like? Just another day. After a long cold winter, maybe I’m just ready for some sunshine, but I have found that I’m usually seeking HOPE when I come to this special day on the calendar. My verse of the day was this sweet promise in my devotional this morning. This verse was so encouraging in my present circumstances, praying for my own healing and…
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Its Own Way: Having 1 Cor. 13 Love in my marriage
Sunday, my husband and I decided to cook spaghetti together. We had different ideas about making the sauce. Tomato sauce is one of the few things that I have worked to perfect, so I started to fight for my way. What should have been a simple discussion about which step should go first, started to be about who was a better chef, smarter, and generally the most rightest person in all the universe. I silently prayed for the right heart in that moment, and adjusted my attitude before it became a fight. Yet, I should have stopped before I started. The next day, God pointed me right to what He…
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50 Shades of Green Valentine’s Day
Do you picture a 50 Shades kind of Valentine’s Day? Are you doing Valentine’s Day wrong? I was for years and didn’t realize it until recently. The gift that made me realize just how much I’ve changed wasn’t really for me and involved new socks. And real love isn’t 50 shades of grey; it’s one shade of dark green, trust me. This year my husband has to work late, may not even make it home for dinner, and will probably barely drag himself through the house and to bed after the week he’s had, and I’m okay with that. In fact, when my husband “warned” me he has to work…
