When life gives you lemons... (Trust Part II)

Happy Wednesday, Blogland! (yes, I know that it's officially Thursday, but since I haven't gone to bed yet, it's still Wednesday to me - I know I'm not the only one...)!

I hope that the week has been kind to you all so far; here in Chicago it has been super cold since Sunday!  Not so cold that school was closed, but cold enough.  Tomorrow it is supposed to warm up, so I'm glad about that. 

Why did I choose that as the title of this post?  I'm glad you asked...

Today started off as a very trying day - overslept (was apparently exhausted last night), rushing the Teen and the Tween out the door, got the Tween to school and she had no hat or gloves (in 2 degree weather), had to search through the car for my spare pair of gloves, then I was rushing to make the train, wedged my car into a tiny space (the plowing situation has apparently given people license to take up more real estate than they are normally allowed between the little yellow lines), ran halfway 'cross the lot to catch the train that was coming in 3 minutes when I realized that I didn't have my purse with me... No purse meant no driver's license, no wallet, no train ticket!  I sighed, promptly turned around and made my way back to my car where I shimmied back into the car (don't even ask, I'm just glad there was no one with a camera around) and drove back home.  Oh yeah, forgot that my boot broke too and I was going to have to change them also.  So needless to say, I was super irritated with the Tween and with myself for forgetting my purse because I was now going to be late!

On the way to the house, I decided that I would just drive downtown because I would be really late if I waited for the next train, and the parking situation wasn't going to get better... So when I got home, I took off the broken boots, walked up the stairs to grab my purse and make myself a cup of coffee for the road.  My cup of coffee was the lemonade for my lemons, or so I thought (I rationalized that the cost of parking was half of what I was planning to spend at Dunkin Donuts, so it made perfect sense to me).

As I walked up the stairs past the front door, I saw that the front door was totally unlocked (thanks to the Teen who leaves out before us; normally I catch it when we leave but today the Tween and I went out downstairs through the garage...). I quickly locked the door, shook my head and continued to the kitchen to make my coffee.  My "trying" morning that led to me returning home was actually a blessing; it allowed me to lock the house up! (The real lemonade of the day) I don't even want to think of what could have happened otherwise - thank God I had to return home today!

Oftentimes we are irritated by life's inconveniences, stressors, tests and trials.  I am raising my hand, because I am a person who hates to be inconvenienced and these days it doesn't take long for stress to overtake me and those things can, if I'm not careful, put a damper on my entire day!  But what if we looked at those negatives in a different light?  What if we looked at them with the perspective that sometimes things that appear negative on their face are really blessings/protection in disguise?  I'm sure you've seen the emails/Facebook posts about the grumbling saint who was late for work because of car trouble and several other mishaps during his day.  During his prayer time, he grumbled to God about why He allowed all of those bad things to happen.  In response, God told him that he let him sleep longer because the death angel had come for him and his protector angel fought for him; he had car trouble because there was accident and he would have been in the middle of it; and the day went on.  Sheepishly, instead of complaining, all the man could do is say "thank you."  (I'm trying to locate it now because I'm sure I didn't do it justice here, but you get the idea).  Found it!  It's called, "Conversation with God," and here's the link if you want to read it yourself.

I repeat my grandmother all the time, "we can only see to the corner, but God can see around it."  What does that mean?  That means that although we don't know what lies ahead, He does.  And sometimes life's inconveniences are sent our way to keep us out of harm's way.  

Scripture tells us that God is our protector; He has our back!  Don't believe me?  Look here:

Isaiah 41:10  fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.

Isaiah 54:17   no weapon that is fashioned against you shall succeed, and you shall refute every tongue that rises against you in judgment. This is the heritage of the servants of the LORD and their vindication from me, declares the LORD.”

Psalm 46:1  God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.

Psalm 91:1-3   He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty.  I will say to the LORD, “My refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.”  For he will deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the deadly pestilence.

Psalm 121:7-8   The LORD will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life. 8 The LORD will keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forevermore.

2Timothy 4:18 The Lord will rescue me from every evil deed and bring me safely into his heavenly kingdom. To him be the glory forever and ever. Amen.

Sometimes we have to learn to thank God for what He didn't give us:  that job you just had to have and were disappointed that you didn't get, only to learn that the whole department got laid off 6 months later - Thank you God!  That event you were dying to go to and you just couldn't get the timing together, only to learn that something bad happened there and you were the only person not involved - Thank you God! Everyone can come up tons of examples, but you get the picture.  I told you all a few months ago about how I lost some "friends" and it was a hard situation to deal with at the time and I kinda missed my phone ringing.  But you know what?  When I look back on what those conversations sometimes consisted of (nothing positive, complaining and folks always looking for an "amen corner" to their self-righteous mess), I thank God that they don't call me any more - I don't have time for that mess, and there is the added benefit that now my name can't be put in the middle of mess because I am not on the call list...!

What am I saying - that you should never get irritated when negative things come your way? Absolutely not, because that would make me the QUEEN of the hypocrites!  But what I am saying is that after your blood pressure has gotten you up to 29 (some of y'all are gonna miss that one), just stop and say, "Lord, I don't know why this happened, but I thank you for protecting me from things seen and unseen today."  We have no idea of the many obstacles that come in our path but are blocked by the angels that God has protecting each and every one of us.  Reminds me of a song, "God Blocked It" by Kurt Carr, you can listen to it here. 
Found a picture that sums it all up:

Scripture says that "we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places."  Ephesians 6:12  I thank God for the angels that protect me and mine daily; I don't know, nor do I want to know, all of the things that did not happen!  Yeah, I may have gotten hit with a few pebbles, but... 

This is truly not what I intended to write about today, but talking about my morning allowed for our conversation to go in this direction. But, I still get to bring it back to my intended topic for the day- Trust.  Yep.  We have to learn to trust God no matter what is going on in our world.  I thought I wouldn't be able to work in a nugget from Pastor Singleton's sermon (1/3/2016), but here we go:

- He promised to be with us, no matter what the future holds; God's got "this" even when you don't know what "this" is yet!

I'm just going to let that sit right there... 

So my Darvism for the day?  We have to learn to trust His plan, even when it looks like bad things are happening to us from our limited perspective and know that He has our back, no matter what.  And make lemonade with those lemons!

Anyone else ever have a morning like mine?  You know the drill, Holla @ Darvi and let's talk about it!  Be blessed and stay warm!

xoxoxo