Where God's Word Meets Our Mess
Louis saw God as the source of his suffering in the prison camps and wanted nothing to do with Him. When the PTSD became too difficult to handle, he drank alcohol. But it led him to his downfall. He was only able to see his circumstances clearly when he turned to Christ and trusted Him for salvation. He realized that God did not cause his pain but allowed it so that Louis could come to know Him.
To be brutally honest, this summer wasn’t easy for me. It was a rollercoaster of anxiety, happiness, fear, discouragement, excitement, frustration, eagerness, and doubt. But I’m still here. I survived Summer 2018. And I learned a few life-changing lessons along the way:
I felt a twinge of jealousy crawling up my spine as I stared at the words on my computer screen. I couldn’t believe what I was reading. A friend of mine had just received her very first book contract. Why hadn’t I received a book contract? I just couldn’t figure out what I was missing. Was I not doing enough? Was it simply not the right time for me to be a published author? Would it ever be the right time? How many articles and blog posts did I have to write until it was the right time? And then I began to realize the truth of the matter.
No one and nothing is like our God. He wants us to know Him, love Him, and worship Him only. But we can’t do that if we’re worshipping eight different idols—or even one.
Church…blah, blah, blah. Bible study…blah, blah, blah. Prayer…blah, blah, blah. Worship…blah, blah, blah. Quiet time…blah, blah, blah. Do you ever feel like you’re living a blah spiritual life? I definitely do. I’ve been a Christian since I was a little girl, so I’ve learned how I should act and what I should do as a Christian. But sometimes I feel tired of doing the "right" things.
My sins dug nails into His hands and feet. My sins thrust a crown of sharp thorns onto His head. My sins hung Him on a splintering wooden cross so that the world could watch His pain and mock Him relentlessly. My sins cast Him into utter darkness—a world full of loneliness, shame, misery, gloom, frustration, rage, anguish, sorrow, despair, rejection, and pain. Why would the King of Light dwell in the world of darkness?
People can be cruel, and Satan is always cruel to us. But when we call upon God, when we lean upon Him, and when we trust in Him, He will rescue us from the deepest waters.
Have you ever prayed and felt like God didn’t listen to your whole prayer? I have. I have received totally different answers than the ones I prayed for and I have wondered if God didn’t listen to my whole prayer. But you know what? I think we feel this way sometimes because we have some misconceptions about prayer. Sometimes we can get so focused on how we think answers to our prayer should be, that we forget who God is.
I’ve known several homeschoolers who feared that public-schoolers thought they were weird or awkward. I’ve even experienced that fear, and you might, too! I want to address the fears of typical homeschoolers so that we can own up to our homeschooled-ness and not be ashamed of it!
Tizzie's Tidbits of Truth 