I Am My Problem

I’ve realized in the last few days that I am my own problem.

I love to learn and I love to explore and do new things but I have to admit that as of late the only thing I want to do it’s just curl up at home with a nice cup of tea and a good book.

 
We just spent a week in St Louis for our kids Nationals Bible quiz tournament and it was so hot there! And I was so sick while we were there. And well I wish I could say I was graceful even in my suffering I just wasn’t.

 

 

While we were away from home though even as I complained and wine my way through the week I noticed fangs I hadn’t noticed before. About myself and my husband. About our children. I noticed things that made me stop and really seek the Lord for our hearts.
I used to love to travel. Once I had the idea to go somewhere there was no doubt but that was where I was headed. I would hop into my Chevrolet tracker and drive to Indiana or down to Chicago. Now going to the grocery store only minutes away is a dreaded thing.

 

 

I listen to my oldest son talk and sometimes I hear my anxieties and my obsessive need for perfection in him. He can do amazing things like winning two games at the Nationals Bible quiz competition last week and yet he can walk away from it telling himself that he failed. He gets that from his mom.

 

Now and then when he’s struggling with something I will hear him talk about how he is cursed. I often hear my husband say that. A generational curse on his family.

 

 

Maybe those things are true and maybe they are not but what does it matter when it’s still just stinky thinking. What kind of talk is that coming from a child of the one true king?

The Bible tells us to think on those things that are good and true. Those things that are lovely and righteous and holy and Noble. These are the things that we need to thank God. Those things that matter to the Lord.

 

Instead we allow toxic things into our mind and then we wonder why….

 

Someone complimented me some time ago about the lovely family I had. As we were talking I learned that she was not married and had no children but desperately wanted them both. Without thinking I jokingly said you can have mine. Maybe there was a little truth there at the time I said it.

While the truth is that I never wanted children or a husband it doesn’t change the fact that my ways are not the Lord’s ways and he has blessed me with more than I ever knew I needed in my family.

 
I remind myself when there’s something that I feel I really need and I just can’t seem to obtain that whatever I need and do not have cannot be as important as I think it is.

It’s so easy when things aren’t going well. When our plan doesn’t match up with reality. We forget our children really are blessings. When my husband is frustrated about something and having a fit it’s easy to forget that he is a blessing.

 

I remind myself daily that I am blessed and I am chosen and that God is in control. Yet some days I still panic because what I imagined in my head isn’t quite what happens.

 

I was listening to the pineapple story the other day. A friend posted it and I remember hearing it long ago. But it’s always a wonderful reminder because it’s so true but we could all be such a perfect missionaries if it wasn’t for those people.
I could be a happier mom if only…. I would be a better wife if I had a better husband. You get the point?

I am my problem. Something goes wrong and a thought gets in my head. If we aren’t being wise we allow that thought to stay. What we are to do is turn that thought away in Jesus name and replace it with God’s goodness.

 

It’s not my husband and it’s not my children. It’s not the woman at the store or the driver in front of me. It’s me.  It’s me forgetting who I am and whose I am. Getting caught up in things that just don’t matter and taking my eyes off of the only one that does matter.

 

We must be careful what are icy and what are ear is here but we must also be careful what we allow ourselves to think. Let us guard our hearts and our minds. Let us give them to the only one who can truly fill them with that which is good.