Mine...or His?

"Thank God for being able to see all that you have not yet been. You have had the vision, but you are not yet to the reality of it by any means.

It is when we are in the valley, where we prove whether we will be the choice ones, that most of us turn back. We are not quite prepared for the bumps and bruises that must come if we are going to be turned into the shape of the vision.

We have seen what we are not, and what God wants us to be, but are we willing to be battered into the shape of the vision to be used by God? The beatings will always come in the most common, everyday ways and through common, everyday people."

~Oswald Chambers~

So these 'common, everyday' things that have been a thorn in my side are actually the very things that God wants to use to shape my character? I will admit that rather than embracing them for what they are, I am rebuking and complaining about them.

But this week the Lord is gently nudging me back onto the path of the 'vision.' I can't honor Him with a complaining spirit. I can't glorify Him by running from the very tests meant to shape who I am in Him.

I constantly struggle with my right to myself. But how can I claim a right to myself and desire to be His? Sometimes being His is so.very.hard.

Offer yourselves to God, as those who have been brought from death to life.

Rom 6:13

Perspective

Okay, I just couldn't let the post below be the post at the forefront of my blog ;-)

Even though I've lost control - er, wait, did I ever have control? No, not really. But there are a few things I can control, like:

1) the repeated choice to eat copious amounts of junk food,

2) to let my imagination run wild,

3) to bark military-style orders at my family,

4)to shrug off my responsibilities as I do the aforementioned things in hopes our TA will come.

None of those will change a single thing concerning our TA. So I'm slapped in the face with perspective, and I have nowhere to go but the cross!

I am reminded of my devotion a few days ago from Titus 1:2 ~

God, who does not lie, promised.

The author says, "I often hear people praying for more faith, but when I listen carefully to them and get to the essence of their prayer, I realize it is not more faith they are wanting at all. What they are wanting is their faith to be changed to sight.

Faith does not say, 'I see this is good for me; therefore God must have sent it.' Instead, faith declares, 'God sent it; therefore it must be good for me.'" ~ Phillip Brooks

So I declare, God has ordained this waiting; therefore it IS good for me. How will I respond to His goodness? Where is my faith?

I have to trust without seeing and cling to the peace that surpasses all understanding...and get on with my life.

May His peace, love, mercy and grace surround you today!