Energizer Bunny

During the past 5-6 years when all of the unaddressed issues in my life sprung a major leak, it has been difficult to keep going.  Many times I wanted to give up.  Quit.  Every step took great effort.  Answers were few and far between.

Everyone goes through similar periods when we feel so useless...to everyone....and we would bet the farm that we will never be any good again.

This is exactly how the enemy wants us to feel.  He keeps pounding on us, stomping us, tripping us, kicking us until we are so battered and bruised that all we can do is lay down and listen to his words of failure and pain:

See, everyone knows what you are really like.
Yes, they do know what you did and they have told everyone.
No one will ever love you.
You can never be fixed.
You will always feel this way.  Always.
Don't bother trying because it won't make a difference.
Nothing will change.

These are just a few of the destructive words I heard when I felt so down, out and hopeless.  And as I have started this new food plan, it can be easy to hear some of those same taunts:

It's not enough.
It won't make a difference.
No one will ever love you.
Why bother?  Everyone knows all your mistakes anyway.

Well, let me encourage you and me again.  There is ALWAYS a way to get there.  God does not give up on us so who are others to give up on us?  Are they bigger than God?  Who are we to give up on ourselves?

Just keep taking one step at a time.  Keep breathing.  If you trip (and bust your teeth, break a foot, ruin the tendons in your hands), GET BACK UP!  It's not about the fall.  It's about the getting up and righting your circumstance.

Oh, I can't tell you it will be easy.  Most things that are worth something are NOT easy.  If it were easy, we would have more heroes in this life.  Everyone would do it.

Look, faith isn't faith when everything is rosy.  The good times are mercy and grace and faith is rarely required.  Faith is when you believe even though you cannot see the good.  We have to be like the Engergizer Bunny....take a lickin' and keep on tickin'.

There was something that God gave to me when I first got divorced and had just moved back to Oregon to live with my parents.  Everyday on my way to work, when I took the turn onto Burnside headed east, there sat Mt. Hood in all of its glory.  Beautifully white with snow and the sun coming up behind it.  I cannot even begin to tell you how gorgeous this sight is to me.

But I felt like God spoke to me and said, you know, when the mountain is covered up by gray clouds and rain, you never think that someone took the mountain away.  It never crosses your mind that, oh no, what happened to Mt. Hood?  It's gone! 

No, there is a blessed assurance that it is still there behind the clouds.  We can remember the days of sunrise and snow and we can know those days will come again.  (In Oregon, they don't come often enough during the winter but hey, we have the mountain!)

God is just like Mt. Hood.  Even when the days are gray and cloudy, HE IS THERE!  We can count on Him.

I have thought of this story often and have shared it at times when a friend was in need.  It is a wonderful reminder when we feel lost, alone, like we don't matter, that the clouds WILL part and the sun WILL shine and the mountain WILL appear again.

One more thing:  there is no storm so big or cloud so gray that the Mountain can't show His glory. 

Don't give up on the callings in your life.  You can make it.  The Mountain is there just like you knew He was when the sun shined.  Just believe and keep taking that next right step, one at a time.

Laura

ps  So my friend has joined the food plan with me and it looks like when I get this weight off I will be a health coach.  (I said when, not if!)