“He has besieged me and surrounded me with bitterness and hardship.” Lamentations 3:4-6
It is not easy to live with hardship and to suffer enduring pain. We can lose ourselves in the hardships that come into our lives. Not long ago I was talking to someone who told me about a member of his family that was so caught up in a disappointing event that the person had a mental breakdown over it.
We can let our hardships become so all-encompassing that it is difficult to see beyond them. Even single events in our lives can swallow up the good things that God would have us focus upon instead.
If we were to balance everything out on a scale, the good things, the undeserved blessings, the wonderful events in our lives, they would far outweigh the bad experiences that have come our way. I do not make light of hardship. But wrong thinking, and obsessive thoughts about only the bad circumstances in life can swallow up the many blessings around us.
We need the Lord to keep us off of the dark path of pessimism. We may not always be cheerful and feel uplifted, we may even struggle continually with depression, yet there is reason for hope as Christians. The pathway may be dark on occasion, and the hardships may seem overwhelming, but the end result is glory and paradise with our Lord. And on earth fellowship with our Savior and those who are His children.
Don’t let pessimistic thinking and focusing upon hardships rob you of the many wonderful blessings God has brought into your life. Focus instead upon the Lord’s blessings and place our disappointments in their proper context. Both hardship and blessings are ours in this life.
You may feel weighed down by disappointment and hardships, but if you will start adding up the blessings God has given you throughout your life it will help you to gain perspective.
Prayer: Dear Lord, help us to see the entire picture of our lives, and to place hardship and disappointment within a context that also includes the many blessings You have given us.
Thanks Karlton! I really needed to read this to regain some perspective while I go through a tough "crash." I had a tiny medical procedure over a week ago that wouldn't even cause a blink of an eye for a moment to a "normal healthy" person, but...! Sooooo many blessings in my life to focus on instead.... praise God! LOTSoluv Kerryn
ReplyDeleteKerryn, I hope you are feeling better! Glad to hear the devotion was helpful to you.
ReplyDeleteSometimes it takes an effort to remember and count our blessings, negativity is easy to come by.
God Bless You my Sister in the Faith!
Karlton