Circumstances and Perspectives

I am on week four of the Unglued Online Bible study, and the first couple weeks were quite uneventful as far as facing moment where I would become unglued. I was thinking that I had this managing emotions stuff under control. Then week three happened.

It started with a sick cat and a trip to the vet on Monday…

…then it lead to a discovery of some unwelcome flea guests, of which we managed to clean up round one on Tuesday…

…then a busy and rough workday for both me and my husband, on the same exact day as our church small group on Thursday…

…then on my way home from my other small group the very next day, my check engine light came on, and the repair would not be covered under my maintenance plan at the dealership I bought it from because they are not a Mazda dealership…

…and finally, 11 p.m. on Saturday night, we had a mouse running around in our closet. Which, might I add, had piles of stuff on the floor that the mouse was able to hide in until just the right moment to run out at our feet.

Needless to say, I had reached my limit by Saturday night, and I became quite unglued when the mouse actually ran over my foot.

That is why these words in Chapter 7 stood out to me:

“…if only I were more in the habit of having a thankful heart full of praises instead of a grumbling heart consumed with circumstances.”

It’s a matter of making the habit of being thankful. Putting circumstances in God’s perspective, instead of just my own.  Praising God even if nothing seems to be going right…after all, the world is still turning, and I’m still breathing.

So last week in review with a new perspective:

I have two pets who entertain me, are companions (sometimes, anyway), and are normally healthy…fleas aren’t so fun, but we got free medication, which helps us a lot financially, and we caught them early so there weren’t that many of them…both of us have jobs and we have a great group that meets in our house every week…we both have cars, that are in good condition other than a couple minor things that need to be fixed…and finally , the mouse was tossed outside the same night, and I got a great laugh at my husband as he was chasing the mouse across our backyard yelling “go little mouse, go, go!!!”

Lysa also says, "...how powerful it is to shift from an attitude to gratitude and to praise our God in the midst of it all. When I do this, my circumstances may not instantly change, but the way I look at those circumstances certainly does.” By looking at the above circumstances with a new perspective, I believe it has opened the door to me being able to look at other circumstances with a new perspective as they come.

Today, I was allowing myself to get all worked up about a situation that hasn’t even happened yet. On my lunch break, I chose to sit and read my Bible. I looked up verses on being anxious, and 30 minutes later, I had a much better perspective and I went back to work with the reminder that I should “give all [my] worries and cares to God, for He cares about [me].” I was reminded to take each day as it comes.

God wants to take our worries. He wants to help us not be controlled by our emotions. If we waste time worrying, or being upset over something, or stuffing our emotions, we become ineffective in what God has given us to do in this very moment.