Praising God in the midst of hard things.
Finding joy and peace in the midst of suffering.
Seeing blessings in the challenges.
… all easier said than done!
In 2020, my husband joined the Roman Catholic Church. I thought he would come out quickly once he learned more about it – he’s smart, he loves the Lord – so I didn’t speak up very much. Plus, COVID was just starting and I had little kids at home, so there was a lot to process.
When I realized he was extremely committed to his conversion, it really knocked me off my feet. I felt abandoned, angry – an emotion I had never really had to navigate – and stressed at the impacts (and perceived potential impacts) on our family and our marriage.
Honestly, there were a lot of dark moments – deep discouragement and even despair. It still gets to me sometimes – less frequently now, but there are still Sundays were I find myself on the verge of tears even if my husband has come with me (… but not really with me). I’m learning to see these emotions as companions on my journey now, as uncomfortable as I am with them being a part of me. I’ve always been the steady, reserved, got-it-together friend and partner, and I seemed to be helplessly leaking out my discouragement and processing and wounds in every conversation with friends, my emotional energy tanks continually depleted.
I share all this because I know I’m not alone in this. I suspect we’ve all had our time in the valley. And sometimes just when we think we’re out of the valley and on cruise control, we find ourselves back in it.
But God meets us there, doesn’t He? Even though my brain was scrambling – still scrambling – to figure it all out, and what’s God’s plan here, and whyyyy – He has whispered at various points, “wait on Me.”
To be honest, I still don’t know entirely what that looks like, the waiting. What does it look like to fight for Truth? How do I love and encourage my husband when I feel spiritually abandoned and separated from him – in this area of core identity for me? How on earth do I disciple our kids without undermining his authority, being controlling, or letting bitterness take hold?
I still have a lot of questions.
A friend asked me to share some of my journey at a women’s Bible study, and I came up with 5 things that have helped pull me out of emotional quicksand (and I still get stuck there and have to fight to get out of it). Here they are:
1. Walk in victory before the victory
If God turns this around – WHEN He turns this around – I want to look back and confidently say that I trusted Him, that I faithfully loved and prayed for my husband, that I ended up getting through this with at least some measure of grace (…still working on that).
“If God turned this around tomorrow, would I be proud of the way I got through this?”
- Would I get a “well done” or did I get through by pure avoidance and the occasional pouting?
- Did I learn the lessons I was meant to learn?
- Did I let God purify me?
So taking these questions and visualizing myself walking in the way I wanted to walk if I were looking back on this journey once it was complete. Walking in victory before the victory.
2. Open the the Bible.
Just go to it. Consistently. Desperately. Open the Bible and let God take you on an adventure. As my knowledge of Scripture deepened in this process, it was amazing and incredible how the Holy Spirit would bring to mind Scripture after Scripture and lead me through the Bible. Rabbis call this “stringing pearls” – such an incredible thing to experience and trust when it happens.
Opening an actual Bible has been key to letting the Holy Spirit work. I’m not great with remembering references, so I’ll admit to keeping my phone handy so I can Google snippets of verses and then page through my Bible to find them. The Word of God is truly living and active!
3. Don’t get fixated.
Don’t get fixated on the hard thing – fix your eyes on Jesus, the author and perfector of our faith. And know this: you have heaven cheering you on. C’MON!
Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinners, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.
Hebrews 12:1-5
In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. And have you completely forgotten this word of encouragement that addresses you as a father addresses his son? It says,
“My son, do not make light of the Lord’s discipline,
and do not lose heart when he rebukes you,
because the Lord disciplines the one he loves,
and he chastens everyone he accepts as his son.”
Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as his children. For what children are not disciplined by their father? If you are not disciplined—and everyone undergoes discipline—then you are not legitimate, not true sons and daughters at all. Moreover, we have all had human fathers who disciplined us and we respected them for it. How much more should we submit to the Father of spirits and live! They disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, in order that we may share in his holiness. No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.
Therefore, strengthen your feeble arms and weak knees. “Make level paths for your feet,” so that the lame may not be disabled, but rather healed.
Make every effort to live in peace with everyone and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord. See to it that no one falls short of the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many.
Speaking of our faith and the great value of it:
Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade. This inheritance is kept in heaven for you, who through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.
I Peter 1:3-7
That last verse there is I think the whole point. In the end, the victory isn’t ours. All glory goes to God. HOW we get through the stories God gives us matters, because it reflects on Him. In my story, my husband won’t be restored because I put together a brilliant theological argument – even if I have a few in my back pocket now. 🙂 It will be God’s doing and I have to relinquish my desire to control the outcome. The credit – the glory – will be all God’s.
Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.
Philippians 3:12-4:1
All of us, then, who are mature should take such a view of things. And if on some point you think differently, that too God will make clear to you. Only let us live up to what we have already attained.
Join together in following my example, brothers and sisters, and just as you have us as a model, keep your eyes on those who live as we do. For, as I have often told you before and now tell you again even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is set on earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body.
Therefore, my brothers and sisters, you whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, stand firm in the Lord in this way, dear friends!
God is still writing our stories. He’s not finished with any of us (least of all me!) When we lift our eyes from our challenges to fix them on Jesus, it can help us remember this.
4. Refuse to be alone
We need each other! God gave us each other! We get to share our journeys. We need to see each other standing firm and reflecting God’s glory… and sometimes we need someone to prop us up along the way. Refuse to be alone.
5. Hope is the antidote
This quote (credit: Matthew Crow) gets me every time:
People speak of hope as if it’s this delicate, ephemeral thing made of whispers and spider webs. It’s not. Hope has dirt on her face, blood on her knuckles, the grit of cobblestones in her hair, and just spat out a tooth as she rises for another go.
There’s a reason we are called to hope, and it’s not just for our mental health. Hope is what we shine forth in the world, especially when our circumstances should dictate discouragement. I Peter 3:15 says:
Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have.
I Peter 3:15
“…to give the reason for the hope…” – this tells me our hope should be THAT evident that people would ask us about it. Even if hope looks messier than what we want it to.
It’s easy to get stuck thinking that as Believers we have to have it all figured out and our perfection is what projects God well to the world… but the more I learn, the more I have to accept that this isn’t the case.
And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.
Romans 5:5
…but those who hope in the Lord
Isaiah 40:31
will renew their strength.
But the eyes of the Lord are on those who fear him,
Psalm 33:18-19
on those whose hope is in his unfailing love,
to deliver them from death
and keep them alive in famine.
(I suspect David was really good at walking in victory before the victory. )
So, to wrap this up…
- Walk in victory before the victory
- Keep your Bible open and ask the Holy Spirit bring it to life
- Lift your eyes
- Refuse to be alone
- Our hope is our witness
I’ll close with this little snippet from Cleere Cherry Reaves:
“You are sitting in the middle of God’s goodness. Even when you don’t see it, even when you can’t feel it, even when things don’t go as planned, or life feels heavy, His goodness is the undercurrent of every moment. His kindness includes the allowance of the hard, because how else would you activate trust, build intimacy, and cultivate resilience? His goodness has always helped you and it will continue to protect you. When you realize His grace owes you nothing and is responsible for everything good, you will find fortitude for this place, too.”
May we grow in trust of the good, good, Father.
Can I pray over you who have read this far?
Our Father in Heaven, holy, holy, holy is Your name. What a gift to share this moment with the one reading this today. Lord, you know their story so intimately. I want to boldly speak for all of us in saying that we trust You with the outcomes. I speak that truth over every journey here. May each one get a fresh look at Your kindness and gentleness and deep, deep love this week and beyond. We ask for the courage and clarity to share the stories You’re writing in us in such a way as to give You glory that the world would see Your power at work in us. Let us believe in miracles again! Would Your Word come even more alive to us as we continue along our journeys, and may we be equipped to speak life and encouragement and steadfastness to one another because of it. We can’t wait to see what You will do. We love You and we trust You. May it be. Amen!
One Response
I can relate so much to the feeling of walking through tough emotional waters, especially when faith challenges arise unexpectedly. It’s encouraging to hear how you’re leaning into those hard emotions and allowing them to shape you rather than break you.